Page 31

It’s a strange way to feel, like I’m so unwanted by the one I love that I search for him in every shadow of the long, dark corridors whenever I go for a wander, or that I look up at anyone who enters the dining hall only to deflate in my chair as in-steps Rune or Dare or Eamon or Melantha—anyone but Daxeel.

He warned me that he wouldn’t be around much.

Still, I lean more towards the belief that he’s simply avoiding me.

I don’t chase him down. I let him evade me.

Dare’s advice sticks with me, all the way down to the kitchens, somewhere between a dungeon and a basement.

The early hour of the Quiet has the kitchens clear of any slaves. They must have retired for their rest. Most in Hemlock have found their beds. The halls of the home are asleep already, since most of the doors I passed on the way down were shaded deep hues of slumbering blue.

I don’t find rest.

I instead search for the late snack I am so used to.

Times like these, I miss Knife, that little beast, because no matter how grotesque he is, no matter how many times he has bitten my ankles with his metal teeth, or how hard I kick when I knock him down some stairs, he has always had my late-night snack prepared and waiting for me in my bedchamber.

Now, I find the snack myself.

I plate up some soft cheese, strips of ham, and caramel almonds.

As I dust sugar over the plate, soft bootfalls echo down the long corridor, a hallway that connects the foyer stairs to the kitchens, and nowhere else.

I don’t look up as the late wanderer approaches. Instead, I am delicate as I place three juicy dates on the plate.

The intruder hesitates in the archway for a moment.

Then a familiar sword of a voice cuts through the dim candlelight of the kitchens, “We have slaves for that.”

The mere sound of Melantha’s voice tenses my shoulders.

My chin stays tucked. I don’t lift my gaze to her.

I tidy the strips of cured ham into a neat row on the plate, making sure they don’t touch the wedges of cheese I have delicately placed on the bread, and then I reinforce the separation of the dates from the savoury snacks with a dividing stick of crystallised sap.

“I am one,” I murmur, hushed by the caution that tenses me against Melantha’s presence.

And still, I can’t help but sass her.

Rune’s words echo in my mind, ‘you make a habit of this’, of getting myself into bother, and I find that he might be right.

Soft, stealthy bootsteps resume.

Finally, I glance up.

Melantha’s gaze sears into me as she moves for the scratched table against the wall. She only cuts her stare away when she starts to peel off her gloves, finger by finger.

Heat itches at my face. Cheeks as hot as the embers that gleam in the hearth, I decide I loathe to be caught like a youngling whose hand is stuck in a jar of honey, bee-stings all over, and the gleam of greed in its eyes.

Gluttonous, she likely thinks of me.

She would be right, but still, the shame lingers.

I take my plate and make to draw away from the bench. I have every intention of stealing the snack away to my bedchamber. But I make it back one step when Melantha tuts a disapproving sound that steels me.

Her cheek to me, she reaches out for the woodboard in the middle of the table, where the water-jug stains are at their worst, and she steals a slice of bread from the cut loaf.

I chew on the inside of my cheek for a moment.