IN HER BEDROOM, THE lamps were already lit. Their flames burned dimly, as if the room had been patiently waiting for its mistress.
Rune turned to Gideon, who looked like a wolf stepping into unfamiliar territory: wary, aloof, ready to bare his teeth at the first sign of danger.
His stony gaze scanned the room, taking in the lavender walls and the loft ceiling made of glass. Other than the four-poster bed, there were only a few furnishings, all of them tasteful and understated. Just the way Rune— the real Rune—liked things.
The sea breeze blowing in through the windows ruffled Gideon’s hair. “This is your bedroom.”
She clasped her hands in front of her. “That’s right.”
This was her favorite place. Her safest place. And she had invited a dangerous enemy straight into it.
“You said it belongs to a witch.” He stalked slowly toward her, his gaze pinning her in place.
“It belonged to my grandmother, yes.” Gideon halted.
Did you think it would be that easy?
She frowned, staring at him. He wasn’t very good at this game.
Sudden footsteps made them turn toward the doorway, where Lizbeth stood. On the tray gripped in her hands sat two cups and a decanter of red wine. “Your refreshments, Miss Winters.”
Rune nodded her thanks.
Lizbeth, who’d played her part in this charade dozens of times, brought the tray to the low table in front of the love seat. “A telegram arrived for you earlier. I’ll leave it with your drinks.”
A telegram? It must have been from someone important, otherwise Lizbeth would have waited until tomorrow.
“Oh, and …” She paused at the door. “Verity was looking for you.” “You can tell her where I am. And that I’ll return to the party soon.”
Rune waited for Lizbeth to leave before sinking into the plush cushions of the love seat. Lifting the decanter, she poured wine into both cups. The one she’d enchanted earlier buzzed beneath her fingertips. As Gideon sat down next to her, she held it out to him.
He shook his head. “No, thank you.”
Rune’s outstretched hand remained between them, holding out the wine. “Oh, you simply must try some.” She forced a smile. “It’s from my vintage collection. This bottle came all the way from the Umbrian mountains on the Continent. Lizbeth uncorked it for us. Here.” She pressed it toward him.
Gideon still didn’t take it. “I don’t drink.”
What? Cold sweat beaded down her back.
Why hadn’t Alex ever mentioned this important fact?
She swallowed, the cup hovering between them. “Are you sure?” “Very sure.”
Rune’s mind went strangely blank. This had always been the way: pick a suitor, lure him away from the party, then ply him with truth-telling wine. Sometimes she got the information she needed, sometimes she didn’t, but it was never because they refused her.
“Please,” said Gideon, his eyes narrowing as he studied her. “Don’t abstain on my account.”
Oh, I won’t. A sip would relax her and help her reassess before forging a fresh path. Setting down the enchanted cup, she reached for the other.
“Something wrong with that one?” Rune froze like a rabbit in a snare. “Wh-what?”
“The wine you offered me. After I refused it, you set it down and took the other.”
Shoot.
“D-did I?”
Shoot. Shoot. Shoot.
He stretched his arm across the back of the sofa, his hand gripping the smooth mahogany frame behind Rune. “You wouldn’t be trying to drug me, would you?” His mouth quirked, as if he were flirting. But his eyes were dark, and the look in them dangerous.
He knows.
What had Alex told her earlier this evening? That if she tried a spell in Gideon’s presence, he would smell the magic on her.
Rune tried not to panic. Every witch’s magic smelled different. Rune was only capable of minor spells and illusions—weak castings—making her magic’s scent hard to detect. In fact, the only person who’d ever recognized the scent of Rune’s magic was Verity. A few months after the revolution, Rune had cast her very first illusion before attending a ball. Verity—who didn’t know Rune then—should have reported her the moment she smelled the magic. Instead, she took Rune aside and told her to be more careful.
They’d been friends ever since.
Even if Gideon suspects me, he has no proof.
She put her cup down and lifted the enchanted one. Cupping the bottom of it with two hands—hiding the spellmark drawn there—she locked eyes with him, pressed the cup to her lips, and took a long swallow.
“If it’s drugged,” she said, coming up for air, “you’ll know in a few minutes.”
Releasing his grip on the polished wood, he bent his elbow and leaned his temple against his fist. “Looking forward to it.”
As the alcohol flooded her, warming her down to her legs, something rushed along with it.
Magic.
Like unruly ivy pushing at the windows of a house, forcing open the locks and letting itself in, she could feel Truth Teller breaking down her defenses, loosening her inhibitions, allowing someone to reach in and easily pluck what was inside.
Rune clung to the cup, wondering what the hell she was going to do.
It’s your spell. Work around it.
She had no idea if it was possible. She’d never tested Truth Teller on herself.
But the enchantment wouldn’t force its victim to offer the truth unprompted; if Gideon wanted to get something out of her, he needed to ask a question. And Gideon didn’t know Rune had enchanted the cup, never mind enchanted it with a spell for telling the truth. So, theoretically, he had no reason to interrogate her.
This will be fine. Stay calm.
Hard to do when she felt like a cornered animal.
Gideon sat inches from Rune, making it easy to see how much bigger and stronger than her he was. She couldn’t help but notice the warmth rolling off him. With it came a heady scent, not only of gunpowder, but something stronger, like freshly cut cedar. It was so pleasant, she wanted to lean into it.
Alarmed by the instinct, she immediately leaned away instead. Trying to appear unbothered by everything spinning out of her control, she reached for the folded telegram Lizbeth left on the tray and started to unfold it.
“Is there a reason you abstain?” If she could keep him talking, it might prevent him from asking her questions.
“I don’t like not being in control of myself.”
“But isn’t that half the fun?” she asked, glancing at him.
He looked away, but not before his eyes darkened. “I might have agreed with you once.”
Rune lowered the telegram, curious. “Oh?”
“There was a time when I needed it to survive. Along with other, stronger substances.” His lip curled. “Or that’s what I told myself.”
Stronger substances? Rune wondered what those might be. Years ago, when the Sister Queens ruled, laudanum had been popular among Nan and her friends. Is that what he means?
“Alex could tell you all about it, I’m sure.”
Frustrated that she couldn’t enchant the truth out of him, she asked, “What if I want you to tell me about it?”
When he looked at her, his eyes were full of shadows.
He didn’t answer her question. Instead, he nodded to her telegram. “A love poem from one of your admirers?”
“Uh, no.” Rune glanced down, starting to read, and immediately frowned. “It’s …”
MISS RUNE WINTERS WINTERSEA HOUSE
THE MINISTRY OF PUBLIC SAFETY IS DELIGHTED TO NAME YOU GUEST OF HONOR AT NEXT WEEK’S LUMINARIES DINNER. PLEASE PREPARE A SPEECH EXTOLLING THE NOBLE VIRTUES OF THE REPUBLIC. SEE YOU THURSDAY NEXT.
AILA WOODS PUBLIC SAFETY MINISTER
Rune felt her legs go numb.
The Luminaries Dinner was a monthly tribute to heroes of the revolution, intended to bolster loyalty to the regime. Rune had planned to skip it this time because the last one had been so hard to stomach.
As she read the telegram again, her heart sank.
If she declined to be their guest of honor, the Tribunal would see it as disloyalty.
She had to accept.
Not only did she have no time to prepare a speech, but the Luminaries Dinner always required the worst kind of pretending. She would have to act proud of what she’d done. Have to feign ambivalence about the violent loss of the person she loved most. Her speech would cheer on the Republic while calling for more purgings, and denounce the evil of witches in their midst.
She would spit on Nan’s memory yet again.
In the beginning, pretending had been easier. Rune could push down her anger and grief. But the more fealty she swore to the New Republic, the more witches she failed to save, the harder it became.
If there weren’t a hundred other reasons to despise Gideon Sharpe, this would be sufficient: he didn’t have to hide who he was. He didn’t have to pretend to hate the things he truly loved.
If she didn’t loathe him so much, she might envy him.
Rune fell back into the cushions. “Wasn’t Lola Parsons supposed to be the guest of honor this month?”
Gideon’s brow furrowed as he glanced from her to the telegram. “The Guard took Lola into custody last week.” He gently took the paper from her, scanning its contents. “One of her servants reported a casting signature in her cellar. She denies it, but we believe she was harboring a witch.”
Oh.
“They’re asking you to be the guest of honor instead?” Rune nodded, a little numbly.
His brow furrowed further. “And that’s a bad thing?”
Rune could feel the answer—the real one—surge up her throat.
Yes. I can’t stand it any longer. If I have to toast the villains who murdered my grandmother one more time, I’m going to set them all on fire.
Her answer—the absolute truth of the situation—swelled on her tongue, pushing at the roof of her mouth. She could feel it slipping past her teeth …
No no no no no.
Panicking, Rune tried to think of any other reason this invite should upset her. If she could push out a smaller truth before the more dangerous one escaped, she might subvert the spell.
“I don’t have a dress to wear!”
Gideon drew back, startled by the outburst.
Rune clamped her mouth shut to prevent the real reason from escaping.
But it subsided—for now, at least.
He raised one dark brow. “Is that all?” Curse him.
The surge began again—because no; it was not all. Truth Teller was drawing the words from her depths, like water from a well.
I hate this horrible Republic. I would burn it to the ground if I could.
But if I don’t play along, girls like me will continue to die.
This time when the words threatened to burst out of her, Rune squeezed her hands into fists as she held them back, trying to think of something— anything—else to say instead. Something less damning, but still true.
“There’s no time to have a dress made! My seamstress is booked until next month, but the dinner is next week.”
Rune threw him a pitiful look that wasn’t entirely false. She’d gone hot all over and her heart beat painfully fast.
“Hmm. That is unfortunate.”
But the spell wasn’t finished with her. It snaked up her throat, threatening to choke her.
Tell him, it prodded. Tell him the rest.
“And …” The words itched. She tried to swallow them but couldn’t. “They’ll want me to talk about Nan.”
She had his full attention now.
He was staring at her, his gaze piercing. “And you don’t want to.”
She shook her head no, eyes burning with the tears that were building. She was terrified of blurting out the rest. Rune reached for her throat, prepared to squeeze if something worse tried to escape.
As a hot tear slipped down her cheek, Gideon visibly softened. “I’m sorry. It must have been hard to be raised by a witch.”
It wasn’t a question, so Rune didn’t have to answer. Her chest still rose and fell with her rapid breaths.
He glanced over her shoulder. She followed his gaze. Between the translucent cerulean canopies of her bed, which were drawn back and tied to each of the four posts, an enormous portrait hung on the wall.
Kestrel Winters took up most of the picture’s frame. She wore a black velvet dress with lace trim, and she’d pinned her curls back, allowing the artist to catch every ridge and crease of her solemn face. She was close to sixty in this rendering, and her beauty often reminded Rune of a mighty oak.
It was the child on Nan’s lap, however, that drew the viewer’s eye. She wore a crisp lace dress with pale blue ribbons—but that was where her elegance ended. Her cheeks were bright red from running, and her strawberry blonde hair, which had been painstaking combed not long before this sitting, was a messy tangle.
A grass stain spoiled the knee of one white stocking, and though Rune had been told to sit still, the artist couldn’t paint over her fidgety energy.
Her eyes were bright and full of mischief, as if she badly wanted to laugh, but held it in, for propriety’s sake.
It was Rune’s favorite painting. She always felt like it was trying to tell her a secret.
Keeping a portrait of a witch you’d betrayed wasn’t illegal, but it might rouse Gideon’s suspicions. “I almost got rid of it after they purged her,” she said softly. “But I didn’t want to forget that evil lurks where we least expect it. So I kept it, to remind me.”
Gideon could interpret this to mean the evil of witches like Nan. But for Rune, the evil was in her own actions, in what she had done to the person she loved most.
“You were very cute,” he said, studying the child in the painting.
Rune glanced sharply up at him. The wine hadn’t worked, but perhaps her tears had?
Is that your weakness? she wondered. Girls who cry?
Either way, she hadn’t lost this game yet. She needed to retake control before the spell forced an even deadlier truth from her.
“I was cute?” she teased. “Am I not anymore?”
She couldn’t coerce the truth out of him with wine. But there were other ways to get information. Methods she’d used on plenty of unsuspecting young men.
The thought of using those same tricks on Gideon snarled her stomach in knots, but she’d run out of options. If she wanted to save Seraphine, she needed to find out where the Blood Guard was keeping her. Wherever that was, Gideon had likely put Seraphine there himself.
He turned the full force of his attention on her, and she shivered beneath the weight of it.
“Cute? No.” His eyes gleamed in the candlelight, taking her in. “No, I wouldn’t say that.”
She ran her fingers lightly down the edge of his lapel. “How would you describe me, then?”
Gideon stayed silent, watching her fingers.
Rune hated this part of the game. The flirtatious touching—which inevitably led to kissing—was always the last, most desperate step in
obtaining information.
But it was a necessary evil. And Rune would do whatever was necessary to save more girls from sharing her grandmother’s fate. A fate Rune had delivered her to.
Gideon still hadn’t given her an answer.
“Well?” She pressed her hands to his chest, preparing to run them over his shoulders. “Surely, you—”
He reached for her wrist, stopping her. Rune looked up to find his attention fixed on the hand he’d captured.
Without speaking, his fingertips gently grazed her palm. Her heart climbed into her throat as he traced her fingers slowly, slowly, like he knew exactly what he was doing. Like he’d done it thousands of times before.
She swallowed, her skin sparking where he touched her. Gideon leaned in, brushing his rough cheek against hers.
“Rune …” His breath was warm against her throat. “Do you want to go back?”
“Back?” she murmured.
“To the party.” His fingers traced down her neck and across her collarbone. “Your guests will wonder where we are.”
He was giving her an escape if she wanted it. Like a gentleman. The thought startled her.
She shook her head. “Let them wonder. Unless …”
Rune pulled back a little, peering into his face. She saw now that his eyes weren’t black, but a deep, dark brown. “Do you want to go back?”
He gave her an incredulous look. “And do what? Make conversation with Bart Wentholt?” He scowled. “I have more stimulating conversations with my horse.”
It was so unexpected—Gideon Sharpe, making a joke—that a laugh burst out of Rune.
He let go of her hand, falling quiet. When her giggling subsided, she looked over to find a thoughtful expression on his face.
“Your laugh is like a fuse,” he said. “It lights you up.” Rune’s heart thudded. No one had ever told her that before. He doesn’t mean it.
Gideon Sharpe was a cold, heartless murderer. Not a softhearted suitor. He played the same game she did, and was more skilled at it than she’d thought.
Fear nipped at her.
Perhaps bringing him here had been a mistake.
Her gaze trailed over him: the broadness of his chest and shoulders, the corded muscles in his arms, the shadow of soon-to-be stubble darkening his cheeks. He was so much bigger than her. If he wanted to, he could easily lift her from this seat and carry her to the bed.
Rune froze.
Where had that thought come from?
She reached for the cup of wine, a little shaky, no longer caring about the spell it carried—she was already enchanted—and took another sip, careful to conceal the bottom with her cupped hands. She needed to calm her nerves. Their eyes locked over the lip of the cup, and Rune slowly lowered the wine into her lap.
As if knowing the effect he had on her, Gideon leaned in. Again, he lingered. Touching his temple to hers, running the backs of his fingers tenderly up her arm. Her skin blazed in his wake. His touch was stronger than the drink, pulling her under.
How is he so good at this?
Rune closed her eyes, trying to stay in control. “How much time do you have?”
“My next shift starts at dawn.”
His witch-hunting shift, she told herself. Emphasis on the witch–hunting. When his thumb stroked the line of her jaw, Rune had to bite down on a whimper. It was almost as if he were a weapon specifically designed to
compromise her.
“Hunting anyone in particular?” she asked. “Perhaps.” His breath was hot on her neck. “Who?”
He paused. “Why do you want to know?”
Rune swallowed. Was that suspicion in his voice, or flirtation?
Danger, danger, said her brain.
“What do you do with them, when you—”
Taking her chin gently in his fingers, Gideon turned her face toward his.
His eyes were intense, his breathing shallow and uneven.
“Rune,” he said, pupils dilating. He looked hungry suddenly. Like a man who hadn’t eaten in years. “Less talking.”
He’s going to kiss me, she realized.
And the scariest thing was, Rune wanted him to. More than she wanted information, more than she wanted to rescue Seraphine … in this moment, she wanted to know how his mouth would feel against hers. If it would be soft or rough. If it would be as tender as his fingers, or if he’d give in to that ravenous hunger, taking his fill of her.
It shocked her out of her stupor.
Rune was no longer the mimic spider, luring her victim into a trap. She was inside her own trap … about to be devoured by her prey.
Desperate to extricate herself, Rune remembered the cup still in her hands.
Before Gideon completely overwhelmed her, she dumped her wine down the front of his suit.
