Page 129 of Collared by the Vampire Prince

I let her glimpse me at the edge of the courtyard, then turn away as though I have not noticed her and slip through the nearest door.

By the time she follows, I am already taking the servants’ stairs to the third-floor gallery, where nobody lingers because the portraits follow you with their eyes. I dawdle there just long enough to hear Victoria’s voice approaching before retreating downstairs to the music room.

It is empty and smells of dust and old rosin, and I sit on the piano stool with my feet on the rail and let the minutes pass.

I wonder what it would be like to know how to play. Music lessons are mostly a vampire privilege; the few shifters permitted them tend to be steered towards instruments considered less refined, like drums.

It occurs to me, sitting there in Nathaniel’s coat with my head tipped back against the piano, that I am enjoying this more than I should. Not the plan. The cruelty of it. The small, precise pleasure of making a woman lose her composure in front of everyone she has been trying to impress.

I decide not to dwell on what that says about me.

I have barely begun imagining myself at the piano when footsteps sound in the corridor.

Surely not.

A door opens somewhere nearby. Closes. Then another.

Oh, for fuck’s sake. She’s checking the rooms one by one.

The footsteps draw closer.

I am through the adjoining practice room and out its second door in a heartbeat, plucking a few petals from the bouquet and dropping them behind me for good measure.

The bell rings as I disappear around the corner, fighting a grin.

By now, it must look like a vampiress hunting a wolf through her own school.

I take the long way to History and leave her to search a little longer.

Then I take my seat and wait.

She arrives ten minutes late with two spots of colour high on her cheekbones.

Professor Saunders is already deep into the trade disputes that preceded the Takeover—disputes that ended when Henrikk conquered every kingdom on the continent and ‘united’ us all under his flag. It left no one within reach to trade with and therefore turned the Crown’s attention overseas.

Unlike Saunders’ usual solemn accounts, today there is a note of victory in her voice, restrained but unmistakable, as though every collapsed border proves the brilliance of the Crown’s expansion. She does not stop talking when Victoria enters. I am not certain she even notices.

Victoria comes to the end of my row and stands there with her hands folded. I slowly turn my head and blink politely up at her.

“Excuse me, Professor Saunders.” Victoria’s voice cuts clean across the room. “I need a word with Kira.”

Every head in the room turns. Becky’s mouth falls open. Someone at the back laughs, then quickly swallows it.

Victoria’s friends, in particular, look delighted, stifling sniggers behind their hands. Victoria shoots them a cool look that shuts them up.

Saunders nods without breaking the flow of her lecture and waves us away.

I close my book, square it on the desk, and stand. Then I smooth the prince’s coat.

“Of course,” I say politely to Victoria. I had wanted witnesses, but refusing now might cost me my only chance to reach Nathaniel.

I walk out ahead of her with every eye in the room following me.

The corridors are empty with everyone in class. Victoria walks three paces ahead of me without looking back, apparently trusting I will follow. She turns one corner, then another, and stops in a dark stretch of hallway where the torches are unlit and every door is closed.

Then she rounds on me, bringing us almost nose-to-nose. “Take it off.”

I blink. “Take what off?”