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His usually polite tone dripped with frustration and anger at his own imprudence.

I stifled a laugh and nodded to him. “Have a good evening, Silver.”

“And you, Miss Cricket.”

I didn’t hear him enter. I had seated myself at the window, pushing it wide open letting the evening air flow into the room and chase the ghosts of my own imagination out into the night. The table had been pushed away, and the massive wingback chair had been placed in its stead so I could watch the glory of the sunset and the stillness of the night sweep in over the book I had chosen from his small library.

I had already pored over the Onomastic Priority and had moved on to The Great and Mighty Legacies, a massive tome three times the size of all the other books and latched closed with three metal work fixtures. It contained the collected histories of the important figures in the peerage of the Fae. Of my specific interest, and it seemed that of The Raven as well, if the smudges on the pages were any indication, was the House of Magic.

I memorized the map of the noble manors, palaces, castles, and fortresses that were depicted in the center of the book. I hoped that it had been updated shortly before the war and that the landscape had not changed too much for me to be able to navigate it when the time came.

I didn’t feel him creep up on me, but the way his gloved hands settled on my shoulders and began firmly but gently kneading at the muscles sent waves of contentment and affection washing through me.

I looked up from the page, thankfully on a section about his own court and not the House of Magic, when he had interrupted. “Good evening, Raven.”

A smile the texture of down and just as light, bloomed in his face as our eyes met. “Good evening, little bug. Enjoying the book?”

“I figured if I was going to be here, I might as well learn some about the Fae of the land. I finished the other one already. You don’t mind, do you?”

It felt . . . warm and sticky sweet not to fight with him for once. It felt like we had been fighting tooth and claw for ages.

“Not at all. What’s mine is yours. If you have interest in the histories of the Fae, I could have a book or two brought up for you from the library. You would have to read them here, though. Humans are not allowed access to the library or any of the books within it.”

I laid a hand over his on my shoulder, letting our fingers lace together naturally, and squeezed them gently. “I’d like that very much.”

“Name the topics that would bring you delight, and I will have them brought to you.” He leaned down and placed a scorching fire kiss on the center of my forehead. “Anything at all to have you look at me like that more.”

“And how am I looking at you?” I felt the kiss singe away the paper-thin armor around me, curling up the edges into delicate black scrolls.

“Like I am not your enemy, for once. It’s intoxicating.”

“I thought you liked my claws.”

“Oh, I very much do. I also like to see your happiness, too.” His fingers tightened on mine. “I would enjoy any and all of your moods and passions, little bug, if I could leave my duties and see you thus every evening.”

The if in that statement twisted the sweet moment into bitterness on my tongue. I knew why the if was there. He didn’t seem to realize it, but I knew why it was there. It was a simple slip of the tongue, but I caught it. I knew that evenings such as this were but stolen moments in time between our other lives. I had a mission before me, and he had a wedding ceremony with the one Fae I hated more than his former lover.

I let a soft smile twist into my face to try and hide the acrid poison that had slipped between us and turned my eyes back to the book.

I could feel him frowning behind me, could almost sense him trying to work out what had happened, why I had retracted from the sweetness of his sentiment. The truth was far too deadly of a knife between us for either of us to acknowledge it.

“I’ll draw you a bath. Stay right there. Enjoy your book. Come join me when you are ready.”

I tipped my head back up with a teasing grin. “Joining me in the bath this time, Raven? My, my, how the days of ignoring you have made you bold.”

“Sweet little bug, it’s not a lack of boldness that keeps me from your thighs, but, no, I will let you enjoy your bath in peace.”

The teasing tilt of his lips matched mine perfectly, and I wished I could devour it with a kiss.

His fingers drew away from mine, and I let them trail over my braid and then disappear, floating away. I knew I should savor these moments, these small glimmering memories that I would take with me when he turned against me. Soon, he would marry that viper, and I would steal away into the countryside to figure out how to burn every scrap of the Fae realm to the ground and then, hopefully, back to the human realm.

He would be duty bound to raise his sword against me when that happened. I knew what the Fae did to humans that slipped their leash, even if the memory of Cypress and Rook were songs on the winds of days blown into the past.

I let my eyes pretend to skip over the words on the page, not seeing any of it as I listened to him draw a bath, test the water, draw more water into the basin, and keep testing it until he was satisfied. I set the book down and knelt on the chair, peeking over the top of it to watch him work.

His massive height seemed to dwarf the copper tub as he moved efficiently from a cabinet to gather the supplies he picked out. Each bottle was opened, sniffed, and measured on its worth before either being added to his pile or returned. Each towel was scrutinized and tested between two pinched fingers, and any that he deemed unworthy to touch me were returned. He hesitated after a moment of selecting all the items that he wanted, seeming to take a great while to decide on taking the item from the cabinet and obscuring it under the pile of towels before turning back to the bath.

He knelt next to the tub, rolling up the sleeves to his tunic to reveal scarred forearms the size of my thigh, the dusting dark mark of my long since healed bite mark still present. A network of nicks and cuts laid phantoms of themselves across the flesh he used to mix the oils, perfumes, and dried flowers into the water. Salts of some sort were poured in as he labored to ensure that the bath was to his exact preference before flicking the water from his fingers.