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“Do not push me into a cage, Callan,” she whispered.

He said nothing as she stepped around him and began gathering her dress, dagger, and undergarments. She turned to go to his bathing room to get dressed, but he was again in her path.

“You do not want to be bound to a throne? Then fine. We won’t be.”

“You are to be king, Callan!”

“Then I will abdicate to Eva. She can be queen, and we can disappear into the shadows.”

“Oh, Callan,” Scarlett sighed, new tears wetting her cheeks. “You are not made for the shadows. You are made for the light.”

“You asked not to be pushed into a cage. Now I am asking you not to let me remain in one.” He gripped her elbows, her arms full of her belongings.

“I am not your salvation,” Scarlett whispered, something in her chest cracking slightly.

“No, Scarlett,” he replied, “you will be my greatest regret if I let you slip away.”

His lips were on hers again, and she dropped everything she was holding, the blanket slipping from her shoulders. He backed her up against the wall, his lips moving down her jaw, her neck, to her breasts. She moaned as he palmed her breast while sucking the other into his mouth. Her hands were roving over his back, his chest, into his hair. All of it so familiar at this point. All of it drawing her to that cage.

His hands gripped her backside and hoisted her up. She wrapped her legs around his waist,gasping as he held her aloft while he slipped his loose pants off. He took her against the wall, and she buried her face in his shoulder when she went over the edge this time. Then he carried her to the armchair before the fireplace, where he sat and held her to his chest before the fire. He stroked lines up and down her back, soothing and lazy, until she fell asleep breathing him in.

When she awoke a few hours later, a blanket was draped over them, their naked bodies still wrapped around each other. The fire had died to embers, and Callan was breathing deep and steady in his sleep. She studied his features, the cheekbones and jawline, his lips and the way his hair fell into his eyes.

The number of children going missing had nearly stopped this past year. Their plans of moving them and guarding them seemed to be working. They only lost one every couple weeks now. One too many, but still not nearly as many as before. Yesterday Callan had directly asked his father’s council about the missing children. He didn’t say where they were disappearing from, just that he had heard rumors and wanted to know what was being done. No one had seemed to know anything, but it would be looked into. She could go back to the shadows. She could go back to leaving notes and trailing him in the trees. She could go back to that so he could find someone who could be what he needed. She could do this. She loved him enough to do this.

She leaned in and brushed a feather-light kiss to his cheek. Then, using every stealth technique she had ever been taught, she slipped from beneath the blanket. Silent as the wraith she was, she strapped her dagger to her thigh and slid her undergarments and dress back on. She found a pen and paper on his desk and wrote a note that she left on his pillow.

Find someone to help you shine, Callan, not someone to bring you into the dark.

The dress prevented her from leaving through the windows, so she slipped from his rooms. Finn was on guard outside his door, and she paused when she saw him,tears shimmering in her eyes. His lips formed a thin line at the sight of her.

“He shall rage when he wakes,” she whispered, her lip quivering.

“He is not the only one who will miss you,” he answered with a deep bow to her.

“Don’t let him wait for me,” she said, going to Finn. He drew her into an embrace and held her tight. “Encourage him to find someone else.”

“I will do my best,” Finn answered as she stepped back from him.

She was down the hall in a flash, two lefts and a right, and she ducked behind a tapestry that concealed a secret passage to a set of catacombs and tunnels beneath the castle. She could find her way in the dark by this point and didn’t even bother bringing a match with her. Tears fell from her cheeks as she hurried along the passage, her slippers and hair combs in her hand. Thoughts were whirling in her mind as she absentmindedly navigated the passageway. She was nearing the end when she ran headlong into someone else.

“Cassius?” she gasped.

“No, but you did send him straight to us, so thank you for that.”

A cloth was pressed over her nose and mouth before she could react. She lost consciousness seconds later.

Scarlett’s head throbbed as she cracked her eyes open. Her ankles and wrists were bound with heavy chains, not of iron but of shirastone. They were the same type of manacles they used to restrain Fae beneath the Fellowship. She still wore the dress from the feast. Her throat was dry, and she blinked against the low candlelight in the room.

“There she is,” the same voice who had spoken in the passage crooned.She whipped her head to the right to find Mikale leaning against the wall, his arms crossed before him.

“Where am I?” she rasped, looking around the room, trying to get a layout of her surroundings, but her head was pounding. Everything was swimming in and out of focus.

“That is not important right now,” he answered with a wave of his hand. “Have you given any more thought to my proposal?”

“If this is you trying to woo me, it’s a pretty shitty attempt,” she said, working her wrists to see if there were any weaknesses in the chains, knowing it was likely futile. She was right.

Mikale quickly crossed the room and gripped her face with his fingers so hard it hurt. “Again with the language,” he chided, clicking his tongue. He released her and stood, looking down at her. “My sister was most displeased to see you leave with Callan tonight.”