I’m steps from the Vitric Port when a wall of white flames surge up from the ground and block my way. A hiss rips out of me when my skidding stop isn’t fast enough to keep my forearm from brushing against the barricade of fire. Pain flashes up my arm, but I ignore it as I pivot and frantically search for another exit.
Like this is just another day in the office, King Noctis watches all of this while casually leaning against a wall by the entryway. He’s holding the census I chucked at him, and his face is surprisingly curious, not angry or outraged like I’d expect it to be. My eyes flit to a window opposite the both of us, but before I can even shift my weight in its direction, another wall of white flames cuts off my access.
Sweat and panic drip down the back of my neck when I realize I have no choice but to turn and face off against Kathal Noctis, King of Drameric.
Fuck.
All of the ways he could torture and then kill me flash quickly through my mind. I close my eyes for all of two seconds and slow my frenzied breathing. By the time I open my eyes, I’ve dropped my arm to my side, straightened my spine, and promised myself I won’t break no matter what.
“Are you done?” King Noctis asks evenly, a surprising hint of amusement lacing the question.
The burn on my elbow painfully thrums in time with my pounding pulse, and I use it to ground me. I steal one more hopeful glance around the dark room, but I’m well and truly trapped. I do notice that somehow the king’s fire hasn’t so much as scorched or wilted anything else in his office but me. I file that away to think about later, probably between the beatings and interrogations that are in my near future.
The king lifts a dark eyebrow. The gesture is expectant and it takes me a second to remember he asked me a question. One that continues to go unanswered as I just stand there—a phenomenon, I suspect, he’s unfamiliar with.
“I’d like to keep this conversation between us,” he tells me when it’s clear I have no intention of addressing what he asked me. “If you’re not amenable to that, I can call one of my Wing in here. Or, if you’d prefer, Aeson. If asked, either one will tie you to a chair so that we can talk. And wewilltalk. We have quite a few things that need to be sorted out before your Naming tomorrow.”
He looks toward the window, his gaze briefly studying the sliver of dawn that’s just starting to peek between the summits of Talon’s Reach.
“Correction,today,” he amends. “I planned on meeting you tomorrow, but this works just as well.”
Puzzlement immediately permeates my panic. What is he talking about? Why would he want aconversationto stay between us? Am I supposed to add whatever he’s about to say to this list of things I won’t be confessing to mid-torture?I move closer to the king and further from his blistering walls of fire. My instincts flare with warning, but I flip them the bird. If I survive whatever this is, my intuition and I are going to have a serious heart-to-heart. My gut is supposed to be warning me about traps, not leading me straight fucking into them.
The flames behind me instantly die out, and I can’t help but longingly glance over at the Syphon Glass still hanging undisturbed on the wall.
“Don’t even think about it,” King Noctis warns. “I know how that mirror works. Even if you make it through, you’ll be surrounded by guards on the other side faster than you can say Vitric Port.”
My attention snaps back to the king, his words a sharp, sobering slap.
“How the fuck do you know what a Vitric Port is?” I demand, shock shoving the gravity of who I’m talking to completely out of my mind.
King Noctis smiles, and it’s unsettling and reassuring to see both Aeson and Lorn in it. He calmly ambles over to the bookshelf behind his desk and rehomes the digital census that lured me into this elaborate trap.
“When my son mentioned that you’d taken a mirror from the vaults, I wondered if you knew about the Ports. Your father pretended to collect all kinds of mirrors to help hide the special ones. Your decision could have been purely sentimental, but it made me curious.”
“Do Lorn and Aeson know about Syphon Glass?” I ask, wanting to know just how much I misjudged this situation.
Was the vault and the Crush a setup from the beginning?
Did the Noctis brothers play me…again?
Instead of answering me, Kathal Noctis nods in the direction of the sofa and chairs in his office. The gesture is a silent order to pick my poison and choose a seat.
The king’s gaze roves over my face when I once again don’t respond. “I am not your enemy, Ever Tenebrae. I suggest you endeavor to keep it that way.”
I debate for half a second whether or not I’m going to comply, but curiosity has me cooperating. I move to the chair Aeson occupied earlier, the one in front of a now dark fireplace, and I sit.
A sliver of a smile lifts one corner of the king’s mouth, like he’s amused by my choice for some reason. King Noctis selects the same sofa he sat on when I watched him and his sons earlier from the safety of my room. I’m getting the sense that this is some kind of test, one that doesn’t start or end with the Vitric Port I took from the vaults earlier, and that means not all is lost. I don’t know what King Noctis wants, but he most definitely wants something.
“No, to answer your question, my sons have no idea that Vitric Ports exist, let alone that there’s a network of them hanging in the keeps,” King Noctis tells me while he makes himself comfortable.
I file away his use of the wordkeepsand settle back in my chair, mirroring his easygoing posture even though I’m strung tighter than a mech bow.
“That’s quite the hole you’ve knowingly left in your defenses,” I blurt and then instantly want to punch myself for it.
Nice, Ever. Let’s provoke the asshole who just caught you rummaging through his office. While you’re at it, be sure to remind him that he should shatter all the escape routes you just discovered.
“It’s not a security concern when you think everyone capable of accessing the Ports is long dead,” King Noctis counters, and there’s a tinge of sorrow in the statement.
