Chapter 69

Regardless, Kosha strained his ears, listening for any sound beyond the bathroom.

He lingered in the bath until the water turned cold, then dried himself and stepped out to find a change of clothes already waiting for him. It was a long nightshirt that looked remarkably like a dress.

Lucien clearly intended to keep him confined to the room.

Such nightwear was usually reserved for children, and any grown man caught wandering around in it would be ridiculed until his dying day. In some places, merely offering an adult man such a garment could be taken as a grave insult. Kosha put it on without complaint, though he briefly wondered where Lucien had found a dress-like nightshirt large enough to fit a grown man. At least the fabric was soft against his skin and carried a faint, comforting fragrance.

Kosha crawled into the impossibly plush bed, far too desperate for rest to reject such luxury. If Lucien had been the one taking that monstrous thing from behind, he would not have been able to walk around so straight-backed either. As sleep overtook him, Kosha found himself feeling strangely fortunate that his own body had borne the worst of the ordeal.

He sank into a deep, dreamless slumber and woke with a start only a few double-hours later. Pitch-black darkness filled the room, and he was still completely alone.

Kosha rose and tousled his hair, satisfied that he had slept obediently and fulfilled every one of Lucien’s demands.

Whatever happened next was entirely his own concern.

Rested and clear-headed, his mind had regained the crystalline precision of a mage. Neither Lucien nor Gosrick was there to restrain him or burden him with human self-consciousness.

Although he had no idea where his original clothes had been stored, summoning his gray robe was simple enough. Saturated with his magic, the garment was practically a second skin. He drew it from the empty air and wrapped it securely over the flimsy nightshirt.

That was preparation enough.

Dragging his slightly oversized slippers behind him, Kosha slipped into the corridor, fully aware that no lock fashioned by human hands could ever stop a mage. A lizard crawled from the folds of his robe. He caught the creature, lowered it to the floor, and watched it scurry ahead, its strangely twisted tail swaying as it guided him precisely where he wished to go.

Silence ruled the castle during curfew, and Kosha did not encounter a single soul before reaching the enormous bridge that connected the East and West Wings. Even if he had crossed paths with someone, his enchanted robe would have prevented any serious trouble.

A fierce wind battered the dizzyingly high bridge. Autumn tended to linger in central Izeland, but once the temperature began to fall, winter arrived almost overnight. The cold deepened with every passing day, widening the difference between day and night and warning of the frost and raging blizzards soon to come.

Consoling himself with the thought that he would not have to worry about the geese that winter, Kosha crossed the bridge at a brisk, steady pace.

The moment he entered the East Wing, a heavy, unpleasant energy closed around him, drawing a deep frown across his face. The aura was ominous and alien, strikingly similar to the power radiating from the suspicious mage near the West Wing, the one whose name had begun with Al-something.

Here, however, the oppressive force blanketed the entire East Wing in a far denser concentration, asserting its territory with unmistakable malice.

If that person lives in the East Wing, could he be Prince Bastian’s mage?

The energy was not powerful enough to penetrate Kosha’s protective barrier, but it still settled heavily across his shoulders. The lizard appeared to find the sensation just as repulsive. It shivered visibly against the stone floor.

Kosha continued at a cautious pace, keeping every sense sharpened to his surroundings, until the lizard abruptly stopped. The creature scrambled backward from the corner it had just rounded and burrowed deep inside his robe.

Kosha quickly cradled the reptile and pressed himself flat against the cold stone wall. When he focused his hearing, he caught the faint murmur of human voices farther down the corridor. A man and a woman seemed to be locked in a heated argument.

Their words were still too muffled to distinguish, so Kosha began edging forward. The lizard poked its head out through the front of his robe, peering around with him as though keeping watch. With each careful step, the voices grew clearer.

Kosha had just reached the next corner and leaned out when a heavy slam thundered through the corridor.

The violent crash of a thick door made him jump and draw back instinctively. Agitated breathing followed, accompanied by rapid footsteps, but he sensed no trace of a mage nearby. If he remained still and held his breath, the approaching human would probably pass without noticing him.

Instead, after listening more closely, Kosha abandoned his hiding place and stepped directly around the corner.

“Ah!”

The person approaching from the opposite direction released a shrill cry, startling Kosha into stumbling backward. The lantern in the stranger’s hand struck his body and swung violently with a sharp clink.

“Who is it?” the woman demanded in a terrified whisper.

The shadows beneath her gray hood concealed most of her face, but the long, curly black hair spilling from beneath it was unmistakable.

“Melda?” Kosha asked cautiously.

She flinched and retreated a step. “I asked who you are.”

For all the aggression in her voice, she sounded deeply frightened. Rather than answer immediately, Kosha slowly lowered his hood and allowed the lantern light to reveal his face.

The woman lifted the edge of her own hood and narrowed her eyes, struggling to see him clearly.

“It’s me. Kosha.”

“And who is that?”

“Kosha, the gooseherd. Don’t you remember? From Osterbeek.”

A long, dead silence followed.

Her lips parted blankly. Then she tore off her hood completely, revealing eyes almost as wide as her open mouth.

“The gooseherd?”

Kosha offered an awkward smile, realizing that she had not remembered anything as trivial as his name. “Yes. The gooseherd who even made you a love potion.”

Melda’s parted lips began to tremble, twisting strangely at the mention of the potion. She gave him an indescribable look, then clutched her forehead and scanned the dim corridor like a high-strung cat.

Without warning, she shoved Kosha forward and hurried around the corner. Pressing herself against a broad pillar, she dragged him into hiding with her, seized him again, and thrust the blazing lantern dangerously close to his face.

“Are you really that gooseherd? Did you always look like this? What happened to you?”

Kosha gently pushed the lantern’s radiating heat away and nodded. He undoubtedly looked nothing like the man Melda remembered. Back then, he had worn the skin of a gooseherd as a protective barrier, much as he now wore his gray robe.

“I really didn’t recognize you. Did you finally tidy your hair?”

“It’s all right. I almost didn’t recognize you either.”

“Why in the world are you here? Don’t tell me…”

Her gaze traveled from Kosha’s head to his feet. Beneath the weak lantern light, his gray robe looked remarkably similar to her cloak, obscuring the differences in material and tailoring. His bare ankles, however, were plainly visible below the hem.

Melda stared at them. “What kind of state are you in?”

As forthright as ever, she shoved her hand into the opening of Kosha’s robe without the slightest hesitation. The fabric parted, exposing the single thin layer of his nightshirt beneath it. It was a humiliating sight that would have left most men defenseless against ridicule, but Kosha did not resist. He simply endured the invasive inspection and studied her expression.

“What is…” she breathed.

Kosha remained silent.

“This… This…”

Her trembling hand rose and brushed his loosely exposed neck, tracing the colorful mosaic of bites and suction marks scattered across his skin. Lucien often nibbled at him when they were intimate. It was never more than affectionate sucking or light biting, but marks lingered easily on a mage’s soft flesh.

“Are you sleeping with His Highness too?” Melda’s voice faded to such a faint whisper that the wind might have carried it away.

She could only have meant Prince Bastian, but Kosha’s thoughts immediately went to Lucien.

“What?”

Caught completely off guard by the misunderstanding, Kosha hesitated. He had no idea how to explain his relationship with Lucien, much less how to clarify that he was involved with an entirely different prince.

Melda mistook his silence for confirmation. Covering her mouth with both trembling hands, she drew a sharp breath.

“Ha. You crazy bastard.”

“Melda.”

“You son of a bitch. You fucking bastard. You told me I was the only one. You said it was real this time. And now even a man…”

The curses were plainly aimed at Prince Bastian, though Melda seemed too distraught to remember that he was not standing before her. Her beautiful face crumpled so wretchedly that she appeared ready to collapse. Kosha reached out and caught her before she could.

Melda possessed a voluptuous figure and usually carried herself with such fierce confidence that he had never imagined her looking so diminished. Standing this close, however, she seemed small enough to disappear entirely within his arms.

Kosha hesitated before awkwardly breaking the tension. “Melda, then… are you involved with a prince too?”

He was now reasonably certain that the prince she meant was Bastian, not Lucien, but he still needed to understand how she had become entangled with him.

Melda buried her face against his shoulder, then suddenly lifted her head and whispered fiercely, “I didn’t want it either!”

“Calm down. What happened?” Kosha patted her shoulder as he questioned her. “The man you were seeing back in Osterbeek, the one who was supposedly going to propose after you asked me to make the potion, was he connected to Prince Bastian?”

Deep anxiety and heavy suspicion darkened Melda’s face.

Ah, this is troublesome.

A sinking sensation opened in Kosha’s chest.

“This wasn’t merely some simple romantic entanglement, was it?” he pressed, keeping his voice gentle despite the heart pounding against his ribs. “That man brought you into Prince Bastian’s service somehow.”