Lachlan flashed me an angry grin. “I’m worried you’ll lose control and hurt someone.”
I paused, flattening myself against the nearby post as the last of the morning watch climbed past me to report for duty. “I’ll be fine. Just keep Theodore far from me—”
“Yes, I will,” Lachlan said, agitated. He glanced around, eyed Halla, then stepped closer and lowered his voice. “But what about everyoneelse.”
It would be easy for me to send every sailor, soldier, and courtier on this ship spilling into the sea. The thought sent a shudder through me. It would likely be safest to perform the spell on thewater, away from everyone, and where the nekgya were easier to summon. “Have them lower a launch for me and Halla.”
Halla sucked in a sharp breath. “For me?No.No, I refuse to get in a little boat in the middle of the sea!” She gave her head a vehement shake. “Withyou,no less.” She made a break for the ladder. “I’m going to my husband.”
Lachlan grabbed hold of her cloak. “Your Highness—”
She jutted up her chin, jerking from his hold. “You’ll address me as YourMajesty.”
Lachlan slammed his eyes closed in a bid for patience. “YourMajesty.I have already requested that the council and captain arrange on the deck. They are waiting for us. Imogen needs your blood for the spell. So you will remain withus.”
Her cold eyes flared. “I demand to speak with Theodore.”
Lachlan threw up an exasperated hand. “Well, I don’t know where he is.”
I stepped in beside them. “Excuse me?”
With the early morning hour, and the ever-increasing strain of everything, it was no wonder that Lachlan’s temper was shortening. “When I went back to discuss the topic of the locating spell, Theo wasn’t in his stateroom. But Eftan was pacing the passageway. He summoned the rest of the council, and in the time it took to discuss our terms with them, Theo didn’t return. Aleka only mentioned that she thought he was ‘out for some air.’”
“You made it clear that he cannot be present while I perform the spell, didn’t you?”
“No, I like playing reckless, Imogen. I like the thrill of it.”
Then Halla moved so quickly, so unexpectedly, that I could hardly tell what she’d done. Her lithe arm lifted, and the next moment Lachlan gave a grunt and slapped a hand over his eye. Shedarted up the ladder. I guessed Lachlan had been gentle with her, far more so than he would have been with a regular captive. But I had no such scruples.
A guttural sound escaped me as I followed after her. Lifting my legs so quickly up the rungs sent pain wrapping around my entire torso like a blistering fist, but I kept moving, with Lachlan close behind, out onto the clamorous deck. The lower edge of the sky, right where it kissed the water, was dusted with the first signs of dawn. Faint gray light washed over the deck, dulling the details of the crew that tended the sails and ropes, but it made Halla’s pale hair glow like a beacon.
I followed as she darted through sailors, toward Theodore’s stateroom, spry but not particularly quick. I reached out for her arm, felt my fingertips brush her cloak, before she flung herself forward, into the middle of a shadowy huddle of people. She crouched behind them, whimpering and speaking unintelligible words at a gratingly high pitch.
Blowing out a ragged breath, I stepped away from the group, who’d begun to shout and reach for Halla, as if fawning.
“Oh, for the bloody love of—she’s fine.” Speaking, breathing, walking was near unbearable. My knees threatened to buckle. “Move. There’s no need—”
“Your Majesty.” The voice was a deep, gravelly rumble, and masterfully unemotional. I felt it ricochet through my chest.
Oh Gods.
I gasped and reared back, bumping directly into Lachlan, and scanned the shadowed group of people before me. The blue wash of dawn light barely reached this part of the deck, tucked as it was under the upper deck’s overhang, but I made out Eftan’s outline first. Short and broad and tense. Three others I did not know stood beside him: a younger man of average build, a stoic yet elegantolder woman, and a woman in uniform, making a sort of barricade between myself and Halla. I could feel their scathing dislike though the dark.
But I could not seehim.
I took another stunned step back, and Lachlan quickly clamped a ready hand around my arm. Eftan and the others shifted before me, encircling Halla, their own protestations joining her terrorized cries. I could not make out their words, their faces, fast enough. I lifted my hands, yielding, when Theodore’s voice filled my ears once more.
“That’senough.”
Suddenly he was before me, close enough to touch.
I tilted my head back, taking in the whole of him like I’d swallowed a too-large gulp of air, painful and slow going down. It was unthinkable, but somehow the reality of him was even greater than my memory. How had I forgotten the way everything seemed to tip toward him when he was near? The way he altered the air and made it go thin? He was as cold and imposing and beautiful as the first time I’d seen him.
Dawn swept gray-blue light across his lips, down the ridge of his strong, slanting nose. It dotted the gold leaves of his crown in its gentle color. He’d changed his clothes since I’d seen him in his stateroom with Halla. His black binding suit had been replaced with a simple deep-blue shirt and dark brown trousers, tucked into his polished black boots.
Lachlan’s grip tightened on me as the thick silence stretched long, as Theodore and I stood face-to-face, as if stuck. Even in the gray light, I could make out the summer green of his gaze. A gaze so perfectly blank that even I—who’d seen it filled with longing and anguish and warmth—could not decipher it.
Finally, he breathed. “My council tells me you’ve come to performa spell.” His low voice curled around me, and even though it sounded even,empty,the skin down my back stippled. “I’d like to know why.”
