Thankfully, Gawain stepped in. “Perhaps he's focused on the next trial. I’ve heard it’s the most brutal yet.”
“Indeed,” Tristan said.
"Have you heard any rumblings as to what type of trial it will be?" Gawain asked.
But then their voices began to blend together, becoming a dull murmur that echoed in my ears much like the incessant chatter of hens clucking and squawking, as I felt it...
Lance’s gaze, steady. Across the hall.
Our eyes met.
And something passed between us. Something unspoken. But something undeniable.
I broke the connection first.
Every look was a crack in the armor. Every shared breath, a threat.
This was precisely why I needed to maintain separation between us. I couldn't afford to care for Lance—not when my mission demanded complete focus.
As the knights at my table speculated about what trial might come next, I nodded along, speaking when needed—but my mind kept drifting. Always back tohim.
Like a compass needle drawn north.
And with rising dread, I realized: This—not Arthur, not the trial, not the knights—thiswas the danger that might undo me.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
-GUIN-
Rain hammered the windows as another storm rolled through.
It was directly above Camelot now—lightning and thunder arriving in tandem, violent and immediate. The stone beneath my boots vibrated with each thunderclap, as if the castle itself were holding its breath.
Just as I reached for the latch on my chamber door, the water on the nearest windowpane twisted into a perfect spiral—tight and deliberate, as if drawn by an invisible fingertip.
I hadn’t summoned it.
My magic had answered the storm—unchecked, intimate, dangerous.
My emotions were still out of control, and here was the evidence. Irritated, I waved the pattern away with a sharp flick of my fingers, breath shallow as I scanned the corridor. No one in sight.
Once inside, I would ground myself—sink into ritual, reclaim control of my heart and my thoughts, silence the pull of the storm and the man I couldn’t stop thinking about.
I opened the door.
Lightning split the hall behind me—and in its white-hot glare, I saw her standing there.
Elenora.
She stood at the far end of the corridor, illuminated in silhouette like a spirit conjured from the thunder itself. Her presence was no accident. No one wandered these halls in this storm by chance—no one who didn't belong here, that is.
She walked toward me with her signature grace—fluid as quicksilver, deliberate as a huntress stalking prey, predatory in the way only those born to power can manage. Each step was perfectly measured, her silk slippers making no sound against the stone floor, yet somehow I felt the weight of her approach, all the same. The way she moved reminded me of water—deceptively gentle on the surface, yet carrying the promise of drowning depths beneath.
“A moment of your time, Sir Lioran?”
Alarm knifed through me. The timing. The smile. That expression in her eyes.
I didn’t flinch. “Of course,” I said, stepping aside, keeping the door conspicuously open behind her. Let the corridor bear witness: a knight receiving a courtesan with propriety, nothing more.
