I glared but he simply raised an eyebrow, taunting amusement dancing in his grey eyes…as if he knew the source of my ire and found it thoroughly entertaining. I’d suffered a severe lapse in judgement to have felt even the thinnest sliver of relief upon seeing him again.
“Once more you’ve proven yourself to be anything but a gentleman,” I snapped.
“On the contrary, I’ve merely proven what I claimed before: I’m not your accomplice…though I’m willing to be persuaded if your current mischief is intriguing enough.” He turned his attention to the blank panel I’d been examining when he snuck up on me. “You do seem to like your walls. What plot are you concocting now?”
I hesitated. I had no reason to share my suspicions that a random painting was missing. Yet our banter hadn’t fully eclipsed the lingering relief at his reappearance, the familiarity his presence brought in this strange new world, the sense that I wasn’t alone.
“I’m wondering what happened to the painting that used to hang here,” I confessed.
His brow furrowed as he carefully examined the wall. A flicker of recognition momentarily flitted across his expressionbefore fading into puzzlement as he took a faltering step backward. “I don’t remember there being a painting hanging here.”
But he spoke with the same uncertainty that had cloaked him when we’d been discussing whether or not he’d vanished, giving me another reason to wonder if his memories had slipped away, contained only in the objects that belonged to him. My need to touch one in order to explore the stories it contained grew.
“Could you describe it?” he asked after a moment.
“I’m afraid I don’t remember myself.” It was an embarrassing admission, but he almost seemed not to have heard it. His gaze remained fixed on the blank wall, as if in a trance. After a moment, he hypnotically reached his hand out, fingers brushing the outline of where it had once hung.
A hum of magic filled the air as the wall responded to his touch—a brief flicker, during which I could have sworn the painting momentarily materialized in a blur of color and shape, too briefly to discern the details…before disappearing once more. Evander gasped and yanked his hand away, as if he’d been burnt.
My breath caught. “What just happened?”
He said nothing, simply continued to stare at the wall with wide eyes, as if trying to look beyond the empty space to the vanished painting neither of us could longer see. After an extended moment, he finally looked away. “This castle contains many mysteries, though nothing that can’t be explained away with the enchantments said to be protecting the palace.”
What had just happened went well beyond a mere mystery or protective enchantment. “Something more than magic appears to be at play.”
He shrugged. “Perhaps, but likely nothing that warrants such study. Is there a reason you’re so fixated on this particular anomaly?”
Once more I hesitated. The vanished painting was only one of a myriad of strange occurrences. How could I explain that my own memories seemed to be blurred, or that the reality where I found myself wasn’t how I remembered it?
I couldn’t resist exploring one of the riddles that had haunted me ever since waking, especially when it had so conveniently materialized before me. If this strange man who disappeared and reappeared on a whim reallywasa figment of my imagination, it wouldn’t hurt to see what he might know about the surreal changes.
“Other than the missing painting, does anything else about this place seem…strangeto you?”
He tilted his head. “In what way?”
There was no simple way to ask if the world we’d known before falling asleep was the one we currently inhabited. The inquiry alone should have been enough to invite his observations should he have noticed anything.
At my prolonged silence, he looked around, as if he could find the changes I spoke of arranged as tidily as the portraits lining the walls. “Everything appears as it should. I’m curious—what about the world seems peculiar to you?”
I struggled to put my misgivings into words. It was more than being heralded as a princess, or that time seemed to melt away whenever I fell asleep—it was the world itself, as if the colors and shapes didn’t quite align, though I couldn’t pinpoint examples.
“It just seems different from what I remember,” I murmured.
He stared at me a moment longer, appearing conflicted, as if debating how much to reveal. “Now that you mention it, something unusual occurred only this morning.”
I leaned forward eagerly. “What was it?”
His lips twitched. “I noticed a suspicious woman watching me from the roof of the palace. She not only followed me, buttried to scale the wall in torn silk. Does that classify asunusualto you? It was certainly a new experience for me.”
I scoffed, hating myself for having fallen for such an obvious trick. “I was not inquiring after details I’m already intimately aware of.” I frowned. Wait, had he mentioned that this event occurred onlythis morning?Which likely meant he hadn’t noticed the passage of several days between our first interaction and our second.
“Then unfortunately I have nothing more to offer,” he said. “Other than you, everything is as it’s always been.”
I studied him carefully. I detected no sign of deceit, and it unsettled me that I seemed to be the only one feeling out of place. If the world truly hadn’t changed, then why had the guards failed to see him? How had he vanished? And why did the empty space on the wall feel like it contained a portion of the answers I desperately sought?
Before I had a chance to explore any of his riddles further, he interrupted. “As fun as a game ofTwenty Questionsis, I have official business with you.”
“You mean you didn’t seek me out just to torment me?” My sarcastic quip couldn’t disguise the protective shield I’d just erected. “What sort of business?” I hedged.
