Everything about his presence screamedwrong, even before she noticed the knife he toyed with.
“I’m glad to see you’ve finished,” the man said. There was something familiar about his voice. “The stamina you young people have.”
Stamina. What was he talking about? Had he…
“Who are you?” Teryn asked, voice deadly calm.
“I’m not surprised you don’t recognize me, but surely Her Majesty would. No? Ah, it’s the absence of bruises, isn’t it? You should pay better attention to the people you have beaten at your command.”
Understanding clicked into place. “You’re…the Norunian spy.”
It shouldn’t have been possible. Even without the bruises, there was little to link them by appearances alone. He seemed taller, and far less rough around the edges. But that voice. It held a more distinguished quality, but he was just as well-spoken as the man she’d interrogated in the dungeon. With a deep breath, she opened her senses.
His energy was one and the same.
This was the prisoner who’d faked his own death. Freed by someone in the castle and replaced with a decoy body. And from what he’d said…
The stamina you young people have.
Nausea turned her stomach. Had he been…watching them? Their most private moment? It was one thing to enjoy the thrill of getting caught by people she trusted. Enemies were different. There was nothing thrilling about that. It was simply violating.
Had he been inside her castle all this time, lurking in the shadows?
Teryn shifted to the side, deepening his defensive stance. He opened his mouth and gathered in a sharp breath, as if prepared to shout, but the spy spoke first.
“Don’t call for your guards.” He flipped his knife and caught the hilt with ease. “I can cross the space between us in a heartbeat and shove this through your throat before you’ve had a chance to blink.”
His words pulsed in her mind.
He could…cross the space between them.
In a heartbeat.
She assessed the floor, the bed between them, the wardrobe he’d have to skirt around. The answer was so crushing, she almost couldn’t voice it.
“You’re Darius,” she managed to say.
“Majesty, I wasn’t aware we were on a first-name basis,” he said, tone mocking.
That was when she noticed something about his eyes; they were so like Morkai’s had been, with that same pale blue color. She tried to find similarities to Ailan, but there were none. His complexion was tan but much paler than Ailan’s. His hair was gray where hers was black. But as her eyes fell upon his ears, she saw their subtly pointed tips. They weren’t as angled as Ailan’s but were more so than Morkai’s. Surely she or the gaoler would have noticed pointed ears on their prisoner…wouldn’t they? His hair had been shaggy enough to cover them, but—
Another realization formed in her mind.
The only time she’d seen him had been before the Veil had torn.
Any differences in his appearance could be attributed to that. Though his aging hadn’t reversed nearly as drastically as Ailan’s had, it had darkened his hair, straightened his posture, and elongated his ears.
Terror tore through her. Darius…her enemy…was in her castle.
He washere.
Standing before her.
Teryn shifted his stance again, teeth bared in a sneer.
Darius raised his empty palm while sheathing the knife at his waist. When both hands were empty, he said, “I’m not here for violence. I’m here to talk.”
“Then talk,” Teryn said through his teeth.
