Ugh. I’d have to send Olivian a bill, once this was over. One that included a hefty fee for my pain and suffering.
Within minutes, we joined the influx of theatregoers. Threadbare waistcoats and handheld paper fans gleamed in the torchlight. Kyven dropped a few coins into the ticket-seller’s hand before leading us to our red velvet seats.
I settled in to absorb the scene. The auditorium’s proscenium arch, once gilded, now bore a patina of neglect, but the chandelier made up for it, sparkling with a thousand dangling crystals. Anticipation fizzed in the air. As we waited, someone tossed a pair of underwear onto the curtained stage, prompting ripples of laughter.
A few moments later, the curtain lifted. Kyven’s grip on my hand tightened.
Pirates swaggered onto the stage, accompanied by a creaking ship powered by ropes and pulleys. In the background, drums and cymbals clashed out a thunderstorm.
I leaned in. For the next half-hour, two rival pirate captains—a dark-skinned woman and a brown-haired man—tried to kill one another. When that failed, they grudgingly fell in loveinstead, culminating in a fiery love scene complete with a satin-draped bed and bare, heaving breasts.
They were beautiful together. Incendiary. So much that something fluttered in the base of my stomach, and I couldn’t stop myself from glancing over at Kyven.
He gazed back at me, his eyes like blazing blue stars. His expression crackled with lust, but also with something else—a glittering delight, a joy I’d previously glimpsed only in passing. Now it had found a new home in the sweep of his brows, in the imperial tilt of his nose.
“I love this,” he whispered. “The theatre. I love it more than anything in the world. I could come here every night and never tire of it.”
I searched his face. “Really? But...what happened to you not having feelings?”
“Oh, lioness.” His eyes softened. “Haven’t you figured it out? You shouldn’t take anything I say seriously. Only half of it has any basis in reality.”
I stared, caught up in him, somehow. The sheer delight pouring from him felt so...real. So authentic the plaster ceiling could have fallen in and I wouldn’t have looked away. “Does that mean...youwouldn’thave kept me up on our wedding night, then?”
The moment the words emerged, I clamped my lips together. What the hell? I could’ve said anything, and I’d said...that.
Kyven grinned. Not halfway this time, but full and white, as wide as a promise. “Ah, but that’s the fun part. Figuring out which half to believe.”
He held my eyes a moment longer, then returned to the play. And he really did look like a boy on Solsticetide Evening, breathless and radiant, eager to hang his lantern outside the door so Zephyrine could leave her gifts on the longest night of the year.
The play’s action rose, but failed to recapture my focus. Kyven was like a blue-and-red flame beside me, a bright, burning thing that tangled with thoughts of Eliana and Amryssa.
That wasn’t him.He didn’t do those things.
Seeing him like this, I could almost believe it. After all, Kyven had let me go, in the cellar. He’dprotectedme. And how could a man with a raw love for theatre, with a ready laugh and a zest for...well,everything, it seemed...delight in hurting people?
Possibilities threaded through my mind. I was missing something here. I could feel it.
The play ended. Cheers erupted, Kyven hollering louder than anyone else. When the curtain fell, we rode the crowd out into the sticky evening, where he reclaimed my hand and whisked me down a side street.
A block later, he paused before a rain-stained bulletin board. Ancient flyers advertised shows that had come and gone, while others detailed job postings that no longer existed.
Kyven tapped a Wanted poster. “What’s this?”
I scanned the yellowed parchment. The headline offered a reward for the leader of the swamp brigands, then listed the man’s crimes: robbery, highway banditry, tax evasion. The accompanying portrait was generic and washed-out, and could have been anyone.
The poster must have been years old, considering no lawmen remained to collect a reward from. “It’s about the outlaws living in the woods. The same group that woman in the cellar was from.”
Kyven ran a finger along the bottom of the poster, where someone had scrawled a handwritten addition.The true seneschal of Oceansgate. “And this?”
My mouth tightened. “I don’t know. They’re common thieves, but...their founder has become kind of a mythic figure, at this point. People act like he’s the champion of thedowntrodden. The noble thief who helps the poor, that sort of thing. Maybe because he gives away money. Or used to, when the nightmares first started. And he’s made sure everyone in Oceansgate has a set of chains. But calling him ‘the rightful seneschal’ is ridiculous. I guess Olivian just hasn’t cultivated the people’s love, like this guy has.”
Kyven tore the poster off the wall and folded it into the pocket of his tailcoat.
“What’re you doing?”
“Research.” He flashed a sunlit smile. “I want to know everything about my new home.”
I gave him a skeptical look, but he was already pulling me by the hand again. A brisk walk later, we veered through a doorway, and I found myself sitting at a wooden table in a crowded pub.
