I’ve treated you poorly—both during this investigation and over the past three years. Will you forgive me?”
She swallowed. She tried to cling to her anger, to wear it like a shield, but it cracked before the sincerity in his voice. “I trust you’ve had reasons for what you’ve done during this case. As for the past… You’ve done nothing that needs forgiveness. Not to me.”
“I’ve hurt you. I’ve made decisions for you that I had no right to make.” He waited, eyes dark and solemn.
“I forgive you,” she said. Then her voice and composure cracked. “Of course I forgive you. I love you, you idiot.” She missed a step and they both stopped, leaving other couples to maneuver around them.
“I know.” He cupped her cheek, gauze slithering against their skin, his voice rough with something not quite pain or wonder. “I’ve never understood it, but I know.”
“We ought to step outside,” she said as flatly as she could manage, “or I may make a scene.”
That drew a startled chuckle. “I could never abide scenes.” He led her toward the terrace door; glances from the crowd followed them. She scanned the darkness, stretched out questing tendrils, but found no trace of Spider or anything else inhuman, nothing but a drunken couple groping each other below the terrace.
She turned back to Kiril and stripped aside her veil. “What are you playing at, Kiril?”
“Not playing,” he said softly. “Not with you.” He touched the edge of her veil—carefully avoiding her skin, but she felt the warmth of his hand through the gauze. She couldn’t stop her sharp indrawn breath.
“You are—” It took her a moment to gather her thoughts. The bottom had fallen out of her stomach and she couldn’t let it take her wits with it. “You’re protecting a demon and a blood sorceress!” she whispered. “Don’t you dare deny it.” This wasn’t the place for such conversations, but she couldn’t leave the matter unspoken any longer.
He laughed, but humor died quickly. “No, I won’t deny it.”
“Why?”
A silence settled around them, heavy as a shroud. “Phaedra has a vendetta against Mathiros. She is… justified. I can’t stand in her way.”
“You’re oathsworn to the Crown.”
“Not anymore.”
Her hands tingled with shock. “You mean—”
“I’m forsworn. For months now.” His mouth quirked. “You thought I was merely growing old and feeble. That may be true, but it also took all my strength to break the geas. I’m only now recovering.”
“Why doesn’t Mathiros know?”
Kiril shrugged. “The mage who took my oaths died peacefully in his sleep years ago. A more paranoid king would have had me swear them anew, but Mathiros trusted me.” His lips thinned, eloquent bitterness. “Had he even a shiver, he might have felt the vow break, but he’s anixeros to the bone.”
“By telling me this you’ve broken mine.”
He chuckled. “No, my dear. I’ll know when that truly happens. I have, though, put you in a dangerous position. Which was what I’ve been trying to avoid.” His eyebrows rose. “Do you mean you would choose me over your vows?”
“I swore an oath to the Crown, but I meant it to you. All my service was only ever to you. You idiot.”
Her voice broke and she nearly began to cry. She mastered the urge with a sharp pinch to the bridge of her nose and a scowl. “What are we going to do?”
Before he could answer, they heard the screams.
Something wasn’t right. Savedra had no mystical sensitivity of which she was aware, but she had learned to trust her instincts after years in the palace, and beneath the weight of sweat and hair and gauze her neck was prickling. Everyone on the dais was where they should be, guests laughing and chattering while the musicians rested. She could find nothing amiss as she scanned the room. Neither could she find Isyllt.
The musicians began again, a stately slow vals this time. A heartbeat later a murmur swept the room. Savedra didn’t understand the cause until movement on the dais caught her eye: Mathiros had risen, and descended the stairs. She thought he meant to leave the room, which would be rude but not unprecedented. Instead he walked toward the dance floor, the crowd parting around him. He moved slowly, stiffly, like a man steeling himself to something, and his face was pale beneath his mask.
The courtiers fell away, their obeisance and shocked looks unheeded, till only a woman in white stood before Mathiros. Savedra’s stomach twisted and chilled—she recognized Phaedra from Isyllt’s warning, and from her