"How did you—"
But she shook her head. "We cannot speak here. It's not safe. We need to go. Now.” Her voice sharpened again, low and urgent.
With one hand steadying me and the other gripping her dagger, Elenora led me into the dimly lit hall. The cold stone beneath my bare feet sent shivers through my already trembling body, and I clutched the sheet tighter around my shoulders. My vision still swam from whatever Kay had put in that wine, making the torchlit corridor blur and waver like a nightmare.
Kay stood there against the rough stone wall, his back to us, still holding his soiled breeches around his waist with white-knuckled fists. The stench of urine clung to the air around him, a humiliating reminder of Elenora's power over him. His shoulders were rigid with barely contained rage, and I could hear his breathing—sharp, controlled, seething.
Elenora said nothing to him as we passed, her silence more menacing than any threat she could have voiced. But I felt his presence like a blade at my back, the weight of his hatred following our every step. The moment we moved beyond him, I heard the sharp slam of his chamber door—violent enough to rattle the iron hinges.
I knew with absolute certainty that this was far from over. Whatever humiliation Elenora had just inflicted on him would only feed the venomous promise I'd seen burning in his eyes.
The torchlit corridors of Camelot faded behind us as we slipped into the castle’s hidden arteries: narrow servant paths, blind alleys, and forgotten stairwells that twisted deep into the fortress’s bones. The sheet dragged behind me, snagging on rough stones. I stumbled often, still unsteady from the wine, but Elenora never let me fall.
She knew every passage. Every stone.
We avoided the main halls, ducking from torchlight like hunted animals. She led me through storage rooms thick with dust, weaving between crates and broken furniture as if walking a memorized path.
"Where are we going?" I managed.
"Somewhere safe."
At times, she pressed her hand to seemingly solid walls, and hidden alcoves opened. Stone groaned softly as unseen mechanisms unlocked. She moved with the confidence born not just of familiarity—but ownership.
She didn’t just know these secret paths.
She belonged to them.
Orrather—they belonged to her.
That thought chilled me more than the damp air curling around us.
“Watch your step." She steadied me again as we descended a spiral staircase so narrow that both my shoulders scraped the walls.
“How did you find me?” I whispered, breath ragged.
“I’ve been watching Kay for a long time." She checked a corner before motioning me forward. “Both waking… and dreaming.”
I paused. “Waking and dreaming?”
She glanced back at me with a raised brow. “Yes.”
I blinked.
She nodded, already moving again.
“Yes. I can dream walk.”
She moved with soundless accuracy, fingertips flicking up now and then to halt me when distant footsteps echoed off the stone. I watched, transfixed by the transformation of the person I had thought she was. The coquettish sway, the fluttering lashes—gone. In their place: the lethal grace of someone trained in stealth and survival. Every step placed with intention. Every breath controlled.
After several tense minutes threading through the sleeping castle, we reached what looked like a dead end. But then Elenora pressed her palm to an unremarkable stone, and a doorway opened with a whisper.
She guided me into an abandoned tower room—long forgotten, dust-laden. Furniture loomed like ghosts beneath yellowed sheets of fabric, and cobwebs hung like banners of time. The air was heavy with rot, soot, and something older: the metallic tang of burned magic.
"Where are we?" I asked.
“The north tower." She closed the door behind us. “Abandoned after lightning struck it during Arthur and Merlin’s duel. Servants believe it’s haunted.”
Little did they know, she was the ghost who haunted it.
