The healer mixed up a brew before going, and under her—and Raphael’s—watchful gaze I drained every foul-tasting drop. I’d certainly had worse. Foul-tasting medicine was a novelty, though. When sick as a child, a witch trained in healing magic would tend to me. There was, of course, no such thing in Greymere, but there was no medicine either. The bitter drink felt like a kind of penance, as though because I suffered through the foul taste I would deserve the healing it offered.

The healer departed with promises to check on me tomorrow. Or any time I needed, or wanted to be checked-on—“Even in the middle of the day,” she added, when Raphael didn’t look pleased with her answer.

“You should go to bed,” he said once the door shut.

I was exhausted, but there was no way I could sleep right now. Certainly no way I’d crawl under the bedframe with Raphael here. “Can you send for Amalthea?”

“If you wish. But both the healer and I advise you to rest.”

“Amalthea’s presence will help me rest.”

Raphael chortled. “The last thing Amalthea brings to any room is tranquility.” But he heeded my wishes all the same. He stepped out, summoning a messenger to fetch Amalthea, and stayed, lingering in the doorjamb until the seer arrived.

Amalthea arrived with a basket of gifts. She dismissed Raphael with a wave of her hand and strode into the room, dress billowing around her.

“I have just the thing,” she declared.

“The healer already gave me a brew.”

She waved my words away the same way she’d shooed Raphael from the room. “Bah. This is better than anything a healer could give you. Here.” She lifted a smaller box from the basket she’d set on the ground between us.

I took the box, curious, and lifted the lid. Rows of small brown desserts, decorated with different colored sugar, lined the bottom.

“It’s chocolate. Trust me,” she encouraged. Not knowing what those words meant for someone like me.

But… I did. At least in this. I took one and nibbled on an edge. An explosion of flavor coated my mouth, bitter yet enticing. I took another bite while Amalthea reached over and plopped one whole in her mouth.

I continued on the chocolates. I didn’t exactly like the taste, but I couldn’t stop eating them. My fingers were quickly painted brown. Amalthea managed to avoid making such a mess, despite eating at least as many. When the box was finally empty, I turned it over in my hands, antsy. The pile of splintered furniture, my onetime source of protection, taunted me. The hinges were askew, and from experience, I knew a lock brutishly opened like that would need delicate repair.

I hated to ask favors, but I’d never sleep another night like this. “Thea, do you think it would be possible to get someone to fix the door today?”

Amalthea pursed her lips and twisted her neck to see the destruction from Raphael’s entry. “I guess Raphael was… motivated. If he felt your pain through the bond, I doubt anything would have stopped him.”

The bond again. “So can it be fixed?”

“Of course, Sam. But you should know, even without a door, everyone would respect your space. You’re the king’s Chosen.”

Not everyone. Not Titus. I tried not to let my skepticism show, but must have failed miserably, because Thea quickly added, “Let me see to that right now, actually.”

She got up, and I examined the rest of the contents of the basket. Under the box was a book, a stone, and a bell. I lifted the bell in my hand, the gold metal glinting against the firelight. A summoning bell.

“That’s tied to me,” Amalthea explained, returning a moment later. “More suitable than having Raphael sending servants to fetch me.”

Summoning bells were tied to an individual and called them over a short distance. My mother had given one away once, in affection, and told me to think long and hard before doing so. Beyond that, I’d only ever seen them tied to servants before.

But Amalthea wasn’t my servant. Maybe she really was my friend.

“And what are these for?”

“That,” she said, pointing at the stone, “goes into the fire. It’s not enchanted, but that kind of rock stores heat very well. You take it out a bit before you intend to sleep, and it warms the bed. Before I started taking the tea, it was my best friend during my cycle. The book is to entertain you when you’re bored.”

The stone I appreciated. The book… “I have enough entertainment for me with the grimoire.”

Amalthea grimaced. “That’s hardly fun. This will help pass the time.”

I was about to protest I had no such need for entertainment, not when there was work to be done, when her words made me remember what I was supposed to be doing right now. “Gods, Amalthea. I need to get to the training room! Demos will—”

“Demos will understand,” she interrupted. “He’s a hardass, but he’s not a complete barbarian, Sam. We can resume in a few days when the worst has passed.”

“That’s not necessary,” I protested. “I’m not grievously ill. I’m confident others have fought in worse.”

Amalthea lifted the stone from the basket and placed it at the edge of the fireplace. “Maybe so, but that doesn’t mean you have to. You’re training in self-defense, Sam, not going to war. Just because theoretical ‘others’ had it worse doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take care of yourself.”

I wanted to explain that was exactly what it meant, but I lacked the words that wouldn’t sound petulant. Amalthea, rightfully used to winning every argument, settled back in her chair with another book. I didn’t take the grimoire out, but I didn’t pick up the novel either, instead choosing to study the book on vampire powers. Maybe it wasn’t the worst thing that the mental link had brought Raphael to me, but the intimacy bothered me. Hours passed. The door got fixed—by a vampire—and when he left, Amalthea helped barricade the door once more for me.

At some point, I drifted off to sleep. More accurately, I succumbed to the exhaustion like my body begged me to. When I awoke, it was a fight to lift my eyelids. The room was dark, save the dwindling orange embers from the fireplace. The book I’d been working through was splayed open on my chest. I cracked my neck, trying to orient myself to my setting.

And realized I wasn’t alone.

“You always do this,” I groused.

“Do what?” The Vampire King of the West asked.

“Watch me sleep.”

I didn’t have to see him to know he was smirking. “Someone needs to keep an eye on you.”

But why is it you? “Where’s Amalthea?”

“I sent her back to her rooms to rest. If it helps, she had to be persuaded.” Raphael tossed another log on the fire, jostling the others around until the fire grew brighter. Then he pulled the heating stone Amalthea had placed inside with his bare hand and tucked it into the bed. I wondered if it would still be warm if I pulled it under the bedframe, where I actually slept. He lit the other lights in the room, allowing my human eyes to adjust.

My attention landed not on him—or the barricade that had been carefully reconstructed with more order than Amalthea had been capable of—but on a silver rolling cart piled high past the entryway.

“Raphael,” I said slowly, “what is that?”

“Oh, that.” He shrugged. “Amalthea mentioned you might like them and find the taste soothing.”

That was a pile of chocolate balls piled at least as tall as a child, ornately arranged as if fit for display in the great hall. It probably weighed more than me.

Raphael said the last words I expected to hear from a king. “Let me serve you.”

I didn’t have the heart to admit I’d already eaten half my weight in chocolate, so I dutifully put one of the truffles in my mouth. In fact, I was developing quite a taste for the sweet. “I take it by the fact I can eat it, you didn’t cook it yourself.”