Chapter 5: Celeste Knows

“You lied to him,” Lyra said.

Celeste spun around in the dark corridor. Her silver gown glowed in the torchlight. For a moment, her face was bare and ugly.

“Excuse me?”

“In the hall. You said you felt a bond.” Lyra shifted her tray to one hip. “You felt nothing. You just heard a king describe a feeling and decided to put your name on it.”

Celeste’s mouth twisted. “Careful, omega.”

“Or what? More tea?”

The corridor went very quiet.

Celeste stepped closer. Her perfume was sweet and sharp. “You think you are clever. You are a kitchen rat with no wolf. The King will have me by the Moon Festival. And you will be scrubbing my chamber pots.”

“Then why are you whispering?”

“I am not—”

“You are. You are afraid.” Lyra smiled gently. “Because deep down you know the pull was not for you.”

Lyra, warned Ember. You are pushing too hard.

She is going to hate me anyway. I might as well enjoy it.

Celeste lifted her hand to strike. Lyra caught her wrist in midair.

Her grip was strong. Surprisingly strong. A faint silver warmth pulsed under her skin.

Celeste stared at her hand. “What… what are you?”

“A girl who is done being slapped.” Lyra let go. “Good night, Celeste.”

She walked away with her pulse hammering. I did that, she thought. I actually did that.

Your wolf helped, said Ember, sounding smug.

Fine. Your wolf helped.

Our wolf.

Lyra rounded the corner and nearly walked into Mara, who was clutching a candle and bouncing on her toes.

“Did you just stand up to Celeste? I saw the whole thing! I almost fainted!”

“Do not tell anyone.”

“I am going to tell everyone.”

“Mara.”

“Fine. I will tell only the chickens.”

They crept into the kitchen. The great hall’s noise had died down. The warriors were drunk and snoring. A single lamp burned low over the hearth.

Mara yawned. “I am going to bed. You coming?”

“In a minute. I want to count the supplies.”

“You are a strange woman.”

“Thank you.”

Mara left. The kitchen went quiet.

Lyra set down her tray, sat on a stool, and let out a breath she had been holding all day. Her hands were shaking. Her heart still beat too fast.

The King felt me, she thought. He felt me, and he doesn’t know.

Be patient, said Ember.

I am a very impatient woman.

I know. It is going to be a long relationship.

The door creaked.

Lyra’s head snapped up.

A tall shadow stood in the doorway. Broad shoulders. Dark hair. A faint gleam of silver.

“Your Majesty,” she said carefully.

Kael Draven stepped into the lamplight. He had taken off his heavy coat. His white shirt was open at the collar. He looked tired and strangely young.

“I could not sleep,” he said.

“The guest wing has a bed.”

“It is very comfortable.” He looked around the kitchen. “I came here because the pull is strongest in this part of the pack.”

Be calm, said Ember. Be calm be calm be calm.

“Maybe you are hungry,” Lyra said. “There is bread.”

His mouth twitched. It was not quite a smile, but it was close. “Bread.”

“It works for most problems.”

“I did not know that.” He walked closer. His eyes never left her face. “You are the girl from the courtyard. The one who said she was not a wolf.”

“I am Lyra.”

“Lyra.” He said it slowly. “You do not bow.”

“I was told to bow in the courtyard.”

“You were kneeling.”

“Then I am out of practice.”

He stopped three feet away. “Most people tremble when I enter a room.”

“I am trembling,” she said. “I just have good posture.”

For the first time in, perhaps, many years, the Alpha King’s mouth curved into a real smile.

It changed his whole face. Lyra’s heart did something stupid.

That, said Ember, is a very dangerous man.

I am aware.

“Tell me,” said Kael. “Why does my chest hurt when I stand near you?”

Lyra’s breath caught. She forced a calm expression. “Maybe you ate something.”

“I have not eaten since morning.”

“Then maybe you should.”

“I think,” he said slowly, “that you are laughing at me.”

“Only on the inside.”

He took one more step. Then another. Close enough that she had to tilt her head back to look at him. She could feel the heat of his body.

“What is that?” he asked.

“What?”

His fingers lifted toward her face. They stopped an inch away from her cheek. “Your eyes. For a moment, they were silver.”

Ember, she panicked. Did you—

I did not do anything!

Lyra blinked. “It must be the lamp.”

“Perhaps.” But he did not lower his hand. His thumb hovered near her jaw, trembling very slightly, like a man standing on the edge of a cliff. “Lyra. If I asked you a question, would you answer honestly?”

“That depends on the question.”

“Are you…”

A glass shattered in the corridor.

Kael’s head snapped up. His eyes went cold.

“Wait here,” he said. In an instant, he was gone, striding into the hall like a storm. Lyra heard his low, furious voice, and then footsteps, hurrying away.

She stood alone in the kitchen with her heart in her mouth.

He almost asked, said Ember. He was going to ask if you were his mate.

And I almost said yes.

Why did you not?

Lyra pressed her palms to the counter. Because Seraphina said yes to the wrong man once. And it killed her.

Ember was quiet. Then she said, very gently, This is not the wrong man.

I do not know that yet.

You will.

Lyra picked up her tray and walked toward the pantry. Her hands were still shaking.

She did not see the curtain by the corridor window move.

She did not see the girl behind it. A girl in a silver gown, with golden hair and wide, glittering eyes. A girl who had been standing there for the last ten minutes, listening to every word, watching the Alpha King’s thumb hover near a kitchen omega’s face.

Celeste Voss pressed one hand over her mouth. Her whole body trembled with rage.

Not me, she thought. It was never me. It is her. The rat. The little wolfless rat.

Slowly, she smiled. It was a terrible smile.

She slipped out of the shadows and hurried down the hall to the one man who could help her. Hadley Pike opened his door in his nightshirt.

“Miss Celeste? It is the middle of the night.”

“Pike,” she whispered. “The King’s mate is the kitchen girl, and I want her dead before the Moon Festival.”