Page 53 of Seduced By Darkness
I reach inside my pocket and produce my catch.
Finn eyes my hairpin with barely disguised disdain.
“It works,” I tell him. “I’ve done it many a time.”
“On what? Your bedchambers?”
Maybe.
“Over there,” he says, tipping his head toward Edain’s pallet and the piles of saddlebags there. “His Royal Sulkiness put the key in there.”
I scramble across the floor toward the packs.
“But you’re not going to touch the key,” Finn whispers. “It’s a trap. I saw him lay the magic on it. Something violent, by the look of it. No. What you’re looking for is a satchel of knives. He’s got an entire roll of them. There’s a dirk there. Thin enough to stab through an ear without leaving a mark.”
I arch a brow at that and find the satchel. “Plotting your escape, were you?”
A flash of a smile greets me. “Not my first time in a cage, Princess. Nor my last, I daresay. Though I wasn’t expecting a helpless accomplice to simply amble in here, and hadn’t yet figured out how to get my hands on that dirk.”
I find the dirk.
The hilt of every single knife in that roll of leather is carved of something pale, like ivory. Or bone. The hilts are gold. The blades wickedly sharp. But the dirk is a thing of murderous beauty.
This was only ever created for assassination.
I know Edain works in the shadows.
There have been slips of the tongue over the years—mostly my mother—and enemies who simply… vanished. Or were found in their beds with their throats expertly cut.
“Here,” I whisper as I hand it over with the gloves. “These might help.”
“Thanks.” He tugs the gloves on, and leans as close to the cage door as he can with the collar around his neck. Absolute focus settles over his expression as he begins to work the dirk inside the lock.
“Can I… Can I ask you a question?”
A little notch draws between his brows as he tries to slip the tumblers. “I’m not married, sweetheart, but alas, my heart’s already spoken for.”
A nervous laugh tears from me. He’s ridiculous. But somehow it gives me the strength to say this. “You work for the Prince of Evernight.”
This time he looks up. “Yes.”
“What’s he… like?”
A dozen expressions flicker over his face as if I came at him from a direction he didn’t expect. “Thiago?”
I wait.
“Oh, I see now.” His smile turns into a shit-eating grin. “I thought all of this recklessness was for me, but you caught a glimpse of my prince, didn’t you? My poor broken heart.”
Heat scours my cheeks. “Your heart’s already spoken for.”
“I lied.” He shrugs. “I do that on occasion.” He looks far too interested in the topic at hand. “And you’re not going to distract me now. Tell me everything.”
“There’s nothing to tell.” My cheeks flame. “I just… wanted to know. Whether he was… kind?”
“Kind?” Finn tests the word. “He is strict. With himself,” he clarifies, when my gaze jerks to his. “It’s not kindness, so much as protectiveness. He’ll kill to save those he considers his own. And he has all these sorts of rules for himself that nobody, least of all me, can understand. But he’d never hurt an innocent. He’s loyal, and proud, and aloof, and—”
“Aloof?” That wasn’t at all the impression I gained.
