Page 11 of The Fifth Soul

The space is enormous, splitting into three sections. A large sitting room fills the space to the right. Next to it, there's a dining table and chairs. A large black wood desk stands off to the left side, in front of a huge set of windows. The desk has a mountain of papers scattered all over, in no particular order.

There are four doors on the opposite wall from the entrance. One leads to a small library, and three are private bedrooms. I want to ask him who else shares this space with him, but I keep my questions to myself.

We enter the last bedroom and stand in the clean space. A spacious bed and a desk with a chair are the only pieces of furniture in the room, with a single other door I assume is a bathroom.

“Food will arrive here soon enough.” He gestures back to the space we came from. “Why don’t you shower and change? I’ll be out there. We have a lot to talk about.” He points to the bottle on the nightstand. “That medicine will help your head.”

I survey my surroundings in disbelief. He can’t possibly be offering me to use this room. I’ve never been in a room this nice, let alone used it for myself. Is Matias’ room just as nice?

I chase after Brandon as he moves to the common room. “Where is Matias?”

His head inclines sideways.

“My friend,” I clarify. “Is he somewhere near here?” I take a deep breath, trying to keep my anxiety at ease. “Is he going to be okay?”

“Oh, no, no. He is going to be fine, but he isn’t here.” Brandon points back at the room he assigned me. “I will tell you more about his condition later. For now, just know he is fine.”

“There is a way to fix him?”

Hope flares in my chest. I need the prince to say it for me to believe it.

He sighs. “It won’t be easy, but it’s possible.”

“At what price?” I ask.

There isn’t a single free thing in this world. The question is mostly to prepare myself for what is coming. There’s nothing I won’t do for Matias, he’s my only family.

Brandon points toward the bathroom inside the room. “Shower, change, and we will talk. I have a deal in mind that will benefit us both. You’ll find everything you need inside your bathroom.”

I turn back to look at the room. “My bathroom?”

“If you take my deal, this will be where you sleep for the foreseeable future.”

If the crown prince plans on keeping me near, it is because he needs something from me. I need something from him. This is exactly what I wanted, which makes me suspicious. Being in his personal space feels far too trusting on his part. He doesn’t know me.

I turn back to face the crown prince. “Aren’t you afraid I could kill you in your sleep?”

“There are many, many things I fear, Ms. Blanco, but you will never be one of them.”

He steps back and nods for me to go into my room. This time, I don’t argue and head inside. It’s only when I am submerged in the warm water that I realize he knows my name.

CHAPTER 3

BRANDON

Istare at the cold food Bianca never got to touch. I’ve moved the tray to the side of the room, giving space for my guests. It serves as a reminder of who I have brought to my quarters. Like I’ve been able to think about anything else since my eyes landed on her.

I turn to her closed door. It has remained like that since I sent her to take a shower and change. After she didn’t return, I cracked it open to find her snoring, sprawled across the bed. She didn’t stir as I stepped inside and really looked at her. More specifically, when I looked at the black stain that colors her soul.

Soul reading is my gift. Very few know about it. From the surface, it looks like a color that changes from person to person. If I look deeper, many more things come to the surface. People have a unique color because their experiences, desires, and intentions are unique to them.

Hers looks so much like the one I see daily in the mirror. It’s not uncommon to find souls that look alike, but I have never seen one that looks like mine.

The revelation must be clouding my judgment because I am far too intrigued by the young thief. Much more than I should be. She is a thief from a rough city known as a no-man’s-land and filled with madness and sin, yet our souls look alike. That only entices my curiosity further. What can possibly make our souls so much alike?

Looking deeply into her soul while she sleeps would have been the best time, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. It felt immoral. The only type of thief that would let sleep win in a situation like this one is the one who does the job out of necessity, not choice.

The second my eyes landed on her, I knew three things. One, I was not looking at a cold killer. She’s just a young woman trying to survive.

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