But it was what lay underneath that confused me.

It was a splash of blue nearly as pale as a wolven’s eyes. I picked up the slippery, silky material, my eyes widening at the tiny straps and minimal length.

The thing was indecent.

But the nightgown I’d been given in New Haven was far too heavy for nights that didn’t drop below freezing, and this…this nightgown didn’t actually require a sash to stay closed, so there was that.

Dropping it onto the bed, I turned around and I had no idea how long I stood there before I sprang forward, racing back into the living area. I went to the door, placing my hands on it. Tentatively, I reached down and turned the handle.

The door opened.

I quickly closed it and slowly backed up, waiting for Kieran to return, to realize that he’d left the door unlocked. When he didn’t—when no one came—my hands trembled. And when I realized that no one had locked the door behind me earlier today or even the first night Casteel and I arrived, my arms began to shake.

I wasn’t caged anymore. A willing captive. I just hadn’t noticed that none of the doors had been locked from the outside.

Gods.

Realizing that did something to me. It unlocked the rawest emotion inside me, and it hit me hard. Sinking to the floor, I clasped my hands over my face as tears poured from me. The doors were unlocked. There were no guards, no one to govern me. If I wanted, I could simply walk out and go…well, wherever I wanted. I didn’t have to sneak out or pick a lock. The tears…they were borne of relief, and they were tinged with earlier hurts and older ones that had scarred many years ago. They were weighted with the knowledge of future pain, and they fell from the realization that tonight, when I sat at that table, I had finally shed the veil of the Maiden by defending myself. It wasn’t that I hadn’t done it before. I’d stood up for myself with Casteel and Kieran, and even Alastir, but tonight was different. Because there was no returning to the silence, to that submission. It didn’t matter if I was the neck that turned the head of a kingdom or an outsider in a room full of people who had every right to distrust me. Staying silent was only temporarily easier than shattering the silence, and that realization was painful. It shone a light on all the times I could’ve spoken up—could’ve risked whatever consequences. All of those things fed my tears.

I cried. I cried until my head ached. I cried until there was nothing left in me, and I was just a hollow vessel, and then…then I pulled myself together.

Because I was no longer a captive.

I was no longer the Maiden.

And what I felt for Casteel—what I was only beginning to accept—was something I had to deal with.

What I said tonight at dinner? It was true. All of it. Even that last part was true, wasn’t it? That even if I hadn’t entirely forgiven him for his lies or the deaths he’d caused, I’d accepted them because they were a part of his past—our past—and they didn’t change how I felt, right or wrong. That was what I’d denied for so long.

I loved him.

I was in love with him, even though that love had been built on a foundation of lies. I loved him even though there was so much I didn’t know about him. I loved him even though I knew I was a willing pawn to him.

And this didn’t happen overnight. It shouldn’t come as a shock, because I was already in love with him the moment my heart broke when I learned the truth of who he was. I fell in love with him when he was Hawke, and I kept falling once I learned that he was Casteel. And I knew it wasn’t because he was my first everything. I knew it wasn’t my naivety or lack of experience.

It was because he made me feel seen, and he made me feel alive even when I genuinely wanted to cause physical harm to him. I kept falling when he never once told me not to pick up a sword or bow and instead handed one to me. I fell and fell when I realized that Casteel wore many masks for many reasons. What I felt only grew when I realized that he would, in fact, kill whoever insulted me, no matter how wrong that was. And that love…it entrenched itself deeply when I realized the kind of strength and will he had within him to survive what he had and to still find the pieces of who he used to be.

And the catch in my breath, the shiver and the ache whenever he looked at me, when his eyes were like twin golden flames, whenever he touched me, it went beyond lust. I didn’t need experience to recognize the difference. He didn’t have pieces of me. He had my whole heart, and he had from the moment he allowed me to protect myself, from the moment he stood beside me instead of in front of me.

And that realization was terrifying. Scared me more than a horde of Craven or murderous Ascended ever could. Because I had to deal with what Casteel felt and what he didn’t.

The reason Casteel hadn’t told me about this Gianna was the same reason he hadn’t told me about the Joining or about Spessa’s End. Kieran could be right, and he could be wrong. Casteel may care for me—care for me enough to not want to see undue harm befall me, and Casteel did want me physically, but that didn’t mean we were heartmates. That didn’t mean he loved me. And no amount of pretending would change that or how I felt.

I had to deal.

And I would.

Because my agreement with Casteel remained. I wouldn’t back out because of how I felt or that my feelings were hurt. My brother was more important than that.

I lifted my head, bleary eyes focused on the ancient stone walls. The people of Solis were more important than how I felt, so were all those who called Atlantia home. Casteel’s brother was more important, as were all those names on the walls of the underground chambers.

Casteel and I could change things. We could stop the Ascended, and that was what mattered.

Climbing to my feet, I shakily made my way to the small bathing chamber, grateful that Casteel hadn’t returned while I’d been having a complete breakdown and moment of realization. I splashed away the tears staining my face and then undressed, pulling on the nightgown that could barely be called clothing. The cool material skimmed my breasts and hips, ending just below my rear. Tomorrow, I would question whether or not women actually slept in this…this scrap of silk, but tonight, I was too tired to even be concerned with it. After locking the doors, I took my dagger to the bed, placing in under the pillow. Pulling the blanket up over me, I tried not to think about how everything smelled of Casteel. I closed my aching eyes, and as weary as I was from everything, I immediately drifted into the oblivion of nothing.

It was the bed shifting under unexpected weight that woke me sometime later. Rolling onto my side, I slipped the dagger from under the pillow.

A hand caught my wrist in the shadows of the room, and a voice whispered, “Are you going to stab me in the heart? Again?”

Chapter 33

The scent of rich spice and pine reached me the second after the words.

Casteel.

My racing heart didn’t slow. “Why don’t you let go of my wrist and find out?”

“That sounds like a yes if I ever heard one,” he replied as my eyes adjusted. The glow of the lamp outside the canopy cast most of him in shadow, but he was close enough that I could see the arch of a brow and the amused tilt to his lips.

Promised to someone else.

Anger was a heatwave that swept away any lingering sleep. “Let me go.”

“I don’t know if I should.” His thumb moved in an idle circle along the inside of my wrist as he said, “Someone is likely to be very irritated if you stab me, and I end up bleeding all over the bed.”

“You could always clean up after yourself.”

“There’s something innately wrong with the idea of being stabbed and then having to clean up my own blood.”

I pushed against his hold, but my hand remained pinned to the bed. “There’s something innately wrong with you being in here! How did you even get in? I locked the doors.”

“Did you?”

“I did…” I sighed. “Key. You have a key.”

“Perhaps.” His head tilted. “Have you been crying?”

“What? No,” I lied.

“Then why are your eyes swollen?”

“Probably because I’m tired. I was sleeping, but you woke me up.”

“I wanted to come back sooner—it seems I always want to come back sooner,” he said, seeming to have accepted my answer. “Especially when you’re wearing something so interesting.”

The blanket had slipped to my waist in sleep, exposing the low neckline of the nightgown. Heat crept down my neck and across the swells of my breasts. “It was the only thing in here for me to wear other than the robe.”

“I like it.” He shifted, seeming to get comfortable as he reached out with his other hand, fingering the strap. “Such ridiculous, tiny straps. I like them.”

I knocked his hand away. “You can let go. I’m not going to stab you.”

“I find that oddly disappointing.”

“And I find that extremely disturbing.”

He laughed deeply, letting go of my wrist. I started to move, but he was so much faster, shifting so he was above me. The warmth of his body pressed against my chest as one of his long legs ended up between mine, shorting out my senses. A flash of heat rolled through me as every part of my body became overly aware of how close he was.

“What are you doing?” I demanded.

“Making sure you’re comfortable.”

“And how will you accomplish that by lying on top of me?”

“I won’t.” A shadowy grin appeared. “I’m doing that because I like lying on top of you.”

“Well, I don’t,” I bit out, pulse thundering.

His chest brushed against mine, sending a velvet shiver through me. “That’s a lie.”

“It’s not.” I lifted the dagger to his neck. “Truly.”

“Do you remember what happened the last time you held a dagger to my throat?” His fingertips touched my cheek and slid lower, over my jaw. “I do.”

A lick of pleasure followed his fingers. “That was a temporary loss of sanity.”