I flushed.
“You enjoy the gardens?” he asked, sliding into the bench opposite me beneath the vines. I’d opted for the tree, however. It made me feel more…connected to the stories I created. It was easier to imagine myself in the wilds of Noxily when I was surrounded by nature.
I nodded. “Very much so. Did you design them?”
Kaldur took his time answering, but he finally said, “My mother did. In her own way.”
“How so?”
“These,” he said, gesturing behind me and all around us, “were the designs she’d made for my family’s keep in Laras. But after she died, well…Azur cares not for flowers and trees. The existing gardens suited the keep just fine, he said. So I stole the plans from our vault and had them built here in Vyaan.”
A laugh of disbelief emerged from my lips. “Youstolethem?”
“When you grow up with as many brothers and a clever little sister as I did,” he began, “you learn to take what you want instead of asking for permission. Because someone will always have something to say about it. But I don’t have to tell you that.”
I jolted but tried to hide it. “Why do you say that?”
“I hear that you grew up in an orphanage. Near the farmlands. Who was the overseer again? Rizan?”
My tongue felt heavy. “His name was Wrezaan.”
“That’s right,” Kaldur said.
“You…you asked about me?”
“All of the keepers are vetted when they come to work in my House,” Kaldur said, spearing me with a curious look, as if eager to see how I’d respond to the knowledge that he’d been pokinginto my past. “Maudoric merely delivered your file to me. I read it before I extended the contract to you.”
I didn’t know how to feel about that. I wouldn’t hide anything from him if he asked, but this felt discomforting.
“Are you upset by that?” he wondered, quirking a brow.
“I’m not hiding anything,” I answered.
“I never suggested that you were,” he said, every word careful but clipped. Direct. Then he smirked. “Though if you were, I would be most intrigued by it.”
I didn’t want to talk about the orphanage or Wrezaan. Not that anything especially bad had happened to me there; it was just…they were just memories that were better placed in the deep folds of my mind where I didn’t have to uncover them unwillingly. There were many that I loved though. Memories of Luc, of some of the children I’d grown up with, of discovering my love for drawing and writing.
And yet…
“You don’t want to tell me, and now I will not rest until I know,” Kaldur said, his gaze sharpening. “All right, littledallia, I’ll ignore it for now. Though if you want my advice…whenever youdon’twant to talk about something, act like you don’t care if you do.”
“I confess I’m not so experienced in hiding my emotions as I think you might be,” I said, the words tumbling out.
Kaldur laughed. A short, deep chuckle that told me he was surprised, and not offended, by the quick words.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have?—”
“You’re right—it’s a skill I’ve practiced since before I could even speak,” he told me. His smile faded. “Though now that you are my blood giver, Erina, you may need to practice just that. Nobles can be vicious creatures. They’ll feast if they sense weakness.”
My brow furrowed. My lips parted, but no words came out.
Kaldur snorted. “You’re terrible at it,” he commented. “Everyemotion laid out on your face for me to see. It’s beautifully fascinating as much as it’s a fragility in need of strengthening.”
“I didn’t realize I’d need to be conversing with nobles to be your blood giver,” I commented. The way he was watching me made my hands tremble. It was an intense observation, one that made me feel like he could see every throb of my heart and hear every quick catch of my breath. Like he could see inside my mind and find all the things I feared and all the things I wanted.
“Oh, did I not put that in our contract?” he asked flippantly. “I’ll have to make an amendment.”
He was teasing me, I realized, and I relaxed.
