So instead, we stayed up just—talking. About cases he’d cracked, about close scrapes I’d had, about why he even needed five different knives (it turns outgrimlingenhate copper, gold is good against curses, and . . . I forgot the others), and when I’d started picking locks (thirteen). About what he wished he could say to Klemens (goodbye, mostly), and what I wished I could say to the von Falbirgs over breakfast (eat glass, mostly).
But the third mistake, thegreatestmistake, was talking until we both were drowning in yawns, then closing my eyes for only a second. And I know this because as I slowly drift awake now, I realize my pillow is . . . moving. And warm. And it has a heartbeat.
The fire’s burned down to embers, but the room glows the mellow blue of the hour before snowy dawn. Enough light to see I am sprawled on my side, my head and half an arm flopped over Emeric’s stomach. He looks as if he fell asleep propped against the hearth ledge and gradually slid south, one arm tucked behind his head, the other resting on his chest. I feel the weight of a blanket from the waist down, and I suspect the culprit is also responsible for removing Emeric’s spectacles and placing them neatly on the hearthstones. My prime suspect is Ragne, curled up beside them as a black puff of a cat.
She is going to give meso muchgrief for this.
It’s quiet in Castle Reigenbach, and so still, and I am the kind of half awake that cuts straight through the lies I tell myself.
I...likethis.
It wasn’t the wine, it wasn’t my emotions running high. The first and last boy I had feelings for was Sebalt in the stables, who made me laugh every morning as he pitched down fresh hay to lay over Gisele’s floor. Then he started courting the baker’s daughter, and I sniffled into my scrub bucket for a day and a half, feeling like a fool.
But Emeric isn’t the same. I want to think of another puzzle he can’t solve. I want to empty his pockets and get caught in the act. I want the simple peace of being known by him; I want this strange, terrible hope he’s given me, that I could build a life where I choose, instead of living ready to leave everything behind.
I don’t know what’s worse: that he’s slipped into my heart like a knife, or that I like the feel of him there.
Emeric shifts in his sleep. His hand lifts from his chest and comes to a rest where my pulse beats at the corner of my jaw, fingers loosely tangling in my hair.
I catch my breath. There are too many wolves at my door: the wedding, the curse, the margrave trying to kill us both. The way he’s recoiled from any suggestion we might be—more. My own ghost in the mirror, the unlovely face of a thief he has a sacred duty to catch.
Only a fool would hope for anything good to come of this.
In an hour or so, I’ll have to get up to face the von Falbirgs and whatever Gisele’s monstrous fiancé has to throw at me today. Still, that’s an hour off.
I let my eyes slide shut again, leaning into the warmth of his palm. I have this, him, now. I can let myself be a fool a little longer.
`
It turns out I was smart to defer getting up, because when I finally do, I find Eiswald’s curse is done messing around.
Thick rubies run up my ankles to my knees like fat, bloody buttons. All of my breakouts have been relatively discreet until now, but these . . . They’re obtrusive enough to poke through my stockings.
Emeric wakes up to me attempting to chip one off with his gold-plated knife. He takes in the room, the hour, and the sight of me chiseling away at a ruby on my shin, and says groggily, “I cannot tell you how many principles of knife safety you are violating right now.”
“Where’s your sense of adventure?”
“When it comes to stab wounds? On indefinite sabbatical.” He sits up with a groan, rubbing his neck, and puts on his spectacles as Ragne unfurls herself on the hearth. “Good morning, Miss Ragne. When did you return?”
“Good morning.” Ragne arches her back in a stretch, tail curling. “I came back late. I was very surprised to find you sleeping together.”
The knife slips and almost gouges a hole in my calf. “That’s not—”
“We didn’t—” Emeric sputters at the same time, flushing. “Er.”
“I’ll explain later, Ragne,” I say quickly, and hand Emeric his knife. The rubies are staying, like it or not. “All right. So. We have less than a week now. We need a real plan. Where do we start?”
Emeric gets up to pace, pinching the bridge of his nose. “We know a couple of things. The margrave is responsible for Hubert’s murder, and he tried to pin it on thePfennigeist. He’s made serious attempts on both our lives, albeit yours typically in the guise of Gisele, even though he wants the wedding to go through.”
“Seems like it’s to humor the von Hirschings.”
“True. Hmm. I also don’t know why he would go to the effort of petitioning for prefects, only to murder Hubert. What does that get him? Why is it worth bringing scrutiny from the Order?” He pauses to offer me a hand up, still frowning out the window.
I take it and let him pull me to my feet. “And we still don’t know what he’s supposed to get out of marrying Gisele.”
He shoots me a smile. “Iknewyou read through my notes.” I think we both realize he’s still holding on to my hand at the same time. He drops it, then rubs the back of his neck. “You’ll be stuck with the von Falbirgs at least through the morning, right?”
“Can’t wiggle out of that one,” I grouse. “But I’ll try to make the most of it. Maybe Adalbrecht will let something slip with them here.”
