“His Grace hasn’t called for—”
“—I know he hasn’t called for me.” I kept my voice mild. “That’s rather the point.”
A pause, and Alexander weighed it. I watched him do so, watched the slight tightening around his eyes, the barely perceptible shift in his jaw. He was a loyal man, Alexander. Genuinely so, not the performed variety. That made him predictable.
“Your wife is well?” I asked.
The question landed exactly as intended, and his composure slipped by a fraction, but only a fraction.
“She’s improving, my lord. Thank you.”
“Good.” I held his gaze a moment longer than necessary. “The king, Alexander.”
He stepped aside.
When I entered the room, Arthur was standing at the window.
He stood with his back to me, one hand braced against the stone frame, looking down at the training yard below. He was still wearing his nightclothes: a dark linen tunic, unlaced at the collar, and dark braies. The dragon tattoo was visible through the thin fabric, the lines of it shifting slightly as he breathed, and for a moment, the ink looked almost animate. Almost.
I’d seen that tattoo for years, but only recently had I truly understood what it meant.
He didn’t turn around.
“Whatever it is, Kay, it can wait.”
“It can’t.”
A silence. He turned, then his eyes found me in the dimness and stayed there. The blue was flat this morning: not cold exactly, just settled. A man who hadn’t slept, or hadn’t slept well, and had stopped trying to hide it.
“Close the door,” he said.
I did.
Then I crossed the room at a measured pace. Not hurried, never hurried. I stopped a few feet from him, clasped my hands behind my back, and looked at him the way I imagined a brother looked at a brother, which was a thing I’d spent considerable time studying because I’d never quite felt it naturally.
“You look terrible,” I said.
His mouth moved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Kay, invaluable as always.”
“How long has it been since you slept more than a few hours?”
“That’s not why you’re here.”
“No,” I agreed. “It isn’t.”
I let the silence sit. Arthur’s eyes narrowed by a degree, that slight calculation he always did, that quick assessment, and I watched it happen. Watched him try to read me and find, as healways found, not very much. I’d made a lifelong study of giving people only what I wanted them to see.
“Say it then,” he said.
“I know about the dragon.”
Nothing moved in his face. Nothing at all. That told me more than an expression would have.
“How long have you known?”
I cocked my head to the side as I pretended to think about it. “Long enough.”
“And how did you—”
