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I never paid them much mind.

Eamon sighs with obvious tedium, “Her name is Bee.” He drops his hands to the table. “And yes, Dare went to her home for the rest of the night. And no, she isn’t covered in puss and boils and warts. She’s a brilliant person, and a favourite of mine.”

Silence whips through the kitchens.

I doubt Eamon could stand against any of these males in a fight, even on their worst days, but the respect is there, because he’s just silenced three brutal warriors.

Still, Samick’s ice-cold aura creeps through the already chilly kitchens, and—beside him—Rune’s eyes sear into Daxeel’s schooled face, schooled like he only cares about the cinnamon powder he tosses into his copper mug.

Moments pass in quiet before the solid thuds of bootfalls rain down the stairs.

I look over my shoulder to see the beefiness of a shadow come up the corridor, then swallow the archway whole.

Caius’s diamond eyes narrow in on me, arrows notched. “You.” His harsh growl matches the tug of his upper lip. “Your father is at the door.”

Daxeel stiffens in his chair, muscles bolting to bone like lead.

Eamon has his hands cupped around his nose, the tips of his fingers pressed against the underside of his eyebrows, as though to release any of that tension is to allow a monstrous headache to return.

At the mention of my father, he slides his narrowed gaze to Caius. “Did he say why he’s come?”

Caius turns a blank look on his cousin. Less fuelled by pure hatred than when he looked at me. He shrugs then pulls away from the stone arch to head back up the stairs. “Said something about that lordson.”

Then Caius is gone.

Eamon looks between me and Daxeel. “Taroh.”

I don’t meet Daxeel’s gaze as I set my mug down on the table, right where his sentient shadows kept my wrists pinned last Quiet. Now, only one shadow reaches out for me. It flicks my forearm in something of a caress, then curls back into the fold.

Eamon pushes up from his chair with a grated sigh. The bloodshot of his eyes is made worse as he rubs at them with the heels of his palms.

He shadows me out the kitchens and down the corridor.

Once we’re out of earshot of the kitchens, I ask, “What’s the thorn in Caius’s backside?”

Eamon rolls his eyes. “He’s always been that way.”

The face I make at him is a dubious one. “I thought I was special.”

His strained smile is as quick to fade as it was to come. “Daxeel didn’t meet him until he turned twenty-four.”

I raise my brows at him.

“Caius chose to enlist young,” he tells me. “And he didn’t come back for visits when he should have.”

I wonder if he was avoiding his father. I’ve never met the warlord myself but he sounds more frightful than any father should ever be.

“So he left Daxeel to take the lashings on his own,” I decide with a curled lip.

We climb the stairs with such fatigue I think we must look like a pair of sagging puppets on strings.

“Caius never took the lashings,” Eamon grumbles, bitterly.

We fall silent as we reach the foyer.

The door is closed, but I know my father stands on the other side of it. Maybe pretence of coming to discuss Taroh, but really doing all he can to check on me, ensure I’m uninjured—or even alive at all.

Behind my shoulder, Eamon reaches around me for the door handle. He tugs it down and yanks—but nothing. The door stays stubbornly shut.