Page 37 of Only in Moonlight (The Moonlit Court #1)

Valen

“ V alen,” my mother rasped.

She was dead, wasn’t she? Or maybe she wasn’t. I couldn’t bear to see her again, but I couldn’t close my eyes or look away. I felt nauseous, feverish, my heartbeat as fast as a hummingbird’s wings and just as weak.

My mother lurched toward me, bleeding from the wound in her stomach. We were in my childhood home—or my chateau. The scene kept blurring and shifting, full of shadows and malicious intent.

My mother lay down in a pool of blood. “It’s your fault.”

“I know,” I tried to say. “I’m sorry.” But my mouth wouldn’t move, and my throat had clenched shut.

Then, instead of my mother, it was Emmeline lying on the palace floor, dead because of a plot I’d dragged her into.

No. No. NO.

She vanished. I ran through the palace, desperately trying to find her, but the halls had turned strange and mazelike.

Then I couldn’t even run anymore, my legs stuck like I was mired in a bog.

I struggled and strained but couldn’t move an inch.

Everything was getting darker. Fear clutched at my chest. And then. ..

Warmth. Soft lips touching mine. My frenetic heartbeat calmed, and the nausea eased.

I breathed in deeply, inhaling Emmeline’s herbal scent.

Consciousness came with awareness, and I realized I’d been having a nightmare.

I gripped Emmeline’s waist where she lay atop me, needing to feel her alive, needing to anchor myself in something real.

She pulled back, startled, and stared at me.

I didn’t recognize her face, and her enormous headdress blocked our surroundings from view. Interesting.

“Em—”

She pushed her mouth against mine, silencing me. The kiss was fast, desperate... and a little distracted, to be honest. Not that I was complaining. I arched my back, pressing myself more firmly against her body. Even disoriented and tired, I yearned to touch every part of her.

Finally, she pulled away.

What a way to wake up.

Emmeline was oblivious to my entrancement as she looked at something behind me. “She’s gone.”

“Who?” I asked dazedly.

“Regula.”

I sat up so fast that our heads nearly collided. We were in the solarium. No one was in sight.

“Backup plan?” I asked.

Sitting in my lap, Emmeline shifted back to her redheaded form. That large headdress must have hidden my face from Regula’s view, and I assumed the kiss concealed that I was lying unconscious in the grass. My chest swelled with admiration of Emmeline’s quick thinking.

“Yes,” she grumbled. “We were ten feet away from the main doors when they shut them.”

The theft had been discovered. That complicated things.

“Let’s move, then.”

I reluctantly eased her out of my lap. When I stood, a rush of lightheadedness made me pause.

“How do you feel?” Emmeline asked, eyes too piercing.

The lightheadedness faded, but my limbs felt weak, as if I’d just fought a battle. My shirt was damp with cold sweat, but I didn’t feel feverish any longer.

“Weak, but I can manage.”

To prove it, I set off down the path. She followed, catching me up on what I’d missed in a hushed voice. The idea of a tracking spell obviously concerned me, but I couldn’t do anything about it now. We had to press on.

The nightmares lingered, my worst memories dangerously close to the surface. I pushed them down to deal with later. I needed to be at my best right now. Emmeline needed me at my best. The image of her dead on the floor flashed through my mind, and an uncontrollable shudder swept through my body.

We left the solarium and hustled through the halls, pausing when we heard footsteps ahead.

A guard? If one searched us, we’d have problems. The Selenian Jewel felt uncannily heavy on my belt, almost as if the delicate necklace weighed more than my sword.

How quickly would the guards escalate their security measures?

Would my rank protect me? I couldn’t see the lords and ladies at the ball taking kindly to having their persons searched for a stolen relic.

I flung an arm around Emmeline’s waist and slowed our pace, stumbling as if drunk.

Moments later, a servant hurried around the corner, nodding at us as she rushed past. We sped up as soon as she left our sight.

The Palace of Eternal Moonlight was an architectural triumph, a monument to the splendor of our kingdom, but right now, it was too damned big.

Heat exploded at my waist like my belt had caught fire. Emmeline pulled back, blinking at the sudden light—yes, light—that blazed through the cracks of the leather pouch on my belt. The Selenian Jewel had lit up like a damned beacon.

“What’s happening?” Emmeline asked.

“Lady Lurena’s tracking spell, I presume.”

She’d succeeded much more quickly than I’d anticipated. She’d barely had enough time to reach the library. People always underestimated Lurena, but I hadn’t realized I was guilty of it, too.

“Can we wrap it up more?” Emmeline gripped her dress as if she meant to tear it up for more fabric. “Hide the light somehow?”

The light was nearly shining through the leather itself. Nothing short of a metal box would hide it, but at least the initial burst of heat had lessened. I could carry it without getting burned.

“We’re almost at the passage,” I said. “We need to get out of sight.”

We set off at a run.

Our backup plan (the first of three) was the Midnight Passage, a secret passageway with an entrance inside a suite of bedchambers in the guest wing.

Legend stated that an old princess had used it to sneak away to visit her lover, a priestess who was forbidden from marrying.

The passageway did exit near the temple district, so perhaps the legend held some truth.

Only the queen and a few of her inner circle knew of the passage’s location. Most people doubted it existed at all.

We hurried down the ornate hallway. A faint, echoing murmur of voices drifted from unseen rooms, not loud enough to drown out the tap-tap-tap of our footsteps.

The jewel’s light glimmered off the polished marble floor around me and reflected off mirrors decorating the walls.

I could feel it vibrating inside the pouch, still emanating heat like an ember.

Unease prickled at my skin. I wouldn’t quite call my plan a disaster yet, but it was close.

And then disaster struck. We rounded a corner, and a man was waiting, blocking our path to freedom.

Drudon.