Page 155 of Silvercloak

But there was only a one-in-eleven chance of finding the kingpin on the other side. She had to trust the odds, like some twisted gamehouse attraction. She could almost hear the tinkle of coins, could almost smell the rich fruity scent of the blackcherry sours.

Only she was gambling not with ascens but with her life.

Wandless, she shoved upward. The trapdoor swung open into the storage closet. There was a cacophonous racket in the main dwelling, but the closet door was mercifully shut. Rasso sprang into it behind her just as Levan appeared at the bottom of the ladder.

“Silver,” he mouthed, but the second syllable was severed by the closing trapdoor.

Saffron sat down on top of it, breathing hard as Rasso curled into her lap.

It would not stop Levan; he could catapult them into the rafters if he so chose.

But it would buy her a few moments.

From her lower vantage point, she could see through a narrow gap between the slats of the door into the kitchen. Thudding boots and blasts of magical light, overlapping yells and curses, the rush of enchanted wind knocking bodies off their feet. It was too chaotic tomake any sense of, and besides, her mind orbited around one thought and one thought alone.

Levan is a Compeller, Levan is a Compeller, Levan is a Compeller, Levan—

Had he compelled her before?

Would she know if he had?

Back at the Academy, Aspar’s secret Compeller had tried to order her during the final assessment. It hadn’t worked, thanks to her magical immunity, but she already knew Levan alone could breach those defenses. Could force her mouth shut during the throes of sex.

She thought back to the conversation she’d overheard while hiding in Levan’s closet, when the tracing charm led his father to his door.

All along. It was you all along.

How could I have been so blind?

Had Levan been compelling his father this whole time? Had Lyrian finally realized it, and stabbed his son through the hand with deminite so that it could never happen again?

Everything slid into awful place.

Lyrian’s jade necklace—a supposed ward against compelling, Saffron now remembered.

The kingpin repeatedly,doggedlyinsisted that he didn’t want to do such hideous things, that he’d never had the same bloodlust as his wife.

It was allLevan.

“Silver,” came a breathless voice through the pane of wood that separated them. He rapped gently on the trapdoor with his knuckles. “I’m not going to blast through. I’m not going to hurt you. I just want to talk.”

She said nothing. Almost always the safest option.

“We’ve both been keeping secrets from each other,” Levan said, voice strained, almost inaudible over the frenzy of spells in the main shack.

Saffron still could not speak.

“Do you really think I’d hurt you, Silver? Let me in. I could force you to do it right now. I could compel you to open the trapdoor, or slam it open so hard you crumpled like a tin can, or just kill you straight through the wood. But I’m not going to. Please.”

It was true. If he wanted to hurt her, she’d already be dead.

And there was so much she wanted—needed—to understand.

Bile rose in her throat, stinging her tonsils and tongue, as she rolled off the trapdoor.

Levan climbed slowly into the closet beside her, holding his palms in the air—one pale skin, one golden as the sun—as though to show he meant no harm. Rasso’s teeth had torn into his forearm, shredding the fabric and drawing thick red stripes of blood, but he hadn’t bothered to heal it.

He didn’t go straight to her, but instead sank to his knees. He pressed his face against the door into the main shack, then sucked in a sharp gulp of breath. Whatever he’d seen through the crack, he did not relay it to Saff. Instead, he turned to face her, sitting back against the door, resting his elbows on his knees. The deadness had gone from his eyes, making way for a deep and terrible hurt.