He was twenty years old now, and he was still waiting for it to pass. His sudden hope—she’d been infatuated with him!—hit reality like Gandian porcelain hitting the floor. The delicate tracery of thin possibilities smashed. Now the stricken look on her face yesterday made more sense. The revelations that could have been so poignant for her—I am Kylar and Azoth and your young lord and I love you, too!—had hit her like a sledge hammer instead. I am Kylar and Azoth and your young lord . . . and a murderer. Help me. Give me your trust so I can betray it.

There wasn’t time for self-pity, and Kylar had already indulged in too much of it. He’d left behind a witness who knew he was a wetboy and who knew he was Kylar Stern, and who believed him guilty of stealing the Globe of Edges, if not worse. So he’d quite possibly thrown away an identity he’d spent ten years building for a little ball that he hadn’t even kept.

The buckets of hot water that the maid usually put in his room in the morning were empty. For some reason, that set him off. He felt his eyes getting hot, and tears threatening. It was so ridiculous, he almost laughed. Those empty buckets were the smallest inconvenience, but it was like the gods or Drake’s One God wanted to crush him. Everything that could go wrong had.

Master Blint was going to kill him. The woman he was trading his life to save hated him. Even Serah Drake, who had been unsure about whether she loved him or Logan just last night now hated him. The worst part of it was that it was all his fault. Everything that had gone wrong had gone wrong because of decisions he had made.

Well, at least the empty buckets weren’t his fault. Kylar grabbed the buckets and walked down the hall. He ran into the maid coming up the stairs with two buckets full of steaming water.

“Hello,” he said. He didn’t recognize her, but she was prettier than most of the girls Mistress Bronwyn hired.

“Hello I’m so sorry I’m late it’s my first day and I don’t know where to find everything I’m really sorry,” she said. She squeezed past him and Kylar couldn’t help but notice her large breasts gliding across his bare chest. She disappeared into his room and he followed.

“I can take those if you—”

“You aren’t mad, are you?” she asked. “Please don’t tell Count Drake or Mistress Bronwyn that I was late I don’t think she likes me and if I mess up on my first day I’m sure she’ll throw me out and I need this job ever so bad sir.” She had set down the buckets, and she was wringing her hands.

“Whoa,” Kylar said. “Relax. I’m not mad. I’m Kylar.” He extended a hand and a smile.

She seemed to warm instantly. She smiled and took his hand. Her eyes flicked briefly over his bare chest and stomach. Briefly, but appreciatively. “Hello. I’m Viridiana.”

The porter showed a handsome Ladeshian man into the den. Logan had stepped out to grab something to eat from the kitchen, so Count Drake was alone. “Sir,” the porter said, “he insisted that he must deliver a message in person.”

“Very well. Thank you,” Count Drake said.

The Ladeshian had such presence that it seemed odd for him to be acting as a messenger. He looked rather like a courtier or a bard. He was holding something in his hand that took all Count Drake’s attention away from the man. It was an arrow; its entire length, including steel head and feathers, had been painted a glossy red the color of fresh blood.

As soon as the porter stepped out, the man said, “Good morning, my lord. I wish our meeting could be under different circumstances, but I’m afraid my message is quite important. This comes from Durzo Blint. He said, ‘If he’s still alive, give this to the boy and tell him to meet me for dinner at the Tipsy Tart.’” The man bowed and presented the red arrow to the count.

From the doorway, Logan laughed. “‘If he’s still alive’? I guess one of Kylar’s friends saw me coming here this morning, huh?”

Count Drake chuckled. “I’m sure you scared everyone who saw you.” He turned to the messenger. “I’ll give it to him, thank you.”

“My lord,” the Ladeshian said, turning to Logan. “We mourn your loss.” He bowed again and walked out.

Logan shook his head. “Was that a bachelor joke?”

“I don’t know. I visited Ladesh once, and I never did understand their humor. Maybe I should take this upstairs.”

“Here I thought we were about to have the big father-son dialectic about marital intimacies.”

Count Drake smiled. “You put it so primly.”

“Serah’s pretty prim,” Logan said.

“Believe me, there’s nothing prim about marital intimacies, Logan.” Count Drake looked at the arrow in his hand and put it aside. “Well, the first thing you have to understand about lovemaking is . . .”

Viridiana rubbed her shoulder and said, “It’s so nice to see someone nice I thought this place was going to be awful to work at after how mean Mistress Bronwyn was you don’t mind do you?”

“No, not at all,” Kylar said, not really sure what he was not minding, but sure that he wasn’t supposed to.

As if it were the most natural thing in the world, Viridiana untied the laces of her bodice, which Kylar had already noticed was unusually tight. “Oh, that’s better,” she said, drawing a deep breath. She closed and locked the door and then walked over to the buckets, peeling off her bodice and dropping it.

“Um,” Kylar said. Then Viridiana bent over to pick up the water buckets again.

She must have had six feet of cleavage, because Kylar was totally lost in it. His mouth opened, but no words came out. It was with an unseemly amount of effort that he pulled his eyes up. Viridiana was watching him, and even as his face got hot, he saw that she was anything but displeased. With a deft twist, she released her tightly bound hair, and it cascaded around her face in long curls. “Are you ready for your bath, my lord?”

“No! I mean—I mean—”

“You want to bathe after,” she said, walking forward. She reached behind her back and started opening buttons.

After? Kylar stepped back, but his resistance was crumbling. Why not? What the hell have I been waiting for? For Elene? Viridiana filled his vision, full lips, gorgeous hair that he could practically feel already in his fingertips, on his chest. Those breasts. Those hips. And she wanted him. It would be sex, just sex, not lovemaking. Not some grand expression of romance and commitment. Just passion. Simpler. More like Momma K’s version of things. Less like Count Drake’s version. But damn. Her body was more persuasive than a room full of scholars.

His calves hit his bed and he almost fell. “I, I don’t really feel very comf—”

Her hand came up to his chest, and then she slammed it into him. He was falling back as her other hand came up from behind her dress in a glimmering metallic arc.

By the time his back hit the bed, she was straddling him, her knees pinning his arms to his sides, one hand grabbing his hair, the other pressing the knife to his neck.

“Comfortable?” she asked, finishing his sentence. She wasn’t kidding with the knife; it was pressed against the side of his neck just at the point where a little pressure would break the skin, and it was poised over an artery. As his lungs filled with gasps of air, he had to try not to move his neck.