My breath hitched as I reached for it and thumbed through its pages. Dommik loomed over me. His presence unnerved me. I didn’t want to be rushed.
“Well?” he inquired with a heavy breath.
Quickly, but carefully, I flicked through the pages, searching for the image of the necklace. I pushed the pages wide and traced the contents with my finger. My eyes fixated on a name. My name.
Bergmont. I followed the family lineage up the page. This line wasmyfamily.
And it wasn’t just us.
The book was filled with page after page of family trees, magical heritage, all the way back to: The Source.
Dommik’s patience was running out. “Reyva—what is it?”
But we both froze before I could answer. The door handle to the office rattled. There was no time to write down any notes. We needed to take the book.
Dommik squared his stance, putting himself between me and the door, and silently drew a blade while I closed the tome and tucked it in the waistband of my chambermaid’s clothes.
The sound of keys fumbling on the other side of the door masked that of the wooden drawer I steadily pushed closed.
There, all is as it was.Except for me, of course. But I’d sort out my feelings about this mountain-sized familial secret later.
We couldn’t leave the way we came and we were nearly out of time. Luckily, Talia’s memories had shown me a way out. I strode to the wall with the lone bookcase and wedged my fingers between its wooden edges and the stone wall.
Dommik mouthed to me, ‘What are you doing?’
Busy pulling at the heavy furniture, all I could do was summon him with a nod that silently screamed, ‘Hurry up and help me!’
Sweat began to bead beneath my robes and the chain encasing my throat as I fruitlessly pulled. Dommik, on the other hand, exhibited no effort at all, pulling the bookcase away and revealing exactly what I knew would be there.
A perfectly carved opening in the stone. There was only darkness beyond the rounded edges of the opening, but the familiarity I pulled from the memory told me it was our way out.
I said a silent thank you to Talia for unknowingly saving our lives, then rushed into the dark. Behind me, Dommik pulled on an iron handle on the back of the bookcase, sealing us into the cavernous hallway. Once concealed, Dommik used his body to frame me. The black of his armor camouflaged the grays of my borrowed robes.
My eyes darted, searching, unseeing. But he was there, and he was close. And getting closer.
I didn’t gasp when his hands found my shoulders. I didn’t recoil when he pulled me into him, beneath his cloak to shield me entirely should anyone find us. I pulled my arms to my chest while he wrapped his around me.
Within the coverage of the all-consuming darkness, he could havebeen anyone. An enemy. An assailant. Rhazien himself. But my body knew better. Dommik Thorne was holding me like I was a fragile piece of glass. This was not the lust-filled, hungry Dommik I thought I knew. This was something else. Tender. Careful.
After a minute of breathless waiting, the office door beyond our hiding place closed again, and we parted. The silence in the darkness elongated those first few seconds into what felt like minutes.
Dommik placed a hand on my chest, at first laying it completely flat above my breast before tapping his fingers, mimicking my quickened heartbeat. A silent instruction for me to breathe and calm my body.
I inhaled the musky moisture of the secluded tunnel. His fingers continued to keep time and slowed alongside my beats until they reached their normal state.
Dommik’s hands found my shoulders and gave them an encouraging squeeze. Then, they slowly moved down my arms until they met my covered wrists. He pulled slightly, signaling to follow him.
Descending into the dark of the tombs was the first moment I wished I was a vampire. There may have been torches along the way, but we couldn’t risk lighting them and alerting any guards or court members that we’d been somewhere prohibited. So I let Dommik—and his vampiric sight—lead me through the relentless dark.
In those silent steps, I realized Dommik led me often, and never astray. Led me away from the axe, to the Hive, through the Moon Garden, and now the Northern Hive. In a moment of disorientation, I could trust Dommik to be my eyes.
Like the thieves we were, we crept down the hall. Twenty paces. Fifty paces. One hundred and forty-seven paces later, we paused and the sound of wood scraping against the stone floor filled the silence of the cavern.
A blend of lazy, orange light and unfazed murmurs bled into the crack between the heavy barrier and the corridor.
Dommik’s profile, illuminated by the torches beyond our hiding place, belonged to a seasoned soldier. It was alert and filled with assessment. I could almost see the wheels turning in his mind.
“What is it?” I snipped, more frustrated at the pain radiating from where my face met his back than the fact that he’d stopped moving without notice. I tried to move around him, but he turned to block my view.
