Chapter Twenty-Three
I wait only thirty seconds, long enough for Bram to leave this floor, before I burst out of my door and race down the stairs, across the frozen courtyard, and up the stairs of the east wing.
I don’t bother knocking, and the ornately carved door isn’t locked.
The room is dark, and in the middle of the bed, Emmett’s sleeping form is tucked under a pile of blankets. I am flooded with relief that there isn’t someone next to him. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d found Thalia here.
I shove his shoulder. “Emmett, please, wake up.”
He startles awake. “Ivy?” His voice is gravelly with sleep and he rubs at his eyes.
“We have to go.” I throw the blankets off of him, then snatch the jacket hanging on the back of his desk chair and toss it at him. “Get up, now.”
I’m reminded of a night just like this, months ago. I burst into Emmett’s room right after Queen Mor told me I’d lost the competition for Bram’s hand. I was panicked then, too. If only I’d known.
“What’s happening?” Emmett says groggily. His long hairhangs over his face. He makes an attempt to brush it away, but it flops right back.
“Bram knows.” I pull shoes from the wardrobe and throw them to the edge of his bed. “He knows about us.”
“How?” Emmett is moving, but too slow for my taste.
“He came to my room glamoured as you. I think he suspected it was you who was knocking earlier, so he left and came back.” I swallow the sob crawling up my throat. “I thought he was you.”
At this, Emmett springs from the bed and races over to me.
He captures my face in his hands and tips it from left to right, looking for any signs of harm. “Are you all right? Did he—”
“I’m fine. He didn’t get far.”
Emmett sighs in wordless relief, then slips on his breeches, his jacket, and laces up his boots.
He rises and grabs both my hands in his. We’re both shaking a little, but neither of us acknowledges it.
“Are you ready?” he asks. His eyes are so soft, and in them I see how deeply he wants to protect me, how it kills him that he can’t.
“It’s time. It has to be now.”
“Marion and Faith? Rhion? Your sister?” he asks, and a stab of pain bolts through me.
“We don’t have time. Did you send Nan the letter?”
Emmett nods, his eyes swimming with grief.
“Then let’s go,” I say.
We race across the castle to my room, which feels tainted and wrong now. The bed is rumpled, the carpet corner askew from where I ran out the door. Mercifully, Ferrinus is right where I left it, tucked safely between the bedframe and the mattress.
I’m grateful Emmett and I had the foresight to create a backupplan last night, but I never dreamed we’d have to put it into action so soon.
He helps me out of my nightclothes and into a simple black dress, and I toss my blue cloak over it. I hide the knife in the interior pocket, its weight a steady comfort.
We take the back service staircase down into the dungeons, hoping to avoid Bram or his guards.
The first guard we encounter stands at the entrance to the dungeons; when he sees Emmett and me, he waves us by lazily.
I feign tripping over the hem of my dress and fling myself onto the ground at the guard’s feet.
As he bends to help me up, Emmett uses his height to reach over his head and swipe the set of keys that hangs on the pegboard above the guard’s chair.
