Gandrett avoided showing any of the conflicted emotions that welled up inside her chest. All night long she had tried to understand what had happened. Why she had followed that impulse to touch him. Why she had felt as if a wall had broken down between them.
And then he had pulled it up again—iron and stone and ice—and had left her with a cryptic statement which made even less sense than anything else about him.
“How well do you know Nehelon?” Gandrett asked instead of responding to Mckenzie’s words.
The young woman adjusted her sleeves with sudden interest. “Well enough to know that he cares.” There was a hint of discomfort in her voice. If Gandrett didn’t see the smile on Mckenzie’s face widen into a real fake smile, she would have passed it off as embarrassment. But there was more to it.
So she asked, “Did he say anything?” It was a stupid thing to ask. Why would he be talking to Mckenzie about her? And why did it suddenly matter to Gandrett if he did?
She remembered that first encounter in her chambers, how Nehelon had shrunk from Mckenzie’s taunting. “You and he—”
She didn’t need to finish her thought with Mckenzie’s sudden tomato-like skin tone speaking for itself.
“It’s all right. You don’t have to tell me.” Gandrett didn’t need to know. It didn’t change anything. He didn’t mean anything.
Mckenzie’s hand landed on hers with her usual lightness. “I want to tell you. Friends tell friends about such things.”
“Friends?” Gandrett looked up. Surel was her friend along with Kaleb. Mckenzie was the daughter of the man who had damned her to a lifetime of servitude to a goddess who forbade Gandrett from sharing her life with anyone but her. Of the man who had bought her to retrieve his abducted son, using means that would damn her in the eyes of Vala. And yet, when Gandrett looked at Mckenzie, she saw more than that. She saw a brave and witty woman who had spent her life navigating through an existence damned to a different type of servitude. A life of not having a voice, of being the pretty, dressed-up accessory for the men who surrounded her. A life that Gandrett didn’t envy her for. A prison so like the one Gandrett had been pushed into.
“Friend,” Mckenzie smiled and nodded at her. “I didn’t believe it when Nehelon told me a girl was going to save my brother. But if anyone can do it, it’s you.”
“Let’s see about that when I return from my mission.” Light words. But their meaning too heavy to bear. So soon, a life would depend on her. And Gandrett didn’t know if she was ready. To wield a sword, to fight, yes. But to ensnare Armand Denderlain’s heart so she could sneak around Eedwood castle and find Joshua Brenheran—
“I used to believe Nehelon and I could be a thing,” Mckenzie interrupted Gandrett’s thoughts. “We had some moments, I thought, but then he left to get you from the priory and—”
Gandrett didn’t dare ask what could have changed.
“It was I who had some moments,” Mckenzie admitted. “And he might have needed a distraction.” She gave Gandrett a knowing look. “It’s a lonely life being a man of power. And he isn’t even a lord. Just a chancellor.” She pretended to be serious.
Gandrett said nothing. Couldn’t.
“Joshua is different…” Mckenzie’s eyes grew distant as if she was looking at her brother in her mind. “He used to prefer my company over everyone else’s. He taught me how to fight when I was little—not that I am any good.” She giggled. “He is my friend as much as he is my brother.”
Gandrett sighed through her nose, her fingers playing with the edges of the parchment between them. Her brother… She wished she’d been around to show him how to fight.
“You will bring him back, Gandrett.” Mckenzie sounded convinced.
Gandrett didn’t agree or decline. She didn’t speak her doubts, that when even a Fae male had failed to retrieve Joshua—
“This is Eedwood castle.” Mckenzie ran her finger over the inked lines on the open scroll. The layout of the castle grounds. “I might have been brought up to smile and nod like a lady—” She looked at the lines down her nose. “—but I know how to read plans and plot as well of any of the men here in court.”
They spent the rest of the morning going over the floor plans of Eedwood castle’s square layout, and Gandrett spent the major part of her energy on memorizing every entrance and every exit. On the arrangement of the chambers of the Denderlain family on the second floor, on the barracks where the guards slept, where weapons were kept, the location of the stables, the gates—
“Isn’t it a bit late to join?” Mckenzie said, making Gandrett break her focus. She had been so busy memorizing every stairwell, every door, that she hadn’t noticed they had company. “We were just finishing up.”
Nehelon’s shadow hit the bench and crossed Gandrett’s lap as she bothered to look up, her face bored as she glanced at him through the intensity of the spring sun. Gandrett harrumphed by way of greeting and returned her attention to the maps she’d been studying. Good.
“Why didn’t you take a hostage in return?” she asked out of the blue but didn’t give him any time to answer. “You could have taken anyone close enough to Lord Hamyn and exchanged them for Joshua.”
Nehelon lifted a brow, trying to ignore Mckenzie’s sideways glance. Gandrett hadn’t told her what had happened between them. Not that anything had happened, really—
Anything. He had expected rage, hurt, or even that Gandrett would mock him for running out on her, but this—
It was as if last night hadn’t occurred. “We considered the option and deemed it unsuitable for a situation of such importance.” Hadn’t she felt it? The tingling at her touch. How her fingertips had made his buried Fae soul sing? “He is Lord Tyrem’s heir and the only worthy one—” He gave Mckenzie a look, hoping he wouldn’t come across as condescending. “—the only worthy male heir,” he added for her benefit. The laws at the courts of Sives dated back to ancient times when women were not recognized as successors. Mckenzie, with her fierce heart and her sharp mind, would make for an outstanding Lady of Ackwood.
“Hold your breath, chancellor.” She gave him a brief, poison-sweet smile. “I have made my peace with remaining a pearl-laden accessory for the rulers.” She didn’t seem even half at ease.
The young woman shook out her fair waves in the sunlight as she closed her eyes for a long second, a gesture he had observed made the courtiers’ eyes spark. And from an objective point of view, Mckenzie Brenheran was the epitome of beauty, with supple curves and depthless, emerald eyes and a smile that could bring kingdoms down. That’s why he had entertained the thought of seeking distraction in her arms. Why he had lingered in the hallway that night when she had asked him to. Why he hadn’t pulled away when she had laid her hands on his arms and stood on her toes to kiss him. Once. Just once. And with many regrets, not half-worth the trouble of having a noblewoman set her eyes on him.
Gandrett studied him as if he were a book she’d dropped when it couldn’t spark her interest. He didn’t turn away from Gandrett, who seemed intent on pretending she hadn’t felt how his heart had beat in his chest, simply because she hadn’t shied away from him—from what lay beneath the glamour. He hadn’t had that sensation since—