“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.

“Ah, shit,” he said. “You’re Hu Gibbet’s apprentice, Vi. Viridiana, Vi, how’d I miss it?”

She smiled joylessly. “Who’re you working for? The prince was my deader.”

“Seriously. How embarrassing. To be taken in by another wetboy. Hmm. Or are you a wetgirl?”

“Not the way you’re hoping.” She ground her hips against him and he blushed.

She pinched his cheek. “You aren’t too ugly, you know. It’ll be a shame to kill you.”

“The shame’s all mine, I assure you.”

“Don’t feel bad,” she said. “Part of my Talent is a glamour. It’s to your credit you weren’t actually drooling.”

“You mean those are an illus—”

“Move your hands and die,” she said. “The body’s real, thanks.”

“I should say thank you, but this knife at my throat is muting my appreciation some.”

“If you’re trying to charm your way out of this, you need practice. Who’re you working for?”

“You’re working for the king,” Kylar said. “Aren’t you?”

“Backbone,” she said. “I like that.”

“Wetting myself would be awfully messy for both of us,” Kylar said. She chuckled and he smiled as charmingly as he could. “Was that better?”

“Better. I’ll give you one for effort. I took this job from the king. He was a little peeved that you killed his son. So I take his money, but I take my orders from Roth. Last chance now,” she pressed the knife a little further into his skin and he had to lean his head as far to the side as he could to keep it from cutting him.

“Maybe you can appreciate my dilemma,” Kylar said, straining his neck. “If I don’t answer, you’ll kill me painfully but it will take a while. If I do answer, you’ll kill me quickly but soon.”

“Or you can try to string this out for as long as you can and hope someone saves you. You’re smart. I suppose you’d have to be. We’ve all been curious why Blint would choose an apprentice without the Talent. I guess smart wins it.”

“You all? You’ve been taking bets on me? Wait, they say I don’t have the Talent?”

“Like they say, there are no secrets worth knowing in the Sa’kagé,” Vi said. “So you aren’t going to tell me who you were working for, are you? Probably just another one sent by Roth. When he wants a job done, he makes sure it gets done. There’s even a rumor he got Lady Jadwin to do it, but I know a wetboy’s work when I see it.”

“You’re kind of chatty, aren’t you?” Kylar said.

If he had a hand free, he would have slapped himself. Note: when attempting to buy time, do not criticize the prolixity of your captor.

Her beautiful face turned ugly for half a second, and Kylar saw the Hu Gibbet in her. Then she smiled, but Hu didn’t leave her eyes. “In the next life,” she said. “Work on that charm.”

The next feeling would be the glide of a knife, the flesh of his neck parting, warmth. Kylar’s muscles bunched with need and desperation.

There was a knock on the door. “Kylar?” the count said. Vi flinched and turned her head.

Kylar threw his head to the side and bucked, trying to throw her off. Or that’s what he told his body to do. Instead, he felt energy pouring through him like lightning on a leash. A brief euphoria, power swelling through him, well-being as if he’d been sick his entire life and now felt health for the first time. It was the Talent that Durzo had always said he had, and now it was his.

Vi flew into the air, but she held onto Kylar’s hair and one of her legs got tangled with one of his. So instead of flying off him, she flew up and then crashed back down on top him. She tried to slash him, but both of his hands were up now, and he caught both of her arms and rolled.

They fell off the bed and he landed on her. She grunted and raised a knee between his legs. It was like the sun exploding in his pants. He groaned and it was all he could do not to let go of her hands as she rolled on top of him.

“Kylar?” the count shouted through the door. “Do you have a lady in there?”

I wouldn’t call her a lady. Kylar’s stones hurt so bad, he could barely move, much less fight. “Help!”

“You’re pathetic,” she said.

He could only grunt.

She launched herself off of him. He struggled to his feet as the door burst open, but he was too slow. She was already throwing her knife at Count Drake.

The count threw himself to the side, and the knife sailed past him harmlessly. Instantly, he had a throwing knife in his own hand, but he hesitated. Vi saw his hand raised and leaped for the window.

Kylar grabbed the knife from the count’s hand and threw it as Vi disappeared through the window. He thought he saw it sink into her shoulder. He grabbed the sword that was secreted under his bed, but when he looked out the window, she was gone.