The Villain
Trystan stood waiting outside the cellar door for twenty minutes.
Gods knew why. There were plenty of other things he could be doing: managing mercenary requests, torturing the new workers with something truly cruel—like an icebreaker activity. But instead, he paced nervously, waiting for the cellar door to reopen.
That kiss had rattled his brain loose.
He’d tried to forget it—the way one tried to dodge a brick flying at one’s face. Inevitable, painful, and impossible to truly escape.
He needed a distraction. A disruption. He needed…
Kingsley! The frog entered his line of vision, shortly followed by Gideon Sage, who looked mussed and sweaty as he dove after the frog, only to fall hard on his stomach. The amphibian landed at Trystan’s feet, looking up at him with satisfied golden eyes.
“What are you playing at, Kingsley?” Trystan untucked his arms and crouched, waiting patiently as the frog jotted down a word with his free foot, then held up the sign the animal had been keeping who knew where.
Fetch.
Trystan snorted, and Gideon glared as he stood, pointing an accusatory finger at Kingsley. “Real nice, you deranged turtle.”
Trystan looked at Sage’s brother blankly before lifting an eyebrow. “He’s a frog.”
A patch of sunshine dipped in through the stained-glass window, shining right over Kingsley and his tiny crown. Gideon clicked his tongue. “Are you always this literal, Maverine?”
Trystan frowned and looked at Gideon as he said, “Yes.” Gideon chuckled. “I see why she likes you.”
Trystan sniffed and began inspecting one of the water-hose installations
that Sage had put in months prior for safety. To ensure that it was in working order, certainly not to hide the red tinging the tops of his cheeks.
He didn’t need anyone—particularly not Sage’s brother, a man who’d worked for his enemy—to become aware of the…attachment Trystan had formed to his assistant. Once someone else was made aware of a feeling, it became real, inescapable. Chasing you down like a monster on the hunt.
Like Scatter Day but far less entertaining. “Sage likes everyone,” Trystan muttered.
Gideon rubbed the back of his neck, still grinning. “Evie doesn’t like
Gideon opened his mouth to argue, but he pressed on. “When we were kids, she was always the agreeable one, always doing what she was told, going above and beyond to make sure both our parents were happy. It never sat right with me, but they were harder on her, I think. Expected more.”
He paused, shaking his head and coughing lightly into his hand, his green eyes glistening. “She hated making a fuss, even to her own detriment. I remember one of the neighbors gave her a shawl once that was so itchy she got a rash, but she wouldn’t take it off because ‘it was a gift.’” Gideon rolled his eyes as if the memory were endearing, though it squeezed something tight in Trystan’s chest. “But don’t get it wrong,” Gideon added. “Being agreeable doesn’t always mean real affection, especially for Evie. She’s kept her heart guarded all these years.”
Trystan looked down at his feet. “I don’t think you know her well enough anymore to say that.”
“Maybe not,” Gideon conceded, “but I can see she’s not afraid to disagree with you, to argue, to tell you how she really feels. She trusts you not to turn on her.”
She trusts you.
Why in the deadlands would he tell me that?
Trystan swallowed and began pacing in front of the door again, Kingsley now clinging to his boot as he walked. “That’s just good sense. I’m her employer, and there needs to be a certain level of trust and honesty for us to succeed.”
Gideon gave him a look that bordered on pity. “You’re really in deep, aren’t you?”
Just then, Rebecka rounded the corner, trying to look casual as she eyed the still-closed cellar door. “Has she come out yet?”
A knowing smile curled Trystan’s lips, making Rebecka scoff.
“I am not asking for myself! Nobody is getting any work done! Word of her confronting her father is all over the office, and it’s causing an uproar. She needs to hurry up.” Rebecka planted her hands on her hips. “If one more guard asks me where the provolone cheese is, I’m going to break my glasses against the cement just so I don’t have to look at them anymore!”
Another head peeked around the corner, interrupting Rebecka’s rant. “She’s still in there, then?” Gushiken asked nervously.
Trystan pinched the bridge of his nose. “I told everyone to get back to work.”
Tatianna didn’t sneak around the corner like Blade and Rebecka but floated around with a confidence Trystan seemed to lack. “I thought that was just a suggestion.”
Trystan growled. “Apparently!”
Tatianna smirked and nodded toward the door. “How is she?” But the healer’s steady composure faltered when Clare brushed past her.
It would’ve been more nauseating if even the slightest touch from Sage didn’t also make him feel weak in a way that both disgusted and intrigued him.
But mostly disgusted him.
“No word yet,” Rebecka said. “But if she’s not out in the next sixty seconds, I’m sending you all back to your desks.”
The door suddenly burst open, as if Rebecka’s frustration had summoned her. Evie stumbled out into the hallway, blood streaming down her cheek and neck.
“Sage, my gods!” Trystan shouted, immediately checking her for injuries.
“Oh, thank goodness,” Rebecka said. “Can you please tell everyone you’re fine so they can get back to their— Evangelina!” Rebecka’s voice rose in alarm as she finally noticed the blood smeared across Sage’s face and body. But Evie’s focus was solely on Gideon, who was leaning against the wall.
Sage raised her dagger, wild-eyed, and stormed toward her brother, shoving him hard until his back hit the wall. “Eve! What are you doing?” Gideon yelled.
“I’ve just been to see our father.”
Gideon’s eyes darted around, and then he tried to leave, shoving past Sage so forcefully that she stumbled, tripping on the uneven ground and crashing to the floor with a painful yelp.
In any life before he met her, Trystan would have gone after the knight now fleeing down the hallway, escaping for reasons that couldn’t have been good. But the only thing his body recognized was her hitting the ground—and the uncomfortable sensation in his chest at seeing her in even an ounce of pain. He dropped to his knees beside her, panicked.
But before Trystan could brush the curls from Sage’s eyes to see the fury in them, she was already on her feet, dagger still in hand.
“Sage, the blood…” he began, trying to sound calm.
But it didn’t matter—she clearly wasn’t interested in his concern, only in the path she was now tearing down the corridor after her brother. She called back over her shoulder before disappearing from sight: “It’s not mine.”
The words struck him like lightning, sudden and searing. He stared after her, overwhelmed by a tangle of emotions he couldn’t untangle—wonder, pride, concern. But it was the concern that stood out in harsh clarity.
Ellia’s warning before he’d entered the Heart Village echoed in his mind like cold water: *Do not cause any harm.*
Sage was edging closer to darkness, and as much as he admired her ruthlessness, her perseverance, and her strength, that voice in his head—the one that reminded him daily that he was only good for one thing—whispered that the worst harm he might ever cause would be to the one person he wanted to save.
