Page 25

A mbrose woke to the sounds of clinking from the kitchen.

He rose to find Emery, looking bright-eyed and at ease, frying eggs, bacon, and sausages in a pan.

Aside from the cinnamon buns, he’d never used the kitchen, ordering “takeaways” instead. Ambrose had no complaints. Eating (and listening to novels about emotionally repressed homosexuals) were amongst his favorite things about this new world, but it wasn’t terribly in character for him.

“There you are. I made breakfast.”

“You cook?”

“Why the tone of surprise?”

“You’ve never cooked. You baked, but it was under duress.”

“I’ll have you know, I’m very good in the kitchen! Or I used to be. Nothing like a hex that makes everything taste like sewer water to put you off your appetite. But today’s a new day.”

He slid a plate of food across the counter toward Ambrose.

Ambrose took it. “You seem … happy.”

“It’s been known to happen.”

“Last night, you didn’t seem happy.” Ambrose really hoped Emery bought the whole You looked cold thing. He didn’t want to revisit the witch king’s order to execute Emery, not when Ambrose seemed to have finally endeared himself to the witch, and not when his usefulness to that witch had expired.

“Yes, well, it was a lot to take in. But I woke up this morning and thought, I’ll never see that bastard again.

I don’t have to walk on eggshells through all my classes.

I don’t have to worry about what sadistic punishment he’ll come up with in response to an imagined slight.

So yes, I’m …” He paused, twirling the spatula around in the air. “Relieved. Free. I’m happy he’s dead.”

“And Hellebore?”

“Oh, she’s a pain in the arse, but everything she did, she did at his whim. We’ll have to make sure she doesn’t find the body, but I don’t think she’ll want police snooping around any more than he would have.”

Ambrose hadn’t taken a bite of his food yet. He feared asking the one thing he really wished to know. And me? What happens to me now?

Emery waved at him with the spatula. “Don’t wait for me. Get stuck in, or it’ll go cold.”

“I—” Should he ask? It wasn’t likely Emery would reveal his plans if he had any. “Thank you.”

Emery waited. Ambrose got the sense he was waiting for approval. In spite of his worries, he took a savoring bite of bacon, closing his eyes briefly.

He really hoped Emery had no nefarious plans for him, because he would sorely miss the food.

Emery looked pleased by his response. “So. It’s a Saturday, and most people get to have a lie-in on Saturdays, but Morcant would drag us out of bed before the sun rose for our guild meetings.

I think he did it deliberately to ensure we never slept well.

Everyone will think the meeting is still running.

I think we should attend for the sake of appearances.

Pretend to be shocked when he doesn’t turn up. ”

Ambrose paused. What Emery had said replayed in his mind, something which made Ambrose tentatively hopeful. “May I speak honestly?”

Emery’s brow scrunched. “Er, yes? Do you not usually?”

“No. I mean, yes, I do. It’s just that you’re not terribly convincing at pretend.”

Some egg fell from Emery’s fork. “I beg your pardon?”

“Last night, when you were lying to Morcant, he could tell.”

“Well, yes … He always could. I thought he had some lie-detection spell. Are you saying it’s because I’m a bad liar?”

Ambrose smiled sheepishly and shrugged.

“How bad?”

“Dreadful.”

It felt oddly thrilling to say it. Not only because he’d never dream of saying something so bold to the witch king, but because the conversation served to inadvertently assuage Ambrose’s fears.

If Emery was planning to get rid of him, he wasn’t an adept-enough liar to hide it.

Emery stared at him for a moment, then laughed. Ambrose dropped his fork in surprise. He’d never seen Emery smile so brightly. It lit him up. He had dimples .

“What?” Emery said.

“You’re—” Beautiful. Ambrose could have bit through his tongue to stop himself saying it. The witch king’s voice was eerily silent, but that itself felt like condemnation. “It’s rare to see you smile, is all,” Ambrose said.

“Well, that hasn’t helped my ability to lie, apparently! Are you doling out any lessons on maintaining a poker face?” At Ambrose’s confused look, he added, “It’s a game where you—Nevermind. It means not betraying your emotions on your face.”

“Ah, then this ‘poker face’ wouldn’t serve you. It is not in your character to appear unreadable. You might not smile often, but you’re normally quite animated. You speak with your hands, your face is very expressive. Like this.” Ambrose attempted an impression of Emery’s mannerisms.

Emery choked. “You could just call me a faggot, and I’d get the picture.”

Which resulted in an educating moment for Ambrose on the history of the word, both its horrifying usage and the fact Emery had adopted it in defiance of its derogatory meanings.

He seemed genuinely light-hearted and relieved, and there was no point in ruining it by brooding over the witch king’s orders.

Besides, he wished to bask in the first time he’d seen Emery truly smile a little longer.

The initiates did not look well when Emery and Ambrose first arrived at the mausoleum. Ambrose invisibly observed from the corner, as usual, and they all looked exhausted.

Saoirse in particular.

She yawned, and the rest of the guild caught it. They all shifted uneasily from foot to foot, battling between the need for sleep and the tension in the air.

Morcant always arrived early. He wasn’t here. Neither was Hellebore.

“Maybe he’s still in hospital,” Saoirse said.

The other initiates nodded tentatively. They’d all been at the fundraiser.

When Ambrose had first seen Saoirse, she dressed in eclectically feminine styles—earrings shaped like ladybirds, dresses in mushroom patterns, boots with brightly colored laces. Today, she wore trousers and a slouching shirt that barely fit her.

It could have been argued that the early hour left her too tired to put in the usual effort, but she’d dressed plainly at the fundraiser, too.

Ambrose remembered the remark from Morcant about her “inappropriate” dress.

It had burrowed beneath her skin and taken root.

He hoped, now Morcant was gone, she could get back to the girl she’d been.

She approached Emery and said under her breath, “Did you really have something to do with it?”

“With what?”

“The accident yesterday, obviously.”

“I haven’t developed telepathic powers, last I checked.”

“Hellebore seemed fairly convinced.”

“Hellebore’s not fanciful enough to believe in telepathy.”

Saoirse gave him a withering look.

“Where is Hellebore?” he went on, diverting the conversation. “Morcant might be in hospital, but surely she’d let you know if the meeting was off, seeing as you’re her favorite.”

He said it in a deprecating tone, but Saoirse didn’t seem to think it a slight. “She left the dorms this morning in a rush. She didn’t tell me why. So you really don’t know what’s going on?”

“Not the foggiest.”

“And that accident yesterday wasn’t you?”

“Nope.”

She stared at him, studying his expression. He’d done a better job lying this time, but Ambrose thought he may be laying the attitude on thick.

Footsteps pounded down the stairs, and everybody straightened in anticipation of who would arrive.

Hellebore rushed into the tomb and, upon seeing Emery, charged toward him. Her messy bun tumbled loosely from its ties, and she wore no makeup. Without lipstick, she’d gone from vampire to near-cherubic.

At least in appearance. Her personality was another matter.

“He’s not here?” she demanded.

No one needed to ask who she meant. The other initiates murmured confirmation, but she hadn’t directed the question at them.

Emery said, “Not yet.”

“Where is he?” Hellebore said.

“ I don’t keep his itinerary on me. That’s your forte.”

Sarcasm was a more comfortable mask for him. That’s better , thought Ambrose.

“We all know his itinerary for today includes our guild meetings at five in the morning. It’s five-sixteen, and he isn’t here. He usually meets me before we arrive, but he didn’t come. I rang him and heard nothing back. I took a portal home and can’t find him.”

“Well, it was rude of him to drag us all out of bed if he isn’t going to show.”

Hellebore advanced on him. Ambrose, standing only a pace to Emery’s left, felt the force of her anger as if its presence had density.

“I know you did something at the fundraiser yesterday. Then you weaseled your way out of punishment somehow, and now I can’t find him. That’s not good . I know you have something to do with it, so just tell me.”

Ambrose didn’t like her intensity or the direction of her questions. Her anger had taken a subtle sidestep in an alien direction, sprung up from a different source than the one he’d assumed.

He couldn’t place why. She just seemed off.

Emery held up his hands in a helpless gesture of confusion. “I may have played a little prank yesterday, but last I heard he’d been sent to hospital.” He smirked. “Did you check there?”

“You infuriating piece of—” She reeled an arm back to punch him.

Ambrose lunged to intervene, but Hellebore hit the wall behind Emery’s head. Ambrose wrestled his impulse under control just in time. He couldn’t reveal himself now. It would put them beyond suspicion, tantamount to a confession.

Emery had flinched away from her, his back pressed flat to the wall.

“Please just tell me what happened,” she said. Some of her anger bled into fear. She spoke so low, Ambrose barely heard. “We can sort it out, but if we don’t, we’ll be dead when he finds us.”

It struck Ambrose what had bothered him so about Hellebore’s demeanor.

She wasn’t afraid her father was missing, or hurt, or maybe even dead.

She was afraid of what he’d do to them. She believed entirely that Emery had tried to kill Morcant only yesterday, but she was utterly convinced of her father’s safe return.

Emery started to say, “How many times can I say I don’t know before you—”

He stopped short.

At first, Ambrose didn’t know why, but then he heard it, too.

Footsteps. Slow, echoing footsteps on the stairs.

Emery’s face drained of color. Everyone looked to the doorway, to the shoes appearing on the declining steps, the black robes noticeably free of peat and blood, the gaunt face.

“Apologies for my lateness,” said Morcant.

Frigid dread pooled in Ambrose’s half-beating heart.

It made sense now. The way his magic could not feed on Morcant’s demise like the countless deaths wrought before. Why Hellebore had been so convinced of his return. The reason he had not, even in the dying moments of his last breath, been afraid.

Morcant Van Moor was immortal.