“Are you still interested in joining forces?”
I blinked in surprise. “Join forces? I never claimed to want to work with you.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I seem to recall you trying to rope me in as an accomplice in your scheme to evade the guards. If you’re only interested in receiving my assistance when you’re in need without any inclination to offer yours in return, that, my dear, is a double standard. Quite dishonorable for a thief.”
I tightened my jaw. Considering he had offered no true help when I needed it, I refused to allow myself to feel duty-boundto assist him now. However, curiosity warred with my irritation. “What sort of help do you require?”
He grinned. “All in due time. You appear to appreciate a good mystery.”
While that was true, I didn’t like the idea of striking a bargain with so little information on what exactly I was getting myself into. But my wariness wasn’t strong enough to immediately reject him. “You want my help, I want answers. If I agree, what’s in it for me?”
He studied me a measured moment, letting the silence stretch. The corner of his mouth lifted slightly. “Then perhaps a trade is in order.” He leaned closer, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Perhaps we can exchange what you love best:secrets. For I know more about what’s going on in this world than I’ve told you.”
The offer was quite tempting. The more I learned about this strange reality, the better I’d be able to navigate it…and perhaps even find a way to eventually leave. Yet I remained wary. “I’m reluctant to assist a man who has yet to assist me in return, both at the palace wall and when the guards surrounded me.”
He shrugged. “Surely the gamble only makes my offer all the more intriguing.”
As much as I was loathe to admit it, the risk did make me more inclined to accept. I silently cursed my tendency to waltz with danger, especially one carefully concealed behind a handsome face, flirtatious manner, and charming smile. I sighed in defeat and the corners of his lips turned up.
He extended his hand to seal the promise…but still I didn’t take it. Irritated at his obvious expectation of victory, I lifted my chin and evenly met his gaze. “You appear to know little about the one whose aid you’re seeking. My services aren’t so easily rendered, especially to a man who’s not only done little to prove himself to me, but is still very much a stranger.”
“On the contrary:you’rethe true stranger,” he said. “I’ve given you my name, but have yet to receive yours in return. It’s not every day a beautiful maiden spies on me from the roof. Can you blame me for my curiosity, the very trait you yourself appear to deeply value?”
Though his flirting was undoubtedly insincere, my heart couldn’t resist twinging at the compliment before I could check it. The smooth words contained a hint of both teasing and flirtation, but he’d chosen the wrong victim for such a tactic—I’d engaged in enough fake flirting to know how the game was played. I cycled through my prepared list of charming phrases…yet for the first time I came up blank.
“Names are unnecessary in a purely business arrangement,” I stuttered. “Calling methiefwill be sufficient.”
The pseudonym created a necessary barrier that would make it easier to keep my rising emotions untangled from my work; I needed to counter the strange attraction he stirred within me. The longer our interaction, the more certain I was that he was an illusion tempting me from my true purpose…and like a fool, I was falling for it.
He shook his head. “No, I wantyourname. If you hope to uncover the information I hold, the least you can do is offer something in return.”
I felt another flare of irritation that once more he felt the need to call my honor into question, yet still I hesitated.
“If you’re still reluctant, perhaps we can play a game, with your name as the prize?” he offered.
Normally I would thrill in such an exchange, but not only had I finally met a worthy opponent whom I wasn’t confident enough to beat, but now the stakes felt more personal, a feeling that frightened me more than the possibility of being unable to escape this strange place.
“There’s no need,” I said hastily. “My name is Sable.” I fought to keep my voice even to mask the lie, but it trembled slightly…as if a secret part of me wanted him to discover my real name.
“Like the color of the night?” He snorted. “As much as it suits you, I’m certain that’s not your real name. I know names signify trust—a thief’s greatest currency—which takes time to forge. I will be content for now until you not only come to trust me, but call me the man of your dreams.”
I rolled my eyes in an exaggerated display of contempt at such an ambition, anxious to convince both him and myself that such a sentiment would never leave my lips.
“If you truly were the man of my dreams, you would know that I despise foolish wordplay when there is work to be done.”
Evander gave me a long, thoughtful look; I fought to retain a calm, bored expression as it felt that he gazed far beneath my carefully polished veneer. In the same way that I patiently uncovered the truth one layer of memory at a time, it seemed as though he now delved into the core of my true self.
“My apologies,” he said simply after a few moments of taut silence. “But you have to admit that you’ve been the one dodging questions and delaying us…when you aren’t climbing walls or looking for missing paintings.”
I glared at him. If this was the game he wanted to play…little did he know he’d just engaged a master player, one who was determined to do all within her power to beat him.
CHAPTER 12
The darkness of sleep gently enfolded me, tugging on my consciousness to pull me into a sea of color and indistinct shapes. For a moment they whirled around me before gradually beginning to take form. When they finally settled, I found myself standing in a misty garden of thorns and roses I remembered well.
My senses were momentarily overcome with the intricate detail—a vision of crimson and magenta roses woven through the ivy, their floral scent filling the crisp air, the leafy green trees tinged in the early hues of autumn gold, the breeze’s soft caress against my cheeks. A grey, overcast sky obscured the sun, yet its brightness still bathed the world in a dazzling sheen.
I recognized this place by the brambles lacing the manicured hedges, but though I had no memory of how I’d gotten here, I felt more awake in this moment than when I first entered the cursed palace. At the same time, the edges of my memory felt fuzzy, as though my body had traveled here but my consciousness was a few beats behind. I took a breath, trying to remember what I’d seen and done last time I found myself in this strange world.
