The Calling has not lessened. If anything, it is worse now that she is gone. It is reaching for her through the walls of this castle, mapping the route between us—down the corridor, up the stairs, past the nursery, second door on the left, where she has locked herself in. My body knows exactly where she is.
Her room is close to Lily’s room and my room is also close to Lily’s. Therefore, the new nanny’s room is not that far from my own.
I stop pacing and think of my dead wife, Elara. I took her death hard, as did Lily. We did not have a proper Blood Calling, but she was still my best friend. I enjoyed her presence and losing her in such a sudden and shocking manner was difficult for us all. She was a kind female. Our marriage was arranged when I was twenty-six and she was twenty-four, and we built a life together with the gentle efficiency of two well-bred Krovenians who understood our duty. She was my friend and the mother of my daughter. Elara laughed at my dry humor and tolerated my long silences.
I never burned for her. Not once. Not even in the early days when I would have given anything to feel for her what the poets described. And it was the same for her. We were not a Blood Calling match, but a political match and we had to drink Elixir in order to mate.
And now, tonight, a stranger walks into my kitchen and my body knows her in a way it never knew the female I married. The Bellamy Group sent her here. Her contract ends a year from now. For all I know, there is a human male waiting for her in America, counting the months until she comes home with her completion bonus and falls into his arms. She probably has every intention of leaving Krovenia the moment she is paid.
I will not act on a scent. I refuse. If the Calling has chosen, then so be it. ButIhave not chosen. Not yet. Not until I know what kind of female my body has decided to bind me to. Notuntil I know whether she is gentle with my daughter when she does not know I am watching. Not until I know whether she will stay.
There is also the matter of what I am, and what she is.
What I want from her, in the privacy of my own thoughts, would terrify her if she knew the full picture. I will not be the male who frightens her into yielding to him.
And there is the other matter. She is in my employ. Hazel works for me and lives under my roof. The power imbalance is staggering. I could ruin her career with one letter, end her placement with one word. She knows this. Every staff member who has ever worked for the royal household knows this. To even imply interest in her would be coercion. Whether I meant it that way or not.
The thought twists something cold in my chest. I will not be that male. I will not be the male who collected a female because she had no leverage to say no.
If there is ever to be anything between us—and I have not granted thatifeven the dignity of ayes—then it cannot begin while she is my employee.
Lily needs her. Three Krovenian nannies failed at what this human has accomplished in five days. Madam Petrova has been sending me messages, which I read on my tablet, letting me know that my daughter is warming to this human like she hasn’t toward anyone else, since her mother passed away.
I cannot jeopardize this relationship that is already working so well for my daughter.
I will keep my distance. I will not touch her, nor will I be alone with her in any room small enough to scent her in. I will watch how she is with Lily when she does not know I am there. I will see who she actually is, beneath the agency profile and the careful politeness of a female on a one-year contract. I will lether existence in my home settle into me, the way new weather settles into a country.
And then, and only then, when I know what kind of female the gods have chosen for me and how she feels for me too— Then I will decide.
I peel off my soaked coat and drape it over the back of a kitchen chair to dry. The leather is heavy with rain. My shirt beneath is damp at the shoulders. I run a hand through my wet hair and try to gather myself for the walk upstairs.
The corridor is dim, the sconces burning low. Rain whispers against the high windows, summer-warm and steady. The castle sleeps around me as I climb the stairs toward my rooms.
I do not turn toward my chambers. Instead, I turn, as I always do, toward the nursery. Lily’s door is the second one on the left at the end of the family wing. I have walked this corridor a thousand times.
I reach Lily’s door and pause. Every night I am home, I check on her. It is a small private thing. She does not know I do it. The staff has not been told. Madam Petrova suspects, I think, because she finds the door ajar in the mornings sometimes, but she has the grace not to mention it.
I turn the handle, slowly, silently, and ease the door open.
The nursery is full of soft moonlight. The rain at the windows casts faint silver patterns across the lavender walls. The canopied bed glows pale in the dark. The reading nook is exactly as Lily left it before sleep, a small stack of books piled on the cushion, her tiny silk slippers placed neatly side by side on the rug.
My daughter is curled on her side under the pale pink coverlet. Max, her favorite stuffed animal, is pressed against her chest, his floppy ear half under her chin. Her lips are slightly parted, and I can see the tiniest gleam of her milk-fangs in the dim light.
I stand in the doorway and look at her sleeping, and something quiet and hard cracks open in my chest. She has not been peaceful in two years.
If I move too quickly, I lose Hazel. If I lose Hazel, I lose this peace. I will not be the male who took this away from my daughter to satisfy his own need. I cross the room on silent feet and bend over the bed. I brush one curl back from her forehead, lightly, lightly, and her breath catches and resettles.
I press the lightest kiss to Lily’s temple. Then I straighten and back toward the door, and as I close it behind me, the smallest involuntary smile pulls at the corner of my mouth.
Chapter Three
Hazel
“Two braids, please.”
“Two braids it is.” I work the brush gently through her dark curls, careful with the tangles. Lily sits very still on the little cushioned stool in front of the vanity, watching me in the mirror. She holds Max in her lap, his floppy ear half tucked under her chin like always.
“Are you going to brush Max too?”
