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Garrik gestured a hand, beckoning the male to walk ahead before a quiet, broken whisper flowed back to her.

“… news … lon … razkend?—”

Broken pieces. It was all she could hear before Smokeshadows whirled in Garrik’s palm, producing a stack of parchments, tied by a strap of leather, all sealed with the mark of his Dragons. Before their bodies were consumed by the cover of thunder, he handed it to the male he towered over, their figures fading into the pouring rain.

Sitting there alone was about as dreadfully boring as one of Kaine’s parties. Though, at least when she stifled a yawn, she didn’t have to worry about the fists that would meet her later in the night—for daring to show anything but polite zeal in front of company.

The tavern was so simple that there wasn’t much to keep her occupied besides flicking crumbs across the table from whoeverhad sat there before. And once the last crumb of something that could’ve been either stale bread or a cracker flew across the wood and landed somewhere on Garrik’s chair, did she shift her hips slightly in the seat, reclining back with a bored huff.

He was taking his time out there doing … whatever it was he was doing.

Instead of memorizing every sequence of grain in the wood beneath her palm, Alora rose. Carrying her tankard across the floor, she settled herself on a tall stool at the bar, kicking her legs against the hem of her cloak while a barmaid refilled drinks with her back turned.

Scanning the room, Alora’s mind wandered into a corner of darkness near the back hallway. Half imagining the silhouette of a piano, remembering that song—her favorite song—that she heard earlier. One that she hadn’t heard since she was a faeling. The one her mother ethereally hummed her to sleep by. And only years later, when Alora had taught herself how to play on keys of ivory, did she try to master its haunting beauty and divine expression with notes that could touch beyond mortal comprehension. A sound that transcended realms.

“Where was that music coming from earlier?”

The barmaid swiftly raked her eyes over Alora, assessing her as if she’d gone mad. “There is no music here,” she clipped out and twisted toward a door that smelled like a kitchen, disappearing inside.

Alora frowned. There was no mistaking it. There had been music.

And Garrik had asked her to dance.

No one had ever asked her to dan?—

“Alora.” Her name brushed down her spine, hauntingly cold, like someone had breathed in her ear.

She shuddered, turning to scan the tavern. But when doing so, there was no one close enough to whisper like that.

Not until she twisted around.

Not until mahogany eyes stared back.

Behind her, the tavern door opened, heavy with footsteps and clanks of metal, but her entire world had frozen too completely to care about who walked in.

“Alora.”

Something crackled deep inside her veins. Prickling every nerve ending, threatening to explode with embers as she sat rigid, her hands trembling to keep her grip on the edge of the counter, to keep her steady as her world crumbled down.

Terror. Pure, unadulterated terror crackled inside her veins. Alora tried to breathe—couldn’t breathe.

Every ounce of Thalon’s training ebbed from her body, disappearing into the night, only to be stolen and safeguarded behind those sinister eyes that trapped her inside of ruthless memories.

No one in the bar was looking—not one. None of them knew who he was or what he would do.

None of them knew…

“Kaine,” she choked but barely heard her own voice over the ringing in her ears.

Somehow, a glass of scarlet liquid had settled in front of him. She could barely see that, either, nor the single red rose draped across the wooden surface.

“Didn’t I tell you that I would find you?” That glass lifted to his lips, but she could only focus on his broad hand squeezing it. “Imagine my surprise when I returned home yet again and found not only my bed empty but my manor, too.”

Alora opened her mouth to speak. Nothing but strangled breaths came out.

“You’ve been whoring yourself, haven’t you? I smellhimon you.”

Him. Her mind echoed with the word, and suddenly the stiffness in her body loosened slightly.