Chapter Fifteen
“Quiet, Sinclair,” Roze’s lips whisper in my ear.
He pulls me into the shadows of an alcove, and though my heart rate is still thundering, I’m flooded with relief. Here I’m safe. In the darkness. With the Huntsman, ironically. Being close with Roze is like being friends with a snake. At least he’s willing to bite other people on my behalf.
I clutch his forearm, breathing erratically.
“Sinclair? What’s the matter?” Roze asks, turning me and examining my face.
“The guard,” I choke out. “He’s—Roze, he’s here.”
He frowns. “What guard?”
“The one we killed. That guard.”
“That’s impossible.”
I grab his sleeve desperately. “We don’t have time for you to question me about this. I’m telling you—he saw me. He’s coming.”
He puts his hands on my shoulders. “Okay, okay. Do exactly as I say. Follow me, and don’t ask questions.”
“But—”
He gives me a look. “No questions, Sinclair. For once in your life.”
I don’t even want to argue with him, terrified as I am. I will do whatever he says to get away from the undead man in the ballroom.
He takes my hand and drags me away. At nearly a run, we sweep down the corridor, eerily quiet and dark after the noise and ruckus of the dance. Our footsteps are muffled by the thick carpet beneath our feet, and Roze’s head turns this way and that, inspecting the paintings on the walls.
“Are you looking for something in particular?”
“Less than a minute before you disobey me, I see.”
I snap my jaw shut, but then I hear a door open behind me. My breath hitches. “Roze—”
He looks over his shoulder, and then he grips my hand more tightly.
“Run.”
We race down the hall, and pure panic rages in my veins. Roze is sprinting, but I struggle to keep up in my ridiculous shoes.
“Come on!” he urges me.
I kick the shoes off my feet, and now I’m barefoot, racing through the castle with him.
Heavy footsteps thunder behind us. I can’t bring myself to turn around. I don’t dare look back.
I have no idea if there is any logic to the path Roze is taking or if he is just as terrified as I am, choosing our direction at random. I’ve never run so fast in my life—my lungs are screaming but the fear in my head is louder as the guard’s feet thunder behind me.
This is worse than killing him.
A great growl echoes behind me, rattling the crystal in the chandeliers overhead. A whimper of fear escapes my throat, and Roze pulls me faster down the hall.
I can hear him gaining on us, and I can’t help it. I risk a glance over my shoulder.
The captain tears through the corridor behind us, his sword drawn, his eyes red and furious. The collar around his neck has loosened, revealing the gaping wound we left him, a crater filled with dried blood and the white glimpse of bone.
I beg my feet to run faster. Roze’s breathing comes in heavy bursts as he pulls me.
But the guard is getting closer. He’s nearly on our heels, and my heart fails. He grabs the hem of my skirt, and true terror lashes through me.
I cry out, stumble, and fall to the ground. The weight of the large man crawls up my legs, his bloody hands tearing at the back of my gown. I rip at the carpet with my nails, trying to scramble away. Ahead of me, Roze skids to a stop and turns back.
He draws a knife hidden up his sleeve and charges the guard—but then I feel the edge of a blade at my throat.
Roze freezes, his eyes glued to the guard’s sword, which now rests against my larynx.
“No—farther—” The captain’s voice is garbled, as though through a throat that’s not quite reassembled.
Roze’s gaze flits from me to the captain, his brows knit together.
The captain chuckles darkly in my ear. “Re—venge,” he growls, and I feel the keen sting of the blade beginning to slice through my skin as I take a breath, sure it will be my last as I watch horror dawn on Roze’s face—
A feral screech echoes behind me.
Something strong and solid with the velocity of a falling star collides with the captain, and his body rolls off me.
I stumble to my feet toward Roze and whirl around.
And there, wings flapping, jaws growling menacingly, is Saint Waffles, ripping into the face of the guard with his claws.
The little gargoyle roars and scrapes his talons, latching on to his shoulders with his hind legs, goring his face with his tusks.
The guard screams, trying to wrestle Waffles away.
Roze seizes me by the elbow and pulls me to safety.
“Go,” he hisses, and we sprint down the hall again.
We round a corner, and he shouts, “I thought you locked Waffles in your room.”
“I left him in my room, but he likes to come out to hunt at night.”
“Good thing. He’s a protective little bastard.”
My heart squeezes. You can eat my slippers all you want, Waffles, I think.
Behind us, I hear Saint Waffles cry out as the captain roars. There’s a sick thump and a small, gargoyle-ish whimper. Waffles.
I want to turn back, but there’s no time. Roze pulls us through a door. We’re in some sort of sitting room in the nobles’ quarters, but there are no other doors—a dead end.
Roze curses under his breath. There’s nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. Except …
I’ve never done it with someone else before, but with death chasing us, there’s nothing left to lose. I grab Roze’s arm.
“This way,” I urge. Before Roze can protest, I pull him to a corner and push him against the wall, my hands on his chest.
“What—”
“Hush,” I say, and I press my body into his, wrapping my arms around his waist.
And I let my shadows loose.
They burst from my skin like water through a dam, and I nearly cry with relief as they spill from me at last, blanketing me, encapsulating both of us in a cocoon of darkness.
There’s no sound. There are only the shadows, slithering over our skin as Roze’s chest heaves against mine. I’m grateful I can’t see his face as I press my head to his chest and try to slow my breathing.
His body is stiff. His hands hover over my shoulders like he’s afraid to touch me, and his heartbeat thunders in my ear, the only sound I can hear apart from his breathing and mine. I cling to that sign of life like an anchor.
After a few heartbeats like this, Roze slowly lowers his hands onto my shoulders.
At first, I think he’s going to push me away, but then his arms wrap around my shoulders, and he pulls me tighter to him.
I ignore the wash of heat that goes through me even now.
I can feel the hard planes of his chest and the strength in his arms as they hold me close.
Through my shadows, I see the guard crash into the room.
He comes to a sudden halt, peering around the parlor.
His eyes look so … dead. And yet, he’s searching.
He weaves through the space, looking behind furniture.
I will my shadows to thicken. Hopefully, he won’t look too carefully in our particularly dark corner, where Roze and I stand wrapped up in each other.
The captain’s head takes a slow turn, his red-rimmed eyes scanning for movement. What reasoning capabilities do the undead have? What even is he?
There’s no time to think about that. I need all my focus for my shadows, on releasing the pent-up fear, the anxiety, the rage that will keep us safe.
Obscure us.
Hide us.
Keep us secret.
I press myself into Roze until my body is flush with his, shoulder to thigh. I’m aware of every point of contact between us, like he’s stamped on my skin.
“Sinclair,” he breathes.
“Shh,” I urge, keeping my eyes on the captain.
“Sinclair,” he insists, desperate and angry. At what, I can’t imagine. My hand slithers up his side and covers his mouth as I watch the captain look pointedly in our corner.
Roze struggles, trying to pull my hand away from his mouth.
He doesn’t like to be touched.
A sting like acid bites my palm. I hiss as I pull my hand back, and the sound of it is enough for the captain to swing his head in our direction. I hold my breath, and I feel Roze hold his. My body trembles. I beg my shadows to stay solid.
He paces closer, moving slow as a predator, his eyes narrowed with malice. Blood pulses in the open wound of his throat, oozing down his neck. He’s within an arm’s reach, nostrils flaring, gazing into my shadows. Searching.
I’m still as death.
He lifts a large, meaty hand, reaching out in the darkness. It stretches toward us, closer, closer. His fingers are going to reach my shoulder. I brace myself.
Roze’s arm wraps around my waist, jerking me silently farther into the corner, and the guard’s hand closes around nothing.
He growls, a frustrated gleam in his eye. But then he turns away, huffing as he walks back through the door and away from us.
For a full minute I don’t dare move away. I stay in the shadows with Roze, wrapped in their safety.
“Sinclair,” he whispers. His breathing has turned more even, but there’s still a tense clip in his voice. “Move.”
I step away, pulling my shadows back with me. I’m shivering, still terrified. “What was that?” I ask.
Roze is pointedly not looking at me. “My mother’s doing, surely. But I’ve never seen her resurrect the dead before.”
“Not the guard,” I say, studying his face. He keeps it stern, but there’s something new and subtle in his expression—a secret. “When I put my hand on your mouth, you lurched. And then …”
It was like being stung. I glance down at those gloved hands.
“Why don’t you like people touching you?”
Wariness lines the edge of his mouth. Now he’s a moth caught in my web.
“Roze,” I say carefully, stepping toward him. “Tell me what you’re hiding.”
His lips pinch together. “If I promise to tell you,” he says, his voice gravelly, “will you wait until we get somewhere safe?”
I nod.
“Good,” he says, regaining some of his composure. “We need to get back to Vandenberghe.”
A high-pitched scream breaks through the dark.
“What was that?” I ask.
I whirl toward the hall, where the scream came from.
“Sinclair, wait—” Roze says, but I’m already sprinting from the room.
I know the captain is still out there, searching for us. Did he find another victim? I cannot help but think that someone is hurt or about to be, and it’s my fault.
I hear Roze charge after me, but I don’t slow down. More shouting echoes from the grand entrance hall. I round the corner, near a balcony. On the floor below, a smattering of people stand speaking in hushed, anxious tones.
“Sinclair.” Roze grabs my arm, and I jolt. His face is almost panicked. “We need to get out of here.”
But I turn back to the crowd of people, instinct telling me that I have to know what’s going on. I can’t turn away from this. I jerk my arm free from Roze and go down a few steps. He calls my name again—a sibilant hiss from the shadows, where he stays.
There’s an aching, prickling feeling in my head.
I just need to know …
A few paces down the stairs, I see a crowd of people before the parlor doors, all straining to get inside or peer through the doorframe.
A moment later, Princess Belladonna shoves her way through the crowd.
Her face is red and tearstained, her tiara is askew in uncommonly mussed hair, and her eyes are furious.
Behind her, two grim-faced doctors emerge from the room followed by Sir Patrick Porcher, his ruddy face solemn as he meets the crowd.
“The Queen is dead,” he announces, his voice booming off the walls. “Long live the Queen.” Belladonna stops halfway across the room, and my chest pounds as I watch her pinch her lips and clench her fists at her sides, turning slowly to face the nobles.
I back up a step, feel the blood draining from my face. Because the last person who saw the Queen was …
A gloved hand claps over my mouth.