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She jolted backward, stumbling as her eyes flew open. But only the painting stood before her, still propped upon her easel.
“Oh, my God.” She blinked, raking a loose tendril of hair out of her eyes. “I did not just imagine that.”
Silence; the rumble of the air conditioner shutting off; the soft meow of her cat, Cézanne, from the bedroom.
She sucked in several deep breaths, working to calm her rapid heartbeat. Still, no matter how long she stared at the canvas or at the knight himself, she knew she’d heard him speak to her. Not in some dream, but here. Now.
All right, all right, she coached herself. What were you doing when he talked? You were touching him.
Stepping forward, she pressed her eyes shut again and lifted a shaking hand to feel the raised surface of the paint. “Talk to me. Please. I need to know more about you.”
A purring answer vibrated through her mind. He is a devil.
She shook her head, still touching the painted surface of her knight’s body. “No, that’s not true. He’s trying to free you.”
For his own purposes.
“But you’ve wanted freedom. You’ve begged me for it.”
Her eyes flew open, and there he stood. Well, “stood” was far too generous a description for his stance. The knight shimmered in the air, wavering off the canvas into a multidimensional, ghostly form and then resetting himself within the painting’s context anew.
“Come back!” She pressed desperate fingertips against the canvas. “Tell me what I don’t know. What does Claude want from you? From me?”
The figure flickered slightly beneath her hand, rising until, for a brief moment, she felt the heat of his armor, the physical strength of his body. Claudius seeks to possess me.
“How? How can I stop him?”
His answer was eerily simple, stark as the painting displayed before her.
Prepare the gold, Anna.
A sharp knock at her door caused her to drop the heavy velvet bag that she still clutched in her hand.
“That’s probably him,” she whispered at the canvas, but no further instructions came forth. “If I paint you, what happens? If I finish, are you free?”
Another knock, even more impatient than the first.
She backed away from the work, not wanting to take her eyes off the knight; terrified of the man who demanded her attention with his harsh knock.
Finally she composed her face into a mask of strength and calmness, emotions she definitely didn’t feel. She could feel her naturally pale Irish American skin flushing hot and tried to will away those betraying red splotches.
Claude stood beyond the threshold, and as soon as she cracked open the door, he pushed past her to the interior.
She placed her right hand on her hip, working to seem in charge. “I thought you were leaving.”
“I did,” he answered cryptically, gliding far past her.
“Yeah, like ten minutes ago. Tops.”
“I forgot something very important.” He sauntered toward the painting, inspecting the image. It hadn’t changed at all physically—yet for her it had altered completely in the past few moments.
Anna’s heart slammed in her chest because Claude must have known that the knight was trying to warn her. Why else would he have returned so quickly and unexpectedly? Somehow, damn the man, he suspected that she’d been interacting with their knight.
She cleared her throat, strolling toward Claude with forced casualness. “Something wrong about the image?”
“I did not forget the painting, Anna.” He tossed her a narrowed glance and then looked slowly toward the floor. “But you have forgotten your gold. Dropped so casually? I am shocked that you’d dishonor something so precious.”
She swallowed, bending to retrieve the bag. “I was painting, and I, uh . . . set it down.”
