Page 62 of Ties of Shadow

“I would have died.”

“You would have.” His lip twitched. “That was the second time I wanted to kiss you.” I stumbled on a stone. “I’m glad I didn’t have to wait too long.” I stammered through a few false starts before he continued. “But since then, it’s been a remarkably long time. I hardlyremember what your lips were like. Did you taste like radishes? Or was it bark? Or perhaps cave dirt?”

I stifled my laugh and whacked his arm. “You are just trying to distract me with such charming descriptions. It’s no wonder we haven’t kissed since then.”

“Ah, so you’ve decided. I’m glad you keep thinking of kissing me.”

I paused. “Wait a moment. What was the first time you wanted to kiss me?”

“When you were lost in my woods, and August was trying to scare you out.”

Of course. He was the forester.

“You were covered in pine needles and dirt, and I have never seen anything more kissable.”

I flushed. “I…certainly am not thinking about kissing you right now.”

But the Shade seemed to see right through me, even when my mental barriers were up. I had thought entirely too long about wanting to kiss him. I needed to think about something else. Something important—like measuring potion ingredients, or the meaning of life and happiness, or even the color at the edge of the rainbow. Instead, my memory of that harrowing experience was solely focused on that one world-ending kiss. Surely, I’d been delirious with blood loss, but that memory was seared into my very marrow.

The Shade leaned forward. His head angling toward mine. “Well, if you do ever think of it again, let me know.”

Uncle Koll growled beside us. “Young man, if you don’t focus, I’m going to feed you only carrots for a week!”

“Fine. But only because it would be distracting to kiss her with you standing there.”

Uncle Koll rolled his eyes.

“Ready, Dayspring?” He reached out for my hand.

“I’m ready,” I lied.

The impenitent Shade stood proud as we peered through the fence at the back of the gardens. Three guards paced the parapet of the castle, while another two strode corner to corner along the sides.

It was time to break into the castle.

Chapter twenty-five

A Brief Castle Break-In

Uncle Koll gently shifted the dirt beneath the edges of the gate. Arms of soil wrapped around the base, lifting the structure up until the hooks of the hinges slipped out of their holds. The shadows caught the door silently, and together they set it aside so we could sneak into the garden.

The world darkened hazily as the Shade returned the gate and obscured us in inky clouds. My steps were unsteady on the broken tiles of the garden path. But as it was not yet dawn, the grounds were quietly lit by the clouded moon, and we slipped silently toward the castle doors.

I paused with my hand on a cracked fruit tree and looked at the animal menagerie around me. All the pangolins and wolves scuffled around my feet; the bats circled above us.

“Won’t we stand out?”

The Shade looked about. With a tip of his head, he commanded the pangolin and honey badger to stay by the gate with one of the bats, which immediately flew up and hung from the tallest peak of the arch. “These can stand guard.” He instructed most of the wolves to stay in the courtyard, while the dark one with bright yellow eyes came with us.

The dried skeletons of fruit trees around us reached toward an ashy sky with craggy black arms. They were as dry and desiccated as the desolate forests I’d scavenged while searching for a cure for the queen. Pots stood dried and empty. Dead stalks of plants and flowers, caked with ash and black slime, folded onto the cracked soil below. In a hundred steps, we would reach the back door.

Another explosion boomed in the distance.

“I’m glad the prince is having a good time at the manor.” Uncle Koll scratched his beard as he slunk behind a dry wall of shrubbery. “It’s convenient that he’s out of the castle today.”

The Shade chuckled darkly. “I may or may not have sent a threatening letter.”

I put my fingers to my forehead. “You don’t have to antagonize him all the time, do you?”

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