“I don’t think you’re going to attack me” came a man’s voice. He closed the door and became visible.
Dark hair, blue eyes, and, even in my current state, a disturbingly tempting mouth, just as before. But gone was the guard’s uniform. He wore a black coat with a high collar and silver buttons over trousers and boots.
“Hello again, Fox.”
I put down the boot, furious at how relieved I was to see him. Not just because he wasn’t an assassin, but because he was Nik. I pushed that relief down as far as I could manage. It was a luxury I couldn’t afford.
“Where am I?”
“A guest chamber in the palace. Luna brought you here. She carried you through the Aetheric.”
There was no trace of Aether on my arms, but the top of my tunic was stained where my blood had dried. I turned away from him and untied the drawstring at the neck just enough to see the scratches over my heart, made when I’d tried to claw out the pain. These shimmered with Aether but didn’t, at least, have the sickly green tint of the practitioner’s magical workings.
“Fox?” he asked quietly.
“It’s fine,” I said, and hastily retied the drawstring, ensuring that I was covered. He didn’t need to see me or the scratches. As an extra precaution, I crossed my arms over my chest.
He watched me in silence, then gestured to the small table beside the bed. “There’s water there—and food—in case you need them.”
I shifted my gaze and took in the gleaming gold of the waiting cup and the prettily shaped cakes that sat beside it. And next to them, the black coin bag that had been in my tunic. The one the prince had given me in the carriage when we’d returned from Vhrania.
Someone had pulled it from my tunic. I might have fooled him about the handkerchief, but now he knew I’d kept the purse. And there it was, like a beacon from the caravanserai’s towers, in case I wasn’t feeling vulnerable enough.
I slid across the step to the table, ignored the bag, and took a testing sip of water. It was cold and faintly sweet. I drained the cup and put it back on the side table. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. It’s good to see you finally awake.”
“Finally?”
“You’ve been unconscious for a full night and day.”
A full night and day. And that didn’t include the time I’d been unconscious before talking to the practitioner. “When was Springmarket?”
He paused. “Two days ago.”
The practitioner had taken me down for two days.
“Luna said you were attacked with Aether.”
“I saw Aether in the market during the festival. I didn’t know if the practitioner was going to attack the market, or look for humans for possession, but I couldn’t just let him go. So I followed him. And would have been fine…”
“But?”
“Someone who knows me, someone who’d enjoyed himself too much at the party, called out my name. I was chased by assassins and a woman possessed by an Anima. Knocked out, taken to a gambling hall.”
He nodded. “Luna led Galen there after she brought you here. They were already gone. Only candles left.”
I nodded. “I don’t think it’s his hideout. He looked at the space like he’d never seen it before. Maybe he thought it would be a dramatic spot for his recruiting.”
“Recruiting?”
“He says he’s a Luminae, which is apparently a fancy word for an Aetheric practitioner.”
“You haven’t heard the term before? From Luna, I mean?”
“No. Have you?”
He shook his head.
