Page 1 of Heartless Enemy

Chapter1

Loud pounding came from my door. I shot upright and leaped out of bed. Snatching up my sword, I darted across the room and shoved the door open.

“Are we under attack?” I demanded.

Tyler blinked at me from the other side of the threshold. “No, sir. It’s—”

“Then you’d better have one hell of an explanation for this.”

“It’s Eve.”

Dread washed through my veins like cold poison. Keeping my voice level, I asked, “What about Eve?”

“She’s here.”

I leaned out, glancing at the corridor behind him. It was empty. With furrowed brows, I slid my gaze back to Tyler. “What do you mean,here?”

Uncertainty swirled in Tyler’s normally so intelligent blue eyes as he glanced between me and my bedroom windows on the other side of the room. “She’s outside.”

Turning around, I cast a glance at the dark night outside the windows behind me.

Rain poured down, splattering the glass and beating against the metal roof with a steady thrumming sound. I turned back to Tyler, and my frown twisted into an annoyed scowl.

“Why haven’t you allowed her inside?” I said, my voice pulsing with barely restrained anger. “I thought I made it clear to everyone inside this Court that Eve Sterling is allowed to come and go as she wishes. So why is she still standing outside in the rain?”

Tyler, to his credit, didn’t shrink back from the anger bubbling inside me. Instead, he kept his hands down by his sides in a clear gesture that he wouldn’t stop me if I decided to punish him for it.

While holding my gaze, he replied, “We tried, sir. We told her to come inside but she’s just… standing there. She hasn’t even looked at us. Let alone spoken to us. And I assumed that…” His eyes flicked to the side for a second, as if he was uncertain whether he had made the right call about whatever he was about to say next. “That you didn’t want us to touch her.” He cleared his throat before finishing with, “So we haven’t tried to lead her inside either.”

I watched him in silence for a few seconds while suppressing the satisfying smile that tugged at my lips. I really had trained him well.

But the brief flash of satisfaction evaporated quickly when my thoughts returned to Eve, and worry took its place. Why was she just standing out there in the rain? After how we left things, or rather after what she said beforesheleft yesterday, I didn’t think I would be seeing her again.

With worry still snaking through my chest, I gave Tyler a nod to acknowledge that he had indeed made the right call. “I’ll be right down.”

Tyler dipped his chin before disappearing back down the black and gold corridor.

Leaving the door open, I strode back into my room and returned my sword to the rack before quickly putting on some clothes. Then I hurried out into the hallway and down towards the front doors.

Light from the torches and oil lamps set onto the chains throughout my throne room painted the gray metallic space with dancing firelight. Earlier today, this room had been filled with dark mages who had knelt and sworn their allegiance to me as the sole ruler of the south side. The internal war between the dark mage Houses of Malgrave was finally at an end.

That should have made me feel elated. But all I had been able to feel since Eve said goodbye and walked out of here yesterday was pulsing pain that was spreading through my heart like cracks in brittle glass.

So even though I was worried about why Eve was just standing out there in the rain, I also couldn’t help the tiny flicker of hope that sprouted in my chest. She had said goodbye, but now she was here. Did that mean that she had changed her mind? But what could possibly have made her change her mind in such a fundamental way? And in such a short time?

Stepping across the threshold, I walked out into the pouring rain and then stopped when I found Eve standing a short distance from me. My guards flicked uncertain glances at me. I jerked my chin, telling them to give us some space. They dutifully moved out of earshot while still scanning the dark street around us.

Rain splashed down on me, soaking my hair and clothes, as I closed the final distance to Eve. I studied her.

She was wearing civilian clothes, those black and red leather ones that made her look fierce and powerful, rather than that awful white and gold uniform. Her light brown hair lay plastered to her skin, completely soaked from the rain, and water ran down her forehead and along her nose before dripping down to the puddles on the street.

My heart stuttered as I met her gaze. Or rather, as I looked into her eyes, because she was most certainly not meeting my gaze. She was staring unseeing at the red-painted doors behind me, looking as if she was drowning in an abyss somewhere in her mind.

Stopping right in front of her, I flicked a quick glance up and down her body to check for injuries before returning my gaze to her emotionless eyes. “Spitfire?”

No response.

I gently placed my fingers on her chin, tilting it up so that she met my gaze. “Eve.”

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