Chapter 9
CHAPTER
Sleep was a futile endeavor. Vaasa tossed and turned on the couch, the fire raging in front of her. It thawed her frozen limbs. Still, her body twitched with restlessness.
She swore she had seen Roman. Had it just been some figment of her lonely imagination? Some cruel twist of Ozik’s control over her?
“This is useless,” she hissed to herself, sitting up and throwing the blankets off the side of the couch.
All the attendants had retired for the evening.
Why should she sleep? These were the only hours she was truly alone.
For a moment, she thought about entering her mother’s room, but the idea immediately summoned a wave of panic.
And then she wondered… who guarded her door at night? During the day, there was a rotation of guards she had already memorized, but she hadn’t yet gotten the nerve to explore the fortress under the cover of darkness. To look for the necklace her mother had left for her in other parts of the castle.
Perhaps now she would have the freedom to.
Vaasa pulled herself to her feet and quickly changed into a warm wool dress and boots that wouldn’t make noise on the blue runners situated throughout every major hallway in the fortress.
She tucked a dagger into her belt and threw her cloak over her shoulders.
Silent as she had ever been, she slipped out her door and gazed down the dark hallway of the emperor’s wing.
A body stood up straight. “Heiress,” the guard said.
So she was being watched. The insignia he wore identified him as a higher-ranking guard, though not quite the lead sentinel she had yet to meet. “I can’t sleep. I’m going to the kitchens,” she told him, sauntering past him.
“What do you need? I’ll have it brought to—”
“Please,” she said, tilting her head innocently. “There’s no need to wake anyone up. I’ll fetch it myself. I just need a walk.”
“Heiress—”
“Is the fortress unsafe?” she asked. “Have the rest of our guards left their posts?”
The man immediately shifted his tone from concern to defensiveness, just as she assumed he would. “They are right where they should be.”
“Then I’m safe, unless you doubt the competence of the men you work with?”
The sentinel bristled at her insinuation. “Of course not.”
She smiled sweetly. “Good.”
Vaasa turned on her heel and strode to the end of the hallway.
She exited the emperor’s wing of the fortress and plunged into the main rotunda, taking the stairs to the second floor.
Everything was exactly as it had been before she left.
She knew each inch of this fortress like the back of her hands.
Yet it was an assurance she couldn’t rest upon; predictability was not a guarantee.
Faintly, she heard the footsteps of the sentinel behind her.
Others were placed throughout, though none of them stopped her.
The one who had been posted outside her door kept a healthy distance, but dutifully followed her down each corridor.
Vaasa approached one of the older wings of the fortress, the one her grandfather had lived in before her father had demanded a new, larger wing be built.
She placed her hand on the knob, turning to face the sentinel and leaning back against the door.
“This wing was my grandfather’s,” she reminded him. “It’s private. Please wait out here.”
He pursed his lips, but then said, “I thought you were going to the kitchens.”
Vaasa sharpened her tone. “I’ve changed my mind.”
The sentinel nodded, taking a step back. “I’ll wait out here.”
Frustration grew within her. He was too suspicious; she lowered her eyes and swallowed. “I’m going to read some of his old books. It… makes it easier to be here without the rest of my family. I may fall asleep. Please don’t disturb me.”
The sentinel’s expression turned sympathetic at the mention of her late parents and brother. He handed her his oil lamp. “Of course, Heiress. I’ll move my post here for the time being. Would you like me to send an attendant in the morning?”
Vaasa tightened her grip around the handle of the lamp and shook her head. “I’ll return to my rooms when I’m ready. Thank you, though. Your compassion is appreciated.”
The man nodded.
Vaasa slipped through the doors, closing them behind her, finally alone again.
If the necklace was hidden somewhere other than the emperor’s wing, this was her next best guess.
So she scurried to the end of the hall, a fugitive under the cover of night, her entire body thrumming.
None of the sconces were lit. She entered one of the conversation rooms. Everything was exactly as she’d remembered it—untouched, unsullied.
In here, art hung on the walls, covered now by fabric sheets in order to maintain their exact state, as if someone was afraid of allowing a single day to pass where what used to be could end up tarnished.
Settees gathered around each other in the center of the room, all facing a hearth that she pictured raging with warmth.
There were still blankets folded neatly in the corner, still end tables prepared to hold wine.
Still a fluffy white rug sprawled in the center, tying everything together.
She set down her lamp, eyes landing on the books settled atop the mantel of the fireplace. Her father had grown up in warmth like this, and he had chosen differently for Dominik and her. Resentment tingled in her veins.
“You came,” a voice said from the doorway, and Vaasa practically jumped out of her skin. Instinctually, her hand curled around the knife strapped beneath her cloak. She could just see the outline of him, of trousered legs and a coat—formal, especially given the time of night.
And then he stepped into the light, and it felt for a moment like time had stopped.
Vaasa lowered the dagger. “Roman,” she breathed.
The corner of his lips turned up. “Vaasa,” he said.
She threw herself across the room, something desperate overtaking her better senses.
His arms caught her and scooped her up against his body—no longer sculpted like in youth but hard and corded like that of a man.
He held her so tightly she thought it might keep her together.
She breathed him in, adrenaline rushing through her veins.
Was there anything left of her to break?
She’d watched as Roman left. Cried when she pictured him at the front lines.
Followed each and every battle with a meticulous scorn, waiting, knowing, and when the news had come that his entire squadron had been killed, she had mourned in silence.
Raged in the shadows. It was the first true moment she’d thought herself a chameleon, because to hide the way her heart broke had felt like learning an entirely new language; it took practice and an extraordinary amount of thought to translate every move of her body.
She’d sworn to herself then that her father was right: Love was a useless thing.
Yet here Roman was, alive, and—
Vaasa broke from him, realization pummeling her with a ruthless edge. She stumbled away until her back hit the wall, her hand snapping to her knife again.
Instinct pulsed. This was too convenient. Too coincidental. Roman was not here by accident. No matter which way she considered it, Ozik had his hand in this moment.
And yet she couldn’t bring herself to run.
“Vaasa—”
“You’re alive?” she demanded.
Roman nodded, though something that looked an awful lot like pain flashed in his eyes. “I wanted to give you more time. To let you settle in before I sprung this on you. But then you saw me earlier, and I just thought that if you were going to look for me anywhere, it would be here.”
Her palms pressed against the wall with the same force as her back, like if she tried hard enough, she could push right through it and disappear.
He was mere feet from her. She could feel the proximity as if it were a living thing.
Stolen moments hung in the space between their bodies, memories it seemed they were both conscious of: the first time she’d ever noticed him in the inner ward, how he had whispered to her in the abandoned servant’s kitchen over a piece of cake, the string of nights she had met him there afterward.
The moment he had finally backed her into the counter and put his mouth on hers.
It had been hot—on fire the way young things were, fueled by the firsts of it all.
The nights they had snuck into these very rooms. Had slept tangled with each other in one of the many beds in this part of the fortress.
Breath didn’t come easily to Vaasa, and as she tried to take a deep inhale through her nose, her heart beat faster. “Why are you here? Why are you dressed like… a sentinel?” she asked. She scanned his attire again, and her eyes caught on a set of iron keys dangling off his hip.
What did Roman have access to?
His smile deepened. “Because I am a sentinel. Your lead sentinel, actually.”
Vaasa’s lips parted. She forced her gaze to stay up instead of looking at those iron keys.
This meant he had control of her guards, her schedule, her transportation.
Her rooms. Everything. Suspicion flooded her.
What had he done to be put in charge of her personal guard?
Her pained whisper cut the quiet air. “I thought you were dead.”
His shoulders softened, and carefully, he stepped forward. “Until Dominik’s death, I had to be.”
I’m so sorry. The words she had never gotten the chance to say built upon her tongue, but she choked them down, her eyes stinging. Alive. Roman Katayev was alive.
She slid down the wall, farther away from him.
He paused and tilted his head, yet no hair fell into his eyes the way it would have years ago.
It was cut short now, not a strand moved out of place.
Perhaps she would have once thought such a style clean.
Now it seemed restricted. There was something so different about him, the rebellious glint of youth hidden behind the stoicism of his gaze.