“You noticed,” I say, touching the ends, which feel like nothing but a suggestion in this form.
“I notice a great number of things about you.”
My breath catches in my throat and I get the phantom sensation of my body flushing. Such alluring words for sucha vile creature. I recall when he first spoke to me here, of the spider web he destroyed when explaining mind walking. He reminds me of a spider now, spinning a beautiful, glittering web to pull me in and trap me.
“You left rather suddenly this morning,” he says, the comment casual, meant to be unassuming as he rises to fix himself a cup of tea, abandoning whatever he was writing. It seems almost as if he doesn’t know what to do with himself.
All his indecision is putting me on edge, so I stride further into the room and sit on the end of his bed and lean back on my hands. “Rather bold for you to bring that up when you were the one watching me sleep.” He says nothing in response. I think back on the nights I came here and he wasn’t present. Eventually, I would settle down somewhere in his room, usually on his bed, until my mind drifted away into some vague concept of sleep. I hadn’t really thought of what happens to my manifestation during those times. I’m wondering now if, at some point, he’d returned to his rooms to find me asleep. “Do you do that often?” I ask, my muscles tensing as I await his answer.
“Does it frighten you if I admit that I do?” he responds.
If my stare were acid it would bore holes into his back. “No.”
Zhoric turns and raises a brow. “You shouldn’t cast judgment over the quality of my lies when yours are equally lacking.”
The only response I have for that is an amused grin, which he turns from swiftly before I can catch his reaction.
“Youwerewaiting for me,” I goad. “Who else would it be? No one ever comes here.”
“You’ve been here a matter of weeks. That tells you nothing.”
“Tell me who was coming, then.”
“Perhaps it was a mistress,” he says.
At his words, it’s as if the very soul inside me goes still. “Perhaps?”
There’s a knock at the door. Zhoric straightens, and my shoulders tense uptowards my ears.
“You were waiting for someone,” I whisper. The sensation of a lip prying up in a snarl dances through me.
As Zhoric moves towards the door, I hear it escape on a breath, almost as if he didn’t mean for the word to pass his lips. “No.”
Two thoughts cross my mind at once. Hewaswaiting for me, and: I hope he wasn’t being serious when he mentioned a mistress. I stand and cross the room as he sweeps open one side of the door.
“Thrace,” Zhoric says. I lean against the second door Zhoric didn’t open. “Trouble to report?”
“Zhoric, you haven’t let me in in weeks,” Thrace says. “What’s going on?”
“You’re with your bonded and children. You should be glad I haven’t called on you.”
My nerves prickle, dancing on edge—Zhoric knows about Kalixta and Thrace. I step closer to try to catch a glimpse of Thrace, to see if there’s any panic in him at the mention of my sister and his children from the great ruler’s lips. Zhoric doesn’t move aside to give me space to see. And so, I settle my face as near to him as I dare. I catch the subtle flare of his nostrils.
“I can handle both, Zhoric. My family and you.”
“I never said you couldn’t.” Zhoric remains unmovable.
“Let me in.” Thrace demands, sounding more like a petulant brother than the draconem in charge of the Sar Dyeus’s safety.
“No.”
“You have to tell me what’s going on. How can I protect you when you don’t give me the information I need to do it?”
“Thrace,” Zhoric begins and even I can hear the warning in his tone.
“No. Zhoric, no. We’ve been down that road before and look where we ended up. Look at you.”
Zhoric remains silent, the set of his brow deepening. “It’s not like the last time,” he says and my hope leaps to catch the words, even as I realize it means he doesn’t see meas a threat. Good. He shouldn’t. If he did, then my plans would be as dead as me if he ever found out what I was trying to do.
