“The others are usually more creative, but yes. Every time.” Eli ran his hands through his hair. “He’ll be speaking nonsense eventually. One man hunted me for weeks—he couldn’t even speak by the end of it. I shot him as he was running at me on all fours, like a wolf.”
Rey gripped the wall as he stood. “When was that?”
“I don’t know. Not long after it all started. Olivier’s almost tame by comparison, but if he starts talking like the rest of them soon, maybe he’ll be locked up long enough for us to get the sword.”
“What are you saying?” Olivier squinted at Eli. “What sword? Is it code for Sabre?”
“You need to find someone else to think about,” Eli snapped.
“But that’s a possibility, you know,” Rey said. He still looked far too pale, and Eli could see him trembling as he walked over to whisper in Eli’s ear. “Sabre. We can tell him. It’ll make him sympathize with us. He might feel like he owes us.”
“I don’t want him seeing this,” Eli said.
“You said he’s a good man,” Rey said. “He’s the only noble we can trust right now, anyway.”
Eli sighed. “Fine. Go get him. I’ll watch Olivier.”
“Maybe I should watch him.” Rey glanced at the bed frame. “I don’t trust him alone with you.”
“You mean you think I’ll kill him.” Eli met Rey’s gaze, but Rey didn’t look away. “All right. I’ll do it, but don’t let him slip free.”
“I won’t,” Rey said, eyeing Olivier warily, “I assure you.”
Eli could feel the heat of Olivier’s glare on his back as he gathered his clothes. Guilt gnawed at him as he laced up his boots and buckled on his sword. Most of the time, he could justify killing the men who hunted him down. He was defending himself, and most of them were killers or abusers already. Did that make Olivier one? Before the party, Eli would have thought Olivier to be somewhat vapid but pleasant overall. But the way he spoke of Sabre implied he was someone who liked to inflict pain for pain’s sake, not as a dominant or in service to a masochistic submissive. If he had actually done those things to Sabre, if he wasn’t making it up to brag to a country noble, that made him just as dangerous as the other hunters.
Eli shuddered. He knew why he’d wanted to bash Olivier’s head against the bed frame, and it wasn’t self-defense. In the end, he was a killer at heart, too. All that talk Rey had spouted about selflessness and knighthood was just a bit of magic, nothing more.
Rain drummed over the sloped roofs and made small rivers in the gutters as Eli marched down the street toward the pleasure district. Dawn was approaching, but the district was still awash in streetlights, even in the pouring rain. Public eating houses lined one side of the road, where people huddled under awnings with paper-wrapped meals and mugs of hot tea. Carriages lined the other side of the road, waiting for noble customers to return from their stay in the enormous pleasurehouses draped in expensive curtains and lights. Stumping along with his nerves singing and his cloak soaked with rain, Eli felt like a wet street cat among house pets in jeweled collars.
He rang the bell at the House of Onyx, and the door popped open to reveal a woman with the largest bosom Eli had ever seen. She was covered in black lace with a pattern of roses and spiders, and the woman smiled warmly when Eli realized he was staring and took a hasty step back.
“Don’t worry, sweetheart, they aren’t dangerous.” She winked. “Are you here for someone?”
She must have thought Eli was a servant calling for one of their customers. Eli ignored the blush spreading over his face and down his neck and cleared his throat. “No. No, I’m here for, um—maybe I am, actually. He’s…” Eli found himself at a loss. How on earth could he explain that he needed his brother to deal with a noble tied up in a rented house down the street? “I need to see Sabre de Valois.”
The woman barked out a laugh. “Of course. You even talk like him. Come in and I’ll see if he’s available.” She held the door open, and Eli looked up at the high building with its eerie purple lamps and dark curtains. He could practically smell the smoke and rot of collapsed beams and smoldering fireplaces.
This was going to be a disaster. They should have just gone to the guards, or they should have killed Olivier and dumped him in a midden somewhere. He should have never dueled Olivier in the first place. He should have tripped him instead and let him drown in the ornamental creek.
“Never mind,” Eli said, taking a step back. “I’m sorry to waste your time.”
“No one said it’s a waste, honey,” the woman said, and closed the door.
The door opened again almost too quickly, and Eli frowned as the lean figure of Lord de Rue appeared in the entrance,dressed in a fine velvet suit that brought out the violet in his eyes.
“You needed to speak to Sabre?”
“Yes.” Eli could feel Lord de Rue’s dominance weaving through the air. It was a sly thing, not at all blunt and cutting like Eli’s, worming its way into his head and setting the hairs on the back of his neck on end. Eli crossed his arms, and Lord de Rue raised a single brow.
“Very well,” Lord de Rue said. “Let’s be frank. You know my sister is an actress, yes? A particularly famous one.”
Eli frowned. “What does that have to do with me?”
“In the past three months,” Lord de Rue said, “two men have tried to climb the fence into her new house. Two. I had the pleasure of removing the second one myself, since I was visiting at the time, and do you know what I find particularly interesting? You have the same look in your eyes as he did. It’s as though you’re hungry—starving—and you can’t tear your gaze away.”
“I have no interest in your sister,” Eli said, taking a step back. Clearly, Lord de Rue was a man on the edge. Perhaps being related to actors did that to people.
“Of course you don’t,” Lord de Rue said. “It’s Sabre. Did you think I didn’t notice? I’ve had admirers of my own, you know—fervent ones, the sort you need to lock your windows for. They looked at me in much the same way. At the play, at the party—everywhere you so conveniently ended up bumping into us, you watched Sabre like he was an oasis in a desert.”
