He clung to the shadows.What he wouldn’t give for a glamour, a little illusion to cast himself in obscurity.He had only an immensity of curiosity.It would do.
He stepped into the floating chamber, pulled the lever, and descended.
Other than their wrought iron ornamental gates, there were no barriers between the riders of the chambers and each floor.When he traveled to the forge each morning, he passed other smaller forges, offices, a library.
This descent was different.He watched nothing but solid rock pass, and when that rock gave way, it was a wall of iron bars.He pulled a small fairy orb from his pocket, and the heat from his palm activated its dim glow, cast a pale-yellow light on this new find.
A dungeon.
“Bloody hell.”
The platform jolted as it stopped, and Apollo grabbed the lever, looking left and right.No guards.No one, it seemed, occupying the little dirty cells.So he stepped off.
“Where’d they put her?”Depending on whoshewas and who’d ordered her here, Apollo could use this information to ingratiate himself with Stone.
Behind him, the floating chamber’s platform hummed and lifted.Someone had summoned the damn thing.Someone was coming from above.
Apollo’s orb revealed a long corridor stretching out in both directions, cells on either side of it.
A groan echoed down the one to Apollo’s left.He crept that way.If there was an open empty cell, he could hide until whomever was coming finished their business down here and left.He was in luck, every cell was empty.He had plenty of choices.
Another groan, the rustle of cloth against stone.
He hurried toward it, holding his orb high, and was rewarded with his first glimpse of the lump with yellow hair—a woman.Her men’s clothes revealed delicious curves.Right ones, perfect places.No wonder women didn’t wear trousers.Men would be wearing hard-ons all day long.
And those stays.Scandal.Laced over a man’s shirt, pushing her breasts up.Was he lusting after an unconscious woman?
Uncomfortably, yes.
An unconscious woman with lots of yellow hair tangled around a pale face.A pale,familiarface.
“Fuck,” he hissed.That was Temple Grant’ssister!Temple Grant!Royal Alchemist to the Queen and married to Apollo’s cousin Diana.The unconscious beauty was Diana’s sister-in-law!Grant would not be happy about this.That the world’s most dangerous understatement.If Grant thought Apollo had anything to do with his sister’s current predicament, he’d fashion a steel hammer from a garden gate and slam it into Apollo’s head.
The girl… what was her name?She groaned again, eyes fluttering but closed, and lifted a hand to her temple.Her head lolled to the side, opening the vulnerable curve of her naked neck.
He’d held a blade to her throat once, pressed it, cold in his hand, to the arteries in her pretty little neck.He’d been so damn high on potion and opium, he couldn’t remember much.
What he did remember, though—the curvy armful who’d smelled like warm wine and spices, the silk of her curled hair brushing his cheek.Her bright defiance, how she’d been strong and hissing like a cat in his arms.
He remembered, too, his intent to kill her if he had to.
The platform clanged onto the stone floor down the corridor.
Apollo cursed and shoved his orb back into his pocket, dousing its light.Footsteps echoed through the dungeon as he dove into an open cell next to the one that held Grant’s sister.He rolled into the darkness under a narrow cot and pressed himself against the cold bars that made up the walls of the cell.
The footsteps approached, each one louder than the last.Apollo craned his neck to peer into the hallway.Too dark.Couldn’t see a damn thing.Then light blinked on, and the dim glow of a fairy orb illuminated a man’s tall form sailing down the corridor with long, darkness-eating strides.
Apollo held his breath, not quite able to see the man’s face from this low angle as he opened the Grant woman’s cell.He stepped inside, kicked the girl.
Miss Grant groaned once more.She rolled to her side and pushed herself upright.“You.”Her voice was faint, groggy.
“Yes, me.Now, Sybil darling”—the man squatted, bringing his light and his face into view.Apollo swallowed a curse as the Master of the Alchemist Guild grinned—“you and I need to have a little chat.”
Sybil spit in the master’s face.
Her brother would assassinate the entire guild to avenge her.Not that she needed protection.She seemed to have it under control.
Stone’s hand struck out and clasped Sybil’s throat, cutting off a yelp as soon as it began.
