Page 8 of Blackwarden

Rosalin

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I worried I’d be bored, stuck in the same room until lunch after the excitement of my morning, but before I realized what time it was Keres was knocking on my door.

I didn’t rush this time. I set the book I’d been reading down, making sure it was perfectly straight on the side table, then walked as slowly as I could to answer the door.

“Do you plan to collect me for every meal?” I asked, as he stood blocking my path to the hall.

A slow smile pulled at the corner of his lips. “Only until you’re comfortable with the arduous route.” He flashed his dangerous teeth before leading me down the hall with that exceptional view of his back.

This time I studied his tattoos, allowing myself to get close enough to make out more of the details.

They were definitely serpentine dragons, like the statues at the front door and the ones that danced along the walls.

They wrapped around his shoulder blades, the wings seeming to flare out and disappear beneath the solid fabric on his sides.

They were beautiful, and I couldn’t help but wonder if there was some deeper meaning behind them .

I refused to look at the mural as we passed, but my skin burned as if the mural looked at me.

I tried to focus on the way the shadows seem to follow us, making me even more dependent on the braziers as they lit the way.

Another strange thing to ask him about. How exactly did his magic work?

It had to be derived from darkness itself with how it always seemed to cling to him.

I summoned the most ridiculous thing I could think of for lunch, still skeptical the Gatehouse could provide whatever it was I wanted.

I tried not to be surprised, yet again, when this time an entire roasted rabbit with an elaborate assortment of vegetables surrounding it appeared before me.

Keres gave an amused look at my choice. I didn’t regret my decision.

It was perhaps the most delicious thing I’d ever tasted.

At least the Gatehouse was an excellent chef even if it was creating meals with magic.

“So, how does it work?” I finally asked, no longer able to hold the questions in.

He quirked an eyebrow at me as he finished chewing a bite of potatoes. Is that all he ate? Meat and potatoes?

“How does what work?”

“Your magic.”

He set his fork down and took a drink of wine, his eyes never leaving mine.

“My shadows you mean?”

“If that is your magic, yes.” How was he able to draw answers out so elaborately? He was better at avoiding questions than my sister and I had been at avoiding our childhood chores.

He reclined in his chair with the wine glass still in his hand.

“They’re a part of me, like anything else.

Like a nose or a finger. I don’t always have control over exactly what they decide to do.

” He swirled the wine around his glass. “They simply...fulfill my desires.” He took a sip. “There are limits, of course.”

I let this tumble around in my mind for a moment as he took another drink, watching me with a tilt to his head that caused my heart to skip .

“Fulfill your desires? Like create things? Change things? Destroy things? What can they... do exactly?”

A wicked grin crept across his mouth, showing his inhuman teeth. “They can transport me places quickly. They can conjure objects. Glamour appearances. Many things.”

Many things? Like turn his face into something completely different? Seduce a human? Was it the Gatehouse that created the food I ate? Or was it him? “Many things” left far too much unanswered.

“Can they...” My cheeks heated, and then I realized it didn’t matter. He knew he was beautiful, and I’d be leaving in a matter of days. “Can you make someone attracted to you? Can you make someone want you?”

“Do you want me, Ms. Greene?” His voice was smooth, melting into something luscious that settled in my core. His glare was unyielding as it burned into me, my heart rate spiking.

I took a massive gulp of water to avoid answering.

I had walked into the question. My eyes turned toward the door of the dining room in an attempt to escape his gaze.

He laughed, an arresting sound that wrapped around me like a warm blanket.

Mother save me, it was the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard, and I hated that I wanted to hear it again.

“They cannot make someone attracted to me,” he finally answered, drawing my attention back to his amused expression. “Though, they can be helpful in creating the visage you see.”

I blinked hard a few times. What exactly did he mean by creating the visage ? Was this not the way he actually looked? I knew he could change his appearance. He’d already proven this but that had been for only a moment. Other than when he’d shown me Bastion’s face, his appearance hadn’t changed.

“So many questions,” he said as he watched me. “I can see them as they grow behind every answer I give.”

“I think...I think I’m good for now,” I squeaked out, before I stood from the table and hurried from the dining room, walking as quickly as my legs could carry me down the hall toward the safety of my suite.

I couldn’t stay there for another moment.

It was his voice or his face. It was something, and I didn’t like how it pooled in the pit of my being, hot and delicious.

I must have stood too fast because a wave of dizziness caused me to lose my footing and stumble into the wall.

I clung to the chair rail before I was able to stand up straight again.

It took me a moment, but once the unsteadiness waned, I found I was standing directly in front of the depiction of the woman who scarily resembled myself in the mural.

That couldn’t be a coincidence. I shivered and turned, pausing when there was another wall in front of my face.

I spun again, the world blurring around me before I realized I wasn’t where I thought I’d just been.

I wasn’t in the hall at all. I was in a dark room with my back against a closed door.

“Where...?”

I tried the handle, but it was locked. Panic squeezed my chest. I wasn’t supposed to be in any locked rooms. I tried again.

How had I gotten in here in the first place?

Keres said if I tried to force my way into any locked rooms the Gatehouse would know.

But he hadn’t said anything about forcing my way out.

I pulled on the door, but it held firm, a cold sweat breaking out across my forehead.

I spun back to the room, my heart nearly bursting from my chest. It was pitch-black, hard shadows of what might have been windows cut crisp lines against the far wall. I let out a slow trembling breath.

“I’m not afraid of the dark,” I whispered.

But this was a different kind of darkness.

“I’m not afraid of the dark. I’m not afraid of the dark.

” But this was more. I was in a strange place, locked in a strange room I didn’t remember entering.

I squeezed my eyes closed and held my breath for a moment to keep from hyperventilating.

“I’m not afraid of the dark. I’m not afraid of the dark. ”

Unfortunately, repeating the mantra didn’t miraculously make me any less afraid of the dark.

When I was finally brave enough to open my eyes again, they had adjusted to the low light somewhat, and I could make out a few new details.

I was standing in what appeared to be a drawing room.

Dark blurry lumps, likely chairs, arranged in various formations for chatting filled the space.

The gentle glint of gilded frames reflected off the walls.

It was impossible to see what was in those frames.

More grotesque paintings perhaps? I wasn’t sure I wanted to know, but I also very much wanted to know.

Swallowing my fear, I pushed away from the door and crept up to the closest frame.

Even at this distance there didn’t seem to be enough light to make out what was inside it.

I could barely make out the shape of what might have been a face with dark hair.

I leaned closer until my nose almost touched it.

Like fog melting away, I found myself face to face with a woman’s portrait.

I jumped back with a yelp, surprised I could see her so clearly when only a second ago she was cloaked in near complete darkness.

She had spun gold hair pulled back from her freckled cheeks and piercing blue eyes—young and beautiful—maybe in her early twenties if that.

I took a step back and looked around. A brazier on the far side of the room had sprung to life, illuminating a room full of frames.

There had to be nearly a hundred of them, none of them looked the same.

A dark thought crept over me, sending goosebumps down my arms. Were they the other girls taken to the Unseelie Court?

Had there been portraits made as trophies of each before they’d been sent to their doom?

Some of the portraits were of young women but further up the wall the older the women’s faces became.

It wasn’t these that sent a shiver down my spine.

It was the ones toward the top, still cloaked in shadow.

Those frames had nothing more than silhouettes with eerie backgrounds.

As though this was all I was meant to see, the brazier snuffed out, plunging me into a heavy darkness.

I rushed to the door before I lost the memory of how to make it back there, but it was still locked.

Shaking the handle I pulled as hard as I could.

It wouldn’t budge. It felt as if the shadows were wrapping around me, squeezing until my breath was frozen in my throat.

I hugged myself as I slid down to the floor, my knees no longer able to bear my weight as I collapsed in fear.