Page 35 of Promise of Darkness
Because he’s right.
I can’t help wondering what that mouth would feel like on my body.
* * *
My good moodevaporates the moment I enter my bedchambers. There’s a message resting on my pillow, and it looks exactly like the tiny scroll I discovered in the icy remnants of the ballroom.
I snatch it up, glancing around.
There’s no sign of anyone, but I’ve been gone for hours. Anyone could have left it. Except, Eris is the only other soul in the ruined palace, and I’m fairly certain if she were leaving me messages, they’d be painted in blood upon the walls.
Besides, Thiago gave me the only key. He couldn’t have lied about that. Not if he promised thrice.
Everything is notas it seems, Princess. The only way to discover the truth is to remain close to the prince. Push him. He won’t be able to maintain the charade for long, as he’s desperate to reunite with his wife. Trust your instincts.
The note chillsme to the bone. The one in the ballroom might have been left by chance, to be discovered by whoever came after, but this was deliberately placed here.
This was deliberately written forme.
“Hello?” I call, running my hands along the walls and coming up short. There’s no hollow echoing revealed by a rap of my knuckles. No hint of any gaps. It’s as though the note appeared via thin air.
I cock my head slowly, feeling something watching me.
The demi-fey are notorious tricksters. Rarely seen, never to be entirely trusted with anything important, but never malicious if you leave them a saucer of milk.
Which I’ve been doing ever since I arrived, since it never hurts to have the local sprites as allies.
“Did you leave this message for me?” I whisper, sensing one moving behind me.
It’s in the room. I know it is.
But there’s no answer, and suddenly, I feel a swift breeze course by me, the curtains fluttering.
Alone. Again.
But, as I hold up the paper, I realize I can’t be entirely alone.
Because the demi-fey can’t put pen to paper.
Someone here in Valerian is trying to send me a message.
9
Discovering what happened to the prince’s wife is imperative, now I know he thinks to somehow use me to get her back.
Unfortunately, I don’t know where to start. The demi-fey are impossible to capture, even if they’d give me a straight answer, and whoever is sending me the messages is either invisible or a figment of my imagination. Servants, he’d said, but I’ve not seen even a hint of anything living. There’s no one in the castle besides Eris and the prince, and I don’t want to draw his attention to the fact I’m looking for someone.
Which means the prince may be my only means of discovering the truth.
Push him,the note said.
After a week of avoiding him, I find him in the stables, muttering under his breath as he slips a sugar cube, of all things, to his horse. He’s wearing a heavy fur cloak and stiffened riding leathers that hint at armor. Not his usual attire. Hmm. There’s a bow at his side, an enormous goblin-forged sword at his hip, and enough arrows to down an entire hunting party of Unseelie.
The prince isn’t taking his usual route through the forest, which is perfect. I’d rather play a spy than an assassin.
The second he senses me, he straightens incredulously.
“Good morning,” I call, slinging a saddle over the edge of the mare’s stall.
