Page 20

CHAPTER TWENTY

“ S o, is this where you bring all the girls?” Xenia asked, following Cael up a wooden ladder into the cramped stable loft. She flopped down onto a spiky bale, her head nearly touching the slanted ceiling.

“And boys.” Cael winked, dropping into a cross-legged position in front of her.

And though the words were playful, Xenia could tell by his drooping wing and caved shoulders that his heart wasn’t in them. He looked exhausted.

They’d agreed to meet here tonight to check in, and though Xenia had plenty of news to share, she questioned whether she should burden him with any of it.

Straws poked through her skirt, biting into the bare skin above her stockings, and the loft had a cozy, nostalgic smell. One she remembered well from her parents’ farm in Primarvia: apples, hay, leather, and the sweet underlying scent of manure.

She imagined what it might be like had Cael lured her here for a different, more intimate purpose. How he might lay her down on the dusty boards. How strands of hay might catch in her curls. How he might slowly lift her skirt and trail his fingers up her?—

“For the love of Anaemos, Blondie,” Cael said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You do realize I can scent every dirty thought running through your head, right?”

Xenia shrugged. “You never should’ve told me what you used to do up here.”

Cael propped his elbows on his knees and placed his chin atop his folded hands. “How was your day? Where has Mistress Ostere assigned you?”

Xenia told him about her housekeeping duties, about how she’d spent the morning cleaning his father’s office. She pulled the tiny grain from her pocket and handed it to him. “I found this in his desk.”

Cael twisted the device in his fingers, holding it close to his face.

“What do you think that orange glow is?” Xenia asked.

“No idea,” Cael muttered. “Did you find any documentation with it?”

“Yes,” Xenia said, her tone dripping with sarcasm. “It was right beneath the box. And there was a sign on the drawer that said ‘inside is the manual that explains how to deactivate my sinister tracking devices’.”

Cael laughed, crinkling his eyes in a way that made him look a bit less tired. And had Xenia’s heart soaring. She loved making him laugh. Could spend the rest of her life doing it.

“Stupid question. Been a long day.” He expelled a weary sigh, and she couldn’t help yawning in response.

“Djoo get my note?” she asked.

“ I don’t have to give up on my hopes and dreams ,” Cael said with a smirk. “As affirmations go, that one was a little on the nose, don’t you think?”

“Did you say it?”

He tossed a wayward curl off his forehead and looked up at her through thick, brown lashes. “Yes, ma’am.”

Curse Amatu, he was so fucking handsome she almost forgot what they were talking about.

“How many times?” she asked.

“Five. More than the recommended dosage in your very thorough directions.”

“Overachiever. How was your day? Did you find anything useful about the device?”

He blew out a long breath and dipped his head into his hands, scrubbing at his face. “I didn’t have any fucking time . Father’s got me running all over creation for these High-Gods-damned prospecting meetings. Waste of energy. No one’s serious about buying anything. But he refuses to ignore them.” Cael leaned his head back to stare at the ceiling, and his Adam’s apple bulged. She wanted to sink her teeth into it. “I spent the half hour before I came up here listening to him shout about how incompetent I am that I can’t find him any legitimate business.” His eyes glazed over. “It was fun.”

“You don’t have to live under his thumb, Cael,” Xenia whispered. She didn’t understand why he assumed he had no other choices. He was a full-grown male, for fuck’s sake.

Fear shivered Cael’s wing. “You have no idea what he’s like. No idea. Once Arran Zephyrus has mapped out your life, you thank him and you live it. Or suffer the consequences.” He rubbed a hand over his mouth. “Sometimes I think he’d prefer I were dead than living outside his influence.”

“Why’d he let you go to the colonies?” Xenia asked, picking straws from the bale.

Below, tails swished and horses nickered in the ensuing silence.

Cael dipped his head, tracing patterns on the dusty floorboards. “Because the path I was on would’ve given me—and by extension, him—power. Vestian to Vasilikan to head of the Imperial Guard.”

“You wanted to serve Eamon Erabis?”

“I hadn’t given him very much thought. It was more about the position. Moot point now, anyway,” Cael said with defeated finality, rustling his wing.

Xenia didn’t know what to say. When she’d tried to talk to Cael about his injury in the Desolation, he’d always shut her down. And he didn’t seem any more inclined to open up tonight. So, she changed the subject.

“I ran into Elodie in your father’s office.”

Cael’s head jolted upright. “Elodie? Why?”

Xenia shrugged. “No idea. She looked like she was going to jump out of her skin when she saw me. Then got all huffy and entitled. Like she was supposed to be there. Like she had business with your father.”

“What business would Elodie have with my father?”

“That’s what I want to know. She barged right into the room. Didn’t even knock. Don’t you think that’s suspicious?” Cael lifted a shoulder, unconvinced. “And then when I asked her if I should tell Arran she was looking for him, she shouted no and ran from the room.”

Cael shook his head. “I wouldn’t worry about it. We’ve got more important shit to deal with.”

Though Xenia bristled at his dismissal, his mood dissuaded her from pressing. But no way would she let it go that easily. She’d figure out on her own what his fiancée was up to.

He stood and helped her up. “You should get back to the estate.”

“Okay,” she agreed, though she didn’t want to leave him.

“Go ahead of me. Best no one sees us together. If you run into anyone, just tell them Hildreth sent you out here to read bedtime stories to the horses. Stablemaster’s a bit odd. And very attached to the animals. No one will question it.”

Xenia nodded, opening her mouth to say more, though “Goodnight, Cael” was all she landed on.

He cocked his head, staring at her in a way that made her believe he wanted to say more, too. “Night, Blondie.”

She exited the stables into the pitch-black night, ruminating on Cael’s mood and Elodie’s questionable behavior.

She was halfway up the path to the lodge when a deep voice slithered from the trees to her left.

“Well, what have we here? An escaped housemaid, creeping around the property in the dead of night?”

Tomas Zephyrus oozed out of the darkness. He was shorter than Cael, but slightly broader in the shoulders. Waves of golden hair spilled to his shoulders, and the path lights created ghoulish shadows beneath dark gray eyes that held not an ounce of kindness.

“I was just?—”

Faster than she could blink, Tomas was upon her. “No need for excuses, pretty little maid. It’s best when your kind keep your mouth shut anyway. Or use it for something other than talking.” He tugged her off of the path. Toward the dark woods. “Walk with me.”

Xenia pulled uselessly against his grip. Though the softness around his middle hinted at centuries of overindulgence, he was still Fae.

“Oh no, I don’t think?—”

“Tomas!”

Cael’s voice boomed through the night and Tomas, startled, released her.

She stumbled backward, catching herself against a tree.

“I’ve been looking for you,” Cael said, keeping his eyes on his brother.

Tomas furrowed his brow, glancing back at the lodge then over Cael’s shoulder. Toward the stables. “Have you?”

“Father asked me to debrief you on my meetings.”

Tomas leered at Xenia. “He’s always spoiling my fun. Cael, have you met… What’s your name then, little maid?”

Xenia didn’t answer and once again, Cael saved her. “Let’s go , Tomas. Leave the humans alone.”

Cael shoved at Tomas’s back and the two males took to the path, Cael’s sole wing bobbing next to Tomas’s pair. Tomas turned over his shoulder and mouthed see you soon to Xenia.

She waited several minutes before returning to the lodge to ensure Tomas couldn’t follow her to her room.

That night, the monster in her nightmare had oily blond hair, blood-drenched fangs, and a rasping voice that whispered little maid over and over and over.