He found the door with no problem. It was locked, but he picked it in seconds. Let her be asleep. Please.
Easing open the door of the cramped room, Kylar found himself staring at an oversized meat cleaver. It was being held by Elene. She was very much awake.
In the darkness, Elene obviously didn’t recognize him. She looked torn between screaming and hacking at him. Her eyes locked on the sword in his hand. She decided to do both.
Slapping her hand with the flat of his bollock dagger, Kylar launched the knife out of her grip. He dodged a grasping hand and got behind her in a moment, clapping a hand over her mouth.
“It’s me. It’s me!” he said as he had to twist this way and that to dodge flying elbows. He couldn’t hold a hand over her mouth and pin both arms and stop the kicks she was aiming at his groin. “Be quiet or your mistress dies!”
As she seemed to regain her sanity, Kylar finally let Elene go. “I knew it!” she said, furiously but quietly. “I knew I couldn’t trust you. I knew it was just going to be you.”
“I meant your mistress will die because your noise will bring the wetboy here.”
Silence, then, “Oh.”
“Yes.” In the dim moonlit room, he couldn’t be sure, but Kylar thought he saw her blushing.
“You could have knocked,” she said.
“Sorry. Old habit.”
Suddenly awkward, she picked up the cleaver off the bed and put it under her pillow. Looking down at her nightgown, which was disappointingly chaste, she seemed embarrassed. She grabbed a robe and turned her back while she pulled it on.
“Relax,” Kylar said as she turned back to face him. “It’s a little late for modesty. I saw your statue. You look good naked.” Why had he twisted that last bit to make her sound like a whore? Even if she was sleeping with the duke, what choice did she have? She was a servant in the man’s house. It wasn’t fair, but Kylar still felt betrayed.
Elene folded as if he’d hit her in the stomach.
“I begged her not to display it,” Elene said. “But she was so proud of it. She said I should be proud too.”
“She?”
“The duchess,” Elene said.
“The duchess?” Kylar repeated stupidly. Not the duke. Not the duke?
He felt at once vastly relieved and more confused than ever. Why should he feel relieved?
“Did you think I’d model naked for the duke?” she asked. “What do you think, that I’m his mistress?” Her eyes widened as she saw the expression on his face.
“Well . . .” Kylar felt like he’d unjustly accused her, then felt mad that she was making him feel embarrassed for drawing a perfectly good conclusion, then felt mad that he was wasting time talking to a girl when a wetboy was probably waiting out in the hall. This is madness. “It happens,” he said defensively.
Why am I doing this?
For the same reason I’ve watched her from afar. Because I’m intoxicated by her.
“Not with me,” Elene said.
“You mean you’re a . . .” he was trying to sound snide, but he trailed off. Why was he trying to sound snide?
“A virgin? Yes,” she said, unembarrassed. “Are you?”
Kylar clenched his jaw. “I—look, there’s a killer here.”
Elene seemed about to comment about Kylar avoiding her question, then her look darkened as the joy leached out of it. “Two,” she said quietly.
“What?”
“Two killers.”
She meant him. Kylar nodded, again feeling a lump in his throat, and suddenly he was ashamed of what he was. “Yes, two. I saw Hu coming in, Elene. Is the Globe safe?”
He was watching her eyes. As expected, they darted to where she’d hidden it: the bottom of her closet.
“Yes,” she said. “It’s . . .” her voice died. “You’re going to steal it.”
“I’m sorry,” Kylar said.
“And now you know where I hid it. You set me up.”
She was naive, but she wasn’t stupid. “Yes.”
Anger built in her brown eyes. “Is there even an assassin, or was it all a lie?”
“There is one. I give you my word,” Kylar said, looking away.
“For all that’s worth.”
Ouch. “I am sorry, Elene, but I have to.”
“Why?”
“It’s hard to explain,” he said.
“I spent all day being embarrassed about everything I’d ever written to you. I spent all day feeling terrible how much you’d given for me. I didn’t even tell the guards you were coming because I thought—I thought . . . You’re a real piece of work, Kylar,” she said. “I guess Azoth really did die.”