After another extended moment, I reopened the door, doing it as noisily and slowly as I could. Jareth had moved, now standing by one of the windows, right beside my desk. I carefully refrained from looking at the desk, although I wanted to analyze it for any sign of disturbance. This time I had left the top of the desk clear, but the stack of door compositions had been carefully placed in the top drawer.
I crossed over to the window and held out the small posy with a tentative smile.
“It’s a little silly,” I said. “But in Ardann, white tulips are used for apologies and fresh starts. I’m hoping we can have a fresh start.”
He took the sprig from my hands with a gallant bow.
“How could I refuse such a gesture?” He straightened, a smile on his face. “Darius will be pleased.”
“I hope so.” I let my tension push a slight flush up my cheeks.
Hopefully he would think I was making the effort for Darius’s sake. And hopefully the thought would enrage him.
“I will leave you in peace for now,” Jareth said. “But I look forward to a new chapter between us.”
“Thank you,” I said, politely seeing him to my door.
As soon as it had closed behind him, however, I rushed back to the desk. I pulled open the top drawer and stared at its contents.
“Well?” Bryony asked from behind me.
I spun, triumph in my eyes. “They’re definitely disturbed. He read them.”
“So we won’t be sleeping tonight then?”
I chuckled. “You should probably sound at least a little nervous.”
“Never,” Bryony scoffed. “The two of us can take on any assassin.” She gave a smug smile. “Especially you. They won’t have any idea what they’re walking into.”
Chapter 24
Bryony had somehow managed to raid the kitchen again and had a midnight feast ready for us long before midnight. But I could barely eat or drink, my nerves stretched taut.
I insisted we position ourselves on the bed with the door to the sitting room closed, as if I had already retired for the night. The hours stretched on, however, with no sound or sign of life.
“What if he’s not coming tonight?” I asked Bryony. “Maybe he needs some time to source an assassin.”
She yawned. “Then it’s a good thing it’s a rest day tomorrow. We can sleep all day and wait up again all night tomorrow night. But I suspect he’ll want to move quickly. Exams are next week, and then you’ll be gone back to Ardann.”
As the hours wore on, her yawns grew closer together and longer until I suggested she lie down, just for a few moments.
“Of course not.” She widened her eyes dramatically, making me giggle.
“You’re not going to convince me you’re not half asleep that way. It makes sense for us to take shifts, anyway. Otherwise we might both end up falling asleep at just the wrong moment.”
She grumbled but admitted I was right, making me promise to wake her at the first hint of any movement—or in a couple of hours, whichever came first. I agreed, although now that I had carried my point, I was a little worried I wouldn’t be able to stay awake without her company.
I needn’t have worried, however. Despite the creeping tiredness, I couldn’t have slept even if I wanted to do so. Bryony had dropped into slumber almost instantly, barely moving except for the occasional twitch, but too many thoughts whirled through my head for such peace.
I had been so determined to reveal Jareth’s true colors for so long that I hadn’t given much thought to how Darius would react. But now that the moment had potentially come, I found myself wishing someone else—anyone else—could be responsible for revealing the truth to him. I hated the thought of being the one to deliver such devastating news.
The minutes ticked on, Bryony’s assigned two hours nearing a close, when I finally heard what I thought might be movement. I nearly roused her but hesitated at her peaceful face. I had been waiting here in tense expectation for hours now. And it wasn’t the first time I had thought I heard something that turned out to be nothing.
I carefully slid off the bed and padded silently over to my bedchamber door. Placing my ear against it, I listened.
There. The scraping sound came again. Excitement raced through me, flinging me into full wakefulness. Someone had opened my door and entered my sitting room.
Of course, now I was too far away to shake Bryony awake, and I didn’t want to call to her and alert the assassin. Should I run back to the bed, or was I better positioned here by the door? I hesitated. I might not need her assistance if it was a single assassin, and any scuffle would wake her anyway.
A muffled sound came again, like another door opening, but the one in front of me stayed still and silent. I frowned.
Surely the assassin wasn’t retreating again already. I was certain I’d made no noise coming to the door. Had I somehow given myself away? I couldn’t think how.
I pictured my sitting room in my mind, trying to think what else it could have been. It had definitely sounded like a door closing, although it had been slightly muffled.
A jolt of horror passed through me.
I had tried to lay a trap with myself as bait, but what if I had miscalculated? All this time, I had been the target of Cassius’s hatred and anger, but everything had changed now. He no longer held the throne—not really—and it was his son who had wrested it from him.
I had suspected Jareth of betrayal, but it seemed my mind had shied away from the possibility that it could run so deep. I had made the terrible mistake of not considering that I might no longer be the target—and that access to my room also provided access to Darius’s suite. Whatever protection he had on the door behind the tapestry was different from what he had on his main door—I knew that because I had barged through it myself more than once.
The assassin had never been coming for me, and I had just given him access to his true target. Ripping open my door, I abandoned all thought of subtlety and silence.
My sitting room sat dark and empty, giving no sign that anyone had sought passage through it. I almost fell in my rush across the room, tripping over a side table and bouncing off the side of a sofa.
I fumbled with the tapestry, my haste making me clumsy. But at last I managed to push it out of the way and pull open the door. The sitting room on the other side also sat dark and empty, and for a single moment I doubted myself.
Then I saw the open door on the far side of the room and heard the muted sounds of a scuffle. I ran.
I paused in the door of Darius’s bedchamber, my eyes straining to see in the dim light. It would have been pitch black except that someone had pulled open a curtain, letting soft falls of moonlight in.
Two figures grappled beside the bed. One had his back to me, his right arm held above his head by Darius, preventing the long knife gripped in the assassin’s hand from finding its target.
The two swayed back and forth, grunting with effort. The strain of holding back the blade seemed to be preventing Darius from retrieving a composition that might keep him safe from it. At least that was the only explanation I could think of for why he hadn’t already hedged himself in so many shields he couldn’t be touched.
The assassin must have come with an arsenal of compositions himself if he had already broken through the protections Darius always wore.