Maybe it was the fear of his thirst combined with the warmth of his body to inspire the sudden jolt of lust, but I was… curious.

I wanted to know if his cock would be silky and heated over the hardness, if I could fit my fingers around him, what the strange shape of it was.

If he could even fit in me at all. If he would touch the rest of me as carefully as he held my hands.

I licked my lips, my lungs suddenly feeling shallow and airless, and prepared myself to make my desire and curiosity clear, to at least ask my husband what he was hiding about his body—

Bane drew in a hissing breath as I moved, and his hand tensed around mine.

With a smooth motion he pulled away, cold air hitting my back with all the pleasure of exposing myself to a winter rain.

“I wasn’t attempting to hint at things you’re not ready for,” he said gruffly, sitting on the edge of the bed. “I can wait.”

I scrambled to pull my dress closer around myself, feeling the outrage of a soaked cat to be ripped from the comfort of the nest so abruptly. Not only that, but the icy air brought me back to myself—if I had started something, would it only be sex?

Or would he want to feed?

If all my skin was exposed, if he lost any control… for the same reason I felt desire, I also felt fear. He was too strong to be stopped.

The ripple of lust became a pool of dread. I reached for my journal, then I stopped and really looked at him.

His shoulders had risen, the broad curve of his back displaying the sharp nubs of his spine as he gazed at the floor.

He was defensive… because of me. Because I’d run from him the first night he’d tried to touch me, completely rejecting his advances.

I had inspired this apprehension in him; it was terrible to see a creature like Bane, so self-assured in every other respect, look as though he were expecting me to scream at him or slap him away.

Swallowing a sudden burst of self-loathing, I pressed my palm to his shoulder, clambering on my knees across the mountain of blankets until we sat side by side.

Let me find new clothes, I signed, gesturing to the brocade left in a pile on the floor. And I’ll come find you again. 

Bane watched my hands move, and my heart ached at the wariness in his eyes. I got up to grab my journal and found the last page I’d written on.

I’d like you to spend some of today with me, if you can, I wrote. I’ll go put new clothes on, and if you could keep me company for breakfast, I’d like that. I won’t keep you from your duties, but I feel that I haven’t seen you as much as I’d like. 

He read over my shoulder, his breath ruffling my hair, and I felt some of the tension leave him.

“Oh, we’re going to spend the day together,” he said, smiling a little, some of the light in his gaze displacing the wariness. “I have something I want to give you.”

You’ve already given me too much. I arched a brow, tapping the end of my pen against my sentence to emphasize it. I was a servant living like a queen. Giving me anything more would practically be a crime.

“As the Lord of the Rift, I get to make the rules on what constitutes ‘too much’.” He was grinning openly now, and I kept my eyes firmly on his face. As much as I feared the bite of those fangs, I couldn’t divert my curiosity about the rest of his body, and the last thing I wanted was to drive him away or… or make him think I was appalled at what I saw.

So I rolled my eyes and wrote. As Lady of the Rift, don’t I get a say in this?

“Not today, you don’t. Try again tomorrow, but I don’t think you’ll want to.”

Now a different kind of curiosity was piqued. What is it? 

Bane rose, stretching, the muscles of his back rippling. I looked down for a moment, trying to hide the faint flush in my cheeks. He pulled one of the oddly-tailored shirts from a wardrobe, and I only looked up once he’d pulled it on and leaned over to read my words.

“It’s a surprise.” He held out a hand, and I took it. “I’ll walk you to your chambers for your morning ablutions, my lady. And then the rest of your day will be fully monopolized by yours truly.”

He lifted me from the bed and I gathered up the brocade, pulling it on with unseemly haste, but I very much wanted to get the dressing part of the day over with so I could move on to the important things.

He loosely laced the stays so I wouldn’t be a complete shambles walking through the halls, and I held my journal tight as he brought me back to the Tower of Spring.

“I’ll wait for you out here,” he said, holding the door open for me. “Don’t take too long.”

Give me five minutes, I signed, and once the door closed I practically dashed to the wardrobe, flinging aside more fussy brocades and velvets until I found something easily laced at the sides by myself.

I was smoothing the dark green cotton and debating hair pins when Ellena found me.

“Oh, do you need help, my lady?” she asked. It was an innocent enough question, but I didn’t want her help, and I thought I’d made that clear.

I shook my head, but she already had the hairbrush in hand. She gripped my shoulder hard, moving me sideways and attacking my hair.

Will you stop? I signed, twisting to grab the brush. By the Light, if this was how she brushed the Sisters’ hair, no wonder they’d been eager to foist her off on me.

But Ellena grabbed it back, scowling at me. “You know if you don’t let me work, they’re going to send me away? That bloodwitch has made it obvious that if I don’t do something, they won’t keep a useless mouth to feed. I’d rather brush your hair than work in the kitchens again, so just let me get on with it.”

Why would you care? I thought you wanted to go back to Argent. You’ve made it clear you don’t care to wait on me, any more than I care to have you do it. I tipped my head as I signed, and Ellena cursed softly under her breath.

“By the Lady, are you asking why? You worked for the Sisters. You know it’s terrible. This place might be a Light-forsaken hell, but at least it’s softer than living under their whip. I’m not going to let you ruin that for me just because you think you can do better.”

I winced as she pulled the brush through my hair with particular roughness.

“You’re not better than me,” she whispered. “You’re the same as I am. The Sisters sent me to slave away for you, so that’s what you get. I’m not going to lose a comfortable situation because you’re suddenly so high and mighty.”

There was a sudden pinch on the nape of my neck—a flare of pain so intense I thought she’d jabbed one of the jeweled hair pins into my skin.

I clapped a hand to the spot, whirling around to stare at her, but she held nothing but the hairbrush. She leaned back, looking at me like I was the insane one.

“What now? Too rough for your precious princess skin?”

I took my hand away, looking at my fingers. There was no blood; my hair wasn’t even tangled enough to have a knot that would’ve been yanked out. The brush itself only held a few clinging hairs.

Had she pinched me?

I took a deep breath and held it for a moment, mastering my anger.

As much as I disliked her, I understood her. We were the same. We were both unwanted castoffs, our lives reduced to how hard we could work.

It was sheer chance I’d ended up with a title and a husband who ruled a quarter of Veladar. It could just as easily have been me, sent with Antonetta to serve as her maid, and I wouldn’t have enjoyed waiting hand and foot on a girl I’d scrubbed floors with, either.

So I would not go out of my way to ruin Ellena’s life. Not after what I’d seen.

If Bane thought she was hurting me deliberately… there was no telling what might happen.

I held up my hands in a peacemaking gesture, and backed away several steps to the journal. I flipped to a clean page, unwilling to share any of my conversations with Bane, one-sided though they were, and wrote in Veladari, using the common alphabet all servants were taught to read.