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“Okay.” Erix walked away slowly.

Did he expect for me to call out and change my mind? Perhaps he did know me well, because the urge to do it was on the tip of my tongue. Instead, I forced my lips shut and watched my guard enter his room and close the door.

I stood like that for a while. Focused on his door, listening to the sounds of shuffling inside quickly quieten. Then I turned my attention to the corridor. I could see the junction of conjoining hallways at the end, and the winged guard who walked up and down it. I waited, counting the seconds between his pacing. It took seventy-four seconds for him to complete his walk and return.

A lot could happen in seventy-four seconds.

I slunk back into my room, soundlessly closing the door behind me. Scanning the modest room, I saw there was nothing but a trunk of clothes, a four-poster bed, a low table set up with food and water and an even smaller bathing chamber.

I set my mind to the task at hand – finding Rafaela. And for that, I needed some help. Erix wasn’t the only one to send letters ahead of our arrival. All of mine had previously been addressed to the woman I required to see, but the last one I’d sent was addressed to someone else.

Crossing the room, I laid my hand upon the glass of the window.

The winter storm inside of me enjoyed the excuse for release. It rushed up through me with ease, spreading ice across the glass and the wall surrounding it. I didn’t stop until icicles hung beyond the window, like the jagged teeth of a monster’s jaw.

Then, I did the one thing I’d become good at doing.

I waited.

I took a seat on the edge of my bed, noticing for the first time just how tired I was as I felt the plush bedding beneath me. But sleep had to wait. There was more than one reunion I prepared for in Lockinge.

Minutes stretched out until I caught the slight tap beyond my closed door. I stood quickly, crossed the space and opened it to reveal the face of a ghost. It was half covered by a mask, obscuring the knowing grin she, no doubt, had plastered across her mouth.

“Robin Icethorn,” the hooded woman sang my name in greeting, voice muffled by the material across her lower face. She lifted painted nails, pinched the mask and tugged it over her face. Not that I needed to see her to know who she was.

I smiled, beckoning the assassin inside. “Hello, Seraphine.”

CHAPTER 8

Just as the namesake of the group of assassins suggested, the Asps were as slippery as a snake. And Seraphine being the queen of that nest, she could get past anything – even death itself.

The world believed she’d died – buried beneath Imeria Castle during the Draeic attack. However, I’d discovered the truth when I arrived back to the ruins of Imeria.

Seraphine survived and was very much alive, a secret I’d since kept for her in trade for the secret she was forced to keep for me.

And here she stood, alive and well, no different to when I found her all those weeks ago. I thought she was a ghost haunting the ruins of Imeria castle when I arrived with a delirious Duncan before Duwar had truly taken hold of his body. That was until she explained that she’d escaped before the castle came down. The rest of her fellow Asps were not so lucky.

Duncan knew that Seraphine was alive, but that was it. And I’d promised to keep her secret, because she kept mine.

Something happened that day, between Duncan, Duwar and Seraphine. A tale I could barely think about without my skin crawling. And yet, every time I looked at the ropes of vines and flowers that now adorned the walls of my ruined castle, I always thought of Seraphine: she’d been there to witness Duncan do it, as well as other things…

“You look like shit, Robin.” Seraphine watched me from her seat on the plush reading chair. She leaned forwards, legs spread, resting elbows on her knees.

“I feel like shit,” I replied, fisting my hands so she didn’t see the stumps that were once nails. “How have you been?”

It was the type of question friends asked after a long period of time apart, and yet I still wasn’t sure that I could call Seraphine a friend.

“Coping,” she answered, plainly. “Which is as much as you could expect, you know, considering…”

“Considering I’m harbouring a world-ending threat?”

She raised her eyes up to me, the rich colour scoring through my skin. “Yes, something like that.”

I hadn’t told Seraphine by choice. What had happened between Duncan and me, when we returned to Imeria, was something no one could ignore. If Seraphine hadn’t revealed herself in the chaos, I might not have been alive to this day to even have this conversation. But I wasn’t ready to talk about that yet, and nor was she.

“I admit that I’m surprised you came to Lockinge,” Seraphine said, kindly drawing the conversation away from the secrets we both hid. “When I received your letter, I almost couldn’t believe it but here you are… standing out like a wilted rose amongst thorns.”

“Did you think I was going to bring Duncan with me?”