“Did you hear that?” he said.
I curled my lip, prepared to tell him just how unfunny I found his little joke, then choked on my reproach. Footsteps sounded in the hall, so heavy and lumbering they could only belong to one person.
My heart flung itself up my throat. “Oh no. No, no, no. You’vegotto be kidding me.”
Kyven burst into motion, crossing the room in two strides and taking me by the arm. Panicked as I was, I didn’t resist, just let him propel me toward the bed, where he motioned for me to get underneath.
“Hurry,” he hissed. More footsteps, closer now.
I threw myself onto the carpet and wriggled beneath the bed-skirt. Darkness swallowed me up, so complete that only the dust stinging my nose assured me I still existed.
Kyven must have snuffed his candle, because no light accompanied him when he squeezed in beside me. He settled so close that his body heat warmed my arm.
The footsteps stopped in the hall. A key grated in the lock.
My pulse roared. Would Olivian realize the door was already open? Smell the tang of the extinguished candle? Notice the dust smears we’d left behind?
A whimper snuck from my lips. Kyven inched closer, pressing his chest against my side. A warm hand landed across my mouth.
“No sound,” he breathed, so quietly I couldn’t even call it a whisper. “If I have to, I’ll go out and face him, but no matter what you see or hear, you stay here. All right?”
I nodded, knowing he could feel my agreement, even if he couldn’t see it.
We lay like that, unmoving, hardly even breathing, while the seneschal trudged inside. For long moments, Olivian just...stood there, not three feet from where the bed-skirt hid our shoes.
A tremor took up residence in my limbs. Did he know? Did he suspect?
Kyven must have felt me trembling, because he curved closer, his breath stirring my hair.
Out in the room, a match scraped. Faint light rimmed the bed-skirt. Kyven’s hovering face came into focus, the dimness leaching his irises of color.
He glanced pointedly at the hand covering my mouth, then raised questioning brows. When I nodded, his fingers left my lips. He planted his hand beside my head.
There was hardly any space under here. Just enough that he could brace himself over me, assurances in his eyes. I clung to the promise I found there, to the steadiness he radiated.
Then a growl broke the silence. “Show yourself.”
My heart rammed against my breastbone. Shit. Shitshitshit.
“I know you’re here.” Naked fury rode Olivian’s every syllable.
I bit back a cry. Kyven’s brow knitted, his eyes filling with something like regret. Or maybe resolve. He laid a finger across his lips, then pointed to himself and out toward the room.
Terror crashed over me like a breaking wave. No. No, fuck that. I might’ve agreed to let him go, but who cared what I’d said? I wouldn’t hide here while Kyven had the life choked from him. While blood vessels burst in his eyes and all his teasing—his arrogance and half smiles—winked out of existence forever.
He levered himself over me, but I clamped my arms around him, then my legs, trapping him as he tried to wriggle free.
We struggled in silence, but I refused to let go. I didn’t care what I had to do, who I had to stab. How much of Zephyrine’s magic I had to borrow to ensure he walked out of here alive. I would do anything, I would?—
“Coraline,” Olivian growled. “You’ve been dogging me all day, so you might as well show your face. I’m not leaving until you do.”
I froze. So did Kyven. We stared at each other as realization dawned.
Sweet Zephyrine, the seneschal wasn’t talking tous. He was addressing his dead wife.
The bed frame shuddered as a heavy weight settled atop the mattress.
The spasm in my chest eased, if only by half. I pictured Olivian hunched above us, his brows lowered as he waited for a ghost.
