The guard to my right pounds on the oaken slab. “My lord. We have a trespasser. Prince Gherahn said to bring her to you.”
That was the prince. It wasn’t my imagination. He has a name.
Elias. Prince Elias Gherahn.
King Gherahn’s… son? How?
A quiver tightens the muscles along my spine. Something isn’t right.
The door opens of its own volition, and I’m met with a familiar scent that is so strong it almost brings me to my knees. Rich spices, dark wood, and the honey-sweet aroma of ancient magick.
The guards shove me into this room as well, and though my mind races to try and place the fine woods and the bed and the rugs and the many, many shelves of books, I can’t think clearly.
Candlelight flickers around the chambers, making me feel like I’m in a dream, because everything is all wrong. Especially when a naked man pushes up from a silver soaking tub, steps out, and strides soaking wet to a small table where a bath linen awaits.
Because I know that body. I know every single line touched by the shadow of candlelight. Except it bears no runes. Not a single scar on his smooth, golden skin.
And then he speaks.
“Kneel.” The guards send me to my knees again, and that voice… “What did she do?”
Tears well in my eyes. I want to wake up. I don’t like this dream. It feels so wrong. That voice has whispered against my skin. It has scolded me and begged me and loved me. It has never sounded so empty. It has never sounded so foreign.
“She was in the ruins, my lord. She had fire magick. Killed one of our men with a dagger to the face. She doesn’t look like much, but she’s trained. Clearly.”
My heart pounds and pounds as he wraps the linen around his waist to hide the nakedness he so openly revealed earlier and starts toward me. Something in the way he moves—like a predator stalking prey—makes me want to cry. And I do.
Tears fall down my cheeks as a strange sort of knowing tightens my chest to the point of pain. When he stops a few feet away, and I look up into those sparkling green eyes, I know it isn’t him. There’s not a single rune mark on his chest, not even the one he made for me. There’s also no recollection in his gaze. No love. No happiness at seeing my face.
And yet, faster than I can think about it, my feet are taking me to him. He’s whole and well and… free, it seems. And the joy inside me overwhelms.
But I no sooner throw my arms around his neck than he shoves me off him, gripping my wrists painfully in his strong hands.
Using his weight, he drives me back against the wall, pinning me in place, his fingers cutting into my flesh enough to bruise, enough to make my burn flare with pain. “You kneel to me. Do you understand?”
More tears. They fall so fast and so hard I can hardly see. My Alexus would never do this. Never. He would never look at me with such fire, such animosity. He would never allow me to kneel to anyone, and he would never hurt me.
But this man… This man is not Alexus Thibault.
Suddenly, he’s leaning in, his smooth face so close, his scent enveloping me.
“Who sent you here?” His words squeeze between gritted teeth.
Loria, please let this be a dream. Let me wake up.
When I say nothing, he slams my wrists against the wall again, sending a shudder of fear through me.
“A spy? Who sent you? I will find out.” He tilts his dark head. “It won’t be pleasant when I yank that truth from you, know that.”
I shake my head, unable to explain that I can’t speak. Unable to explain anything. Even to myself.
Before I realize what’s happening, he bends down, heaves me onto his shoulder, and shoves past the guards. He heads into the library, stalking down the center aisle with me draped over his body like a sack of grain.
I can’t tell where we are or where we’re going, I only know that in a matter of minutes, we’re going down a set of stone stairs, then another, then another, until he pushes through a door that clangs against its stone frame.
It isn’t until he dumps me on the dirt floor of a torchlit dungeon cell and says, “Welcome to the School of Night and Dawn,” that I know, for certain, where I am.
It’s still confusing, because I’ve seen Colden and Fleurie in a dungeon just like this so many times. Except… it’s not as old. In fact, it doesn’t look old at all. The iron bars are still black. The stone steps are not worn in the middle. The torchlight chains are not rusted. And these cells are even smaller.
