AN: All right, here we go with another one. You'd think I'd realize one of these days that I'm never going to be over Hawke and Fenris, but every time I'm surprised at how much I still love them. For any new readers concerned about diving into a long WIP, please rest assured that as usual, this fic is completely written as of this note. I have some edits to do on the last chapters per Jade's recommendations, but I plan to update about weekly depending on the speed of my progress.

On that subject, I have to make enormous oblations to jadesabre301, whose consistent generosity in donating her time and formidable editing skills and general writing brilliance continues to overwhelm me. For someone who doesn't particularly care about Fenris, she has spent uncountable hours editing him for me, and her willingness to become emotionally invested in my version of him is one of the most humbling things in the world. Anything that is good in this fic is hers; the rest of my fumblings are just trying to live up to her example. (You're the best, Jade. Don't you dare forget it.)

I also owe significant thanks to rannadylin on tumblr, who kindly spent an evening correcting all my half-hearted attempts at Latin. Any correct translations here are hers; all mistakes remaining are my own. Thank you again! You are also the best, and I am so grateful for your help!

Warnings: Due to the nature of Tevinter's history and culture, this fic will contain multiple, often casual references to sex between a master and slave, as well as a few rare depictions of the same. Some of this is willing; some is (as Fenris says) willing, but not by choice. It also includes explicit descriptions of slavery, including violence, humiliation, and references to severe punishment for minor infractions. I have tried to treat the subject with as much care and consideration as possible, but please be forewarned all the same.

Enjoy!

How many times these low feet staggered -
Only the soldered mouth can tell -
Try - can you stir the awful rivet -
Try - can you lift the hasps of steel!

—Emily Dickinson

.

There is a wolf in me . . . fangs pointed for tearing gashes . . . a red tongue for raw meat . . . and the hot lapping of blood—I keep this wolf because the wilderness gave it to me and the wilderness will not let it go.

—Wilderness, Carl Sandburg

part one

—

"But what are we going to do with him?" the matrona asks, less plaintive than he would have expected.

Her husband—his new mistress's father, he surmises, strong-eyed despite the lines of age along his mouth—cups a hand to her cheek and then her shoulder. His travel-stained clothes show poorly against his wife's silk; his fingers leave fresh mud along the cream. Neither of them appears to care. "I don't know. We'll think of something. Give him to Orana for the moment; I've got to go to the healers."

The woman closes her eyes as her husband pulls away; the door closes behind him without a backwards glance, and she lets out a long slow breath before bending to lift the man's carry-bag, still unopened, from where he'd dropped it at her feet. Her eyes are foreign when at last she looks at him again, faded blue framed by greying hair. "Well. You have a name, I suppose?"

He opens his mouth to answer, but a scream ripples through the air before he can speak. The woman pales, her hand flattening on the gilded harpsichord at her side; he hesitates, unsure if he is meant to aid the mother of his mistress or keep his slave's hand from her silk, and in the moment of his indecision she sets her jaw and pushes away from the instrument. He knows that look.

"Fenris, domina," he says, and presses his palms tightly together at his waist. "If it pleases you."

"Fenris. Your trade tongue is excellent."

"I thank you, domina." More is on his tongue, assertions of his own unworthiness in the light of her praise, but another scream cracks across them both like a whip. A woman's voice; the cry from agony, not fear. The sound is familiar to him.

"Maker preserve this house," his mistress's mother breathes. He ought to know her name past the cognomen—a hunting bird, he thinks vaguely, something southern and barbaric. "Maker preserve my daughter."

He drops his eyes, debates dropping to his knees as well. The world has been distant since Danarius fell and did not rise from the white tile of the praetorate's hall; this is only one more dream. In his mind he sees again the slow spread of his master's ribs as he breathed, arm bending feebly at his side despite the apprentices rushing to him—and his prized slave, the wager against his debts, led by a guard in crimson and gold to the side of his new owner. She had been bleeding then, too.

A knock at the door—and as it opens, a wash of magic so sudden and powerful it nearly knocks him from his feet. The weight surges through his markings, cool and immensely strong, and it takes more effort than usual to keep the lyrium quiescent. The elf in the doorway, a slender, slight woman with bound blonde hair, does not seem to notice. "Mistress," she says in accented trade, "she asks for you."

"Of course. Of course. I'll come immediately." She pauses at the door, her hand smoothing anxiously over her own hair. "Orana, this is—forgive me. I've forgotten."

"Fenris, matrona."

"Fenris. Get him settled, would you?"

Orana bends at the waist and the matrona vanishes after her husband. A trusted slave, then, and valued more than he. The thought rankles, unused as he is to anonymity in his master's house; another watch-ward for the days ahead if he is to keep himself unharmed. Danarius will come for him soon, wager or no wager, and he will be displeased if Fenris has managed to shame him in the interim.

The girl comes to his side, hand outstretched. Fool to not even know to fear the lyrium's strength. "Fenris. Salve, new brother, and welcome to this house."

"Salve," he murmurs, and bows. If this woman rules the house beneath the magisters, she cannot be so weak as she appears. Better to cultivate her favor before the rumors come. "My unworthy gratitude for your open doors."

"No need. Come, please. There is a room for you while the mistress is healed."

He follows, head bent, and does not look up at the screams.

—

Ah, he realizes, belatedly enough that his own stupidity embarrasses him. These must be the mistress's rooms. No other explanation for the fine damask curtains, the blue embroidered coverlet, the tall windows open to Minrathous's autumn breezes across the estate's olive grove. Orana had left him standing at the foot of the bed some time ago with some excuse about dinner; only now, near a full hour of kneeling beside the footboard later, has he realized this room's purpose. Humiliating.

At least she will be too fatigued to have him tonight. A small comfort.

He draws in a breath, blows it out again in slow, measured counts as he centers himself once more. His hands ache where they are fisted on his knees, thumbnails scoring lines into his reinforced cuisse; Danarius's costume, he realizes, the black-dyed leathers unlikely to be permitted in his new home. And the soldered collar—and the indulgent length of his hair, perhaps, and his preference for the sword over the dagger. Or any weapon at all, depending on his mistress's use for him. If Danarius were here—

A brief knock, and the door swings open without a sound. The elf-woman Orana stands before him, wiping her hands on her apron; at her gesture he rises and follows her to the open, airy kitchens where he is given a plate of crisp-baked chicken and green peas, a thick, sweet sauce drizzled over them both. He almost recognizes the cook and the tall, severe slave-woman who places the plate before him, something of Danarius's familiarity in their faces, but the food smells appealing enough he does not distract himself with their attentions. He eats quickly and silently, rises when he is finished to replace the dirtied plate in the open sink, and follows Orana once more from the comfortable kitchens to the taller hallways of the family's estate.

The family estate—the family name. Wild birds, hunters—

Hawke. Hawke, magisters from Ferelden. He remembers them now.

"Orana."

His guide halts mid-step, turning to the open double doors on their right, and Fenris cannot stop the leap of his heart to his throat. Beyond the doorway lies a beautifully carpeted parlor, and at the far wall—his mistress reclined on a white chaise, her face pale despite the sunset through the window above her, her linen robe not enough to cover the bandages that stretch from her waist to the base of her neck. Her mother sits at her side; another young woman, hair just as black around a face a little softer, perches on the end of the chaise. "May I borrow you for a moment?" his mistress continues. Her tone is very light.

"Of course, messere." Orana goes to the edge of the chaise at once; Fenris hesitates, then moves to stand at deference just inside the door. This room is too fine for him to profane with the mark of another magister's ownership. "The book again?"

"Yes. Forgive me, Orana. I think it's on my nightstand. With the copy of Paridi's Law and my journal."

Orana shakes her head, smiling. "It is no trouble. I will bring it shortly."

"Thank you." A moment's pause as his mistress begins to look again to her mother, but as Fenris turns to follow Orana from the room the motion draws the magister's attention. She holds up a hand—dangerous as the edge of a blade, he knows, his memory too bright with that same hand clenched around a pillar of fire—and as unavoidable. His nerves sing with fear. "You. Will you—wait, please."

Orana bows and withdraws. Fenris swallows hard and takes two steps towards the mistress's family before going to his knees, his head bowed, his fists on his thighs. One of the women shifts with a rustle of cambric. "Sister, can't you—"

In trade tongue: "I don't think this is a good time, Bethany." Then, returning to heavily accented Tevene, "I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name."

"Fenris," the matrona answers for him, and he bends forward, pressing his forehead to the embroidered carpet. It is soft against his nose. "He is quite fluent in trade, as I discovered earlier."

"Is that so?"

"Yes, domina," he says in the same language, voice steady. "I know it."

"Is that a usual thing for a bodyguard?"

His throat is so dry despite the meal. "My previous master found it convenient that I could speak to his associates in their own language, domina. I learned several."

"Several—"

"This is ridiculous," the other young woman says, obviously irritated, and he can feel the air shift as she rises. "Do stand up, please. I can't bear it."

"Bethany," sighs his mistress, but she does not object, and after a moment's hesitation Fenris pushes to his feet. To know himself on such display is worse even than his kneeling to them; he fixes his eyes on the worn toe of his mistress's left slipper and tries to control his hammering pulse. "My sister, Fenris; Fenris, Bethany. And I believe you've met my mother, Leandra. I'd rise to greet you myself, but it seems I might quite literally lose my stomach if I tried. Forgive the impropriety."

He does not know how to respond and so says nothing. His leathers have begun to stick to him with apprehensive sweat; a brief, violent longing for Danarius's estate washes over him, the familiarity of those cold halls infinitely more comforting than this, three women in a room warmed wall to wall by luxury. "Domina," he says belatedly, and braces himself for the lapse.

"For what it's worth," his mistress says, almost gently, "there's nothing to be afraid of here. No one will hurt you under this roof."

"Yes, domina."

"Oh—he doesn't believe you."

Fenris flinches at the open disappointment in the sister's voice, half-kneels again to the carpet before he remembers the injunction to stand. "Forgive this slave, domina—"

"No need," his mistress says, cutting across him, and he barely hides another shudder. "Bethany, please."

The woman hisses between her teeth but subsides, crossing her arms. The matrona stands and moves to join her, whispering more quietly than even Fenris's ears can catch; his mistress watches them both for a moment before returning her gaze to him, and Fenris abruptly drops his eyes again to his feet.

Bare toes, grimy around the nails, stark contrast to the elegant gold of the carpet; heavy, sharp-edged scars to ridge the lyrium. He must be repulsive for her to stare at him so long. At last she stirs, grunting as she sits up properly, and at her request he approaches the chaise with his fists knotted at his side.

"I would like to remove that collar," she says, and he's startled enough he can't keep his eyes from flicking up to hers. "Only it looks like it's welded shut, and I don't know if I can remove it without damaging it. Is there any reason—your preference included—that I shouldn't break it off?"

His preference—his preference is for the world to reverse itself, to return to the morning not eight hours back, when the world made sense and Danarius still held his lead. At least he knew what to fear, then; at least then he knew his value in his master's eyes. He licks his lips. "No, domina. It is yours."

Her eyes fall shut for a moment, but when she looks at him again there's no sign he has fallen into some unwitting trap. "Fair enough. Bethany, will you help me? You've got to keep the back from burning him."

"Of course," she says, less annoyed, and Fenris does not understand—and then she's there beside him, her smile entirely too sweet and her soft white hand sliding to the base of his neck. The matrona brings a chair behind and Fenris does not realize he is the one meant to sit until Bethany is pushing gently at his shoulder, and his mistress has swung her legs to the side of the chaise despite her mother's protest, and somehow he sinks to the plush cushion and his mistress's knees have come to rest just opposite his own.

Bethany's palm slides between Fenris's neck and the back of the iron collar; his mistress says, holding his startled gaze, "Tell me if this hurts."

Then she lifts her hand between them, and her fingertips light in flame.

"Yes, domina," he says, unable to think clearly through the sudden surge of white terror. She sees it and lowers her hand; this is worse, the knowledge that he has offended, and Fenris wrenches his head away, eyes clenched shut. "At your will."

"Quick, then," she tells her sister, and puts his neck to the fire.

Ten seconds. Twenty—thirty. Every instant he expects the bite of pain; every moment it does not come is a fresh agony of its own. Ice burns against his throat, thaws, burns again; abruptly, his mistress lets out a sudden laugh and Bethany sighs, and then her hand slides away from his neck and there's a heavy metal crack, and a pressure—lifting—

"Here," says his mistress, shaking out her hand, and drops the collar into his lap.

One piece still, the black, polished hinge bent under the protest of years; and at the opposite side a clean break through his master's old weld, the edges still yellow-gold with heat and steaming. How long—

His neck feels light enough to frighten him.

"There," her sister says, dropping a hand on his shoulder still cold enough to raise gooseflesh on his arms. "That wasn't so bad, I hope."

The matrona shakes her head. "And you've gone white as a sheet again, Euphemia. Lie back down before you undo all your father's hard work."

"Some things can't wait," the mistress tells her tartly, but even Fenris can see her lips gone dark with pain against the pallor of her skin. "Will you make sure, these next few days—?"

"Of course. Orana?"

He had not even heard her enter. The elf draws near to deposit the book she'd been sent to claim, clucks at the mistress's smile, takes Fenris's elbow—and they are in the hall again, his collar clutched in one hand, his world gone too bright with confusion and the giddiness of fear. He cannot even track the path; he is only at his door, and through it, and the room with the blue coverlet lies just as silent and alarming as he remembers. The door closes behind him. The lock does not click.

The sun has fallen behind the mountains now, no light in the room but early dusk. Fenris places the collar on the carpet at the foot of the bed, sinks to lie down beside it without undressing, and sleeps.

—

He waits three days. Orana becomes the only face he sees, bringing him from the blue room to the kitchens three times a day for his meals, escorting him twice to the privy yard to dump his pot. She continues to leave the door unlocked despite his inability to brave the threshold; neither does the mistress come despite his presence in her rooms. Voices pass by his closed door more than once, occasionally ones he recognizes: the mistress's mother, her sister, her father from the first day. On one occasion the mistress passes herself, her voice raised and angry against another man's he does not know. They never stop for him, and he does not know if he should be alarmed or relieved.

When the madness of the solitude grows too heavy, he trains. There is little he can do in one room without his sword, but he can manage some things. He strips to his smalls, pushes himself from the floor with his arms, holds the position as long as he can; he rests his ankles on the windowsill and curls upwards to meet his feet over and over, until his hair sticks to his forehead and even his fingers feel hot on the strange bare skin of his neck. He washes himself as best he can from the small washbowl and cloth set atop the desk and longs for a proper bath, even one as cold and crowded as the slaves' bath at Danarius's estate.

He prowls the room's edges, examines the white-painted bookshelves and the fine baubles left on every surface, the silver candelabra, the small paired ceramic statues of halla, a framed portrait of a mabari sitting proudly beneath a green tree. At his most daring he opens the wardrobe with the embroidered screen and finds it empty save a few heavy winter cloaks and a pair of men's shoes in the top drawer, obviously forgotten. Eventually, he places the iron remnants of his collar in the bottom drawer beside a mothball, and the wood rattles when he closes it.

He discovers a small hand mirror in the delicate hard-wooded table beside the bed. He has no recent memory of himself with which to compare the image; he spends most of an afternoon peering at its small glass, studying the green eyes and the hard mouth above the twinned white lines, the white braid reaching halfway down his shoulders. When he can bear that no longer he turns the mirror to the sun instead, flicking bits of light into the corners of the room where the sun cannot reach. By dinner the mirror is safe again in its drawer, slave's fingerprints wiped carefully clean with the corner of the bedcovers.

Then, in the small hours of the fourth day—

Fenris is used to nightmares. Often they are flashes, alarming only enough to wake and then gone in the next moment, leaving nothing behind. This, though, is worse; this time it is Danarius and the punishment Fenris must expect for spending so long in another magister's household, and no matter how long he lies in the dark, gasping against the carpet, he cannot still his pulse or banish the memory of breaking bones.

He stands at the door with no memory of rising. His fingers clench around the handle, spasming with dread; then it is open and he is through, his prison left behind at last for the silence of the Hawke estate at night.

By now he knows his way easily to the kitchens, and in a matter of moments he stands over the large sink with a handful of pumped water splashed over his face and across the back of his neck. He has not truly bathed in days and his hair stinks, even to him; another minute to yank free the leather tie and he submerges his head entirely, scrubbing with his fingertips until they are sore and his scalp feels rubbed raw, his hair hanging in dripping tangles down his neck.

He's already doomed if he is discovered. His dreams have made him bold; four days of unending fear have made him mad, and he recklessly steals mouthful after mouthful of clear water from the ewer set beside the sink. And on the rough table in the center, a bowl of green apples—he steals one of those too and eats it quickly enough his stomach aches, juice dripping down his fingers. The core he throws into a small wastebin left by the kitchen's back door where there are others like it; the windows, small and set with glass on either side of the bolted door, inform him that the quarter-moon has barely moved since he fled his rooms.

Good enough. He stalks back to the half-open door of the hallway behind him, flush with victory—

There are footsteps in the hall.

Fenris goes wholly silent, sliding with one smooth step into the shadow thrown by the door. He does not recognize the tread—far too heavy for Orana, and made with booted feet, not bare—and growing closer. He has survived thus far on the merit of their tolerance; his discovery here will surely strain that leniency past forgiveness. Danarius will not thank him for a flogging over an apple, over a cup of water—

The back door is bolted, as is the door to the central courtyard. Even were he to loosen them, the sound of the hinges would give him away; no choice then but the far door set opposite his entry. It has been closed every time Orana has brought him here, but fortune finds him now and the knob turns, the hinges noiseless, the metal greased and quiet as he slips through and shuts the door behind him.

He drags in air, lets it out again. Only hallways, tall and grand and silent, one stretching out before him for twenty paces before ending in a closed and bolted door, another branching to the right halfway along. Neither points back towards his room. He does not know this part of the house at all, but the stillness is preferable to pursuit, and if Danarius wishes for his history here at least he will have more to offer than one blue room and a hand mirror. Another breath and his best guess leads him rightward; at the corner he turns, follows the hall out of the dark.

Closed doors line the left side here, set double every one and most carved with vines and figures along the jambs; to the right are regular windows carved into the masonry, lined in glass and overlooking the lush courtyard in the center of the estate. The moon hangs lower, though night is hardly gone; the stars have turned just enough he can find the Harper above the trees. It's a comforting sight in a way, to know that at least some things have not ended with all his world, and when the corridor ends in a broad flight of stone stairs he does not hesitate to take them.

The second floor seems laid much like the first, doubling back in the original direction with the same carved doorways lining the outer wall, and Fenris finds himself following the gold-carpet runner in curious disconnect. Four days he has been apart from his master; four days he has waited without an order, without the familiar weight of his collar, without knowing once what is expected of him in this household. He feels more a ghost now than he has ever been. Has he woken? He is not sure—

There is a light.

He follows it without thought, traces it to the last door on the right, standing open. He finds a large, high-ceilinged room filled wall-to-wall with bookshelves; the light comes from further in, dim but steady, and Fenris makes his way through the narrow aisles to the source of it, wandering, distant—

"Fenris?" says his mistress, with a startled glance up from the candlelit spread of books around her, and his heart stops.

—

The crash into himself again is violent enough to shake him. He starts to spread his hands in defense and manages to bend his head instead, though not before he sees his mistress rise from the walnut table, her Orlesian-woven robe open to a simple homespun nightshirt. He cannot even muster the courage to kneel with the room gone so suddenly sharp at all the edges.

"Fenris," she says again as she rounds the end of the table, her hand outstretched. At her back is a carved wooden rail overlooking the square opening to the floor below, just as many shelves there crammed with books, and he wonders briefly if it would not be better to fling himself over it and be done with it. "Are you all right? You look like you're going to be sick."

"Domina," he says with a tongue made thick by dread. "This slave begs clemency. I—forgive me, magister, I only meant to—"

Her hand drops to the back his neck. "Sit down," she says, and he could collapse in relief at the order. Still, the descent to one of the chairs set at the broad table is more the buckling of his knees than an act of will, and before he can adjust to the change she presses a cup of wine into his hands. "Drink this."

He does, his eyes closed. The wine is better than any he has tasted besides the teases Danarius offered at his most indulgent; it offends him somehow, this slight to his former master, and the insult eases the trembling in his hands. He drains the cup, sets it again on the table with a hollow sound.

"Do you need another?"

"No, domina. This slave is grateful for your generosity."

She kneels beside him, surprising enough he cannot stop his glance into her face. "No need for that. Drinking's what the wine's here for, anyway. But Fenris, it's the middle of the night—what in the world are you doing up?"

"I…" he licks his lips, uncertain, "could not sleep. I thought, perhaps, if I walked…"

"You looked half-asleep when you came around the corner. I must have been a terribly unpleasant shock."

"No, domina."

Her lips purse as she pushes to her feet, and his stomach jolts unpleasantly. "You don't have to lie, you know. I mean, you can if you like, but all the," she gestures vaguely to his markings, "lyrium went off like lightning. And you started swaying on your feet. That's all."

He lowers his head. "As you say, domina."

"Fenris." Her voice is an order of itself, and he looks up again to her face. "You're not…well, shit. How should I say this? You did nothing wrong tonight, let's start there. The house is yours to explore as much as you like, though you might find it less perplexing in daylight hours. I've nothing to hide except, perhaps, an inordinate love of my dog, but you've seen the portrait in your room."

He does not know why his mind latches to the one word in the cloud of senselessness. "My room."

"In the west wing? I thought that's where Orana had set you up, with the blue bedspread and the double windows that face full sunset. Sorry about that, by the way; it must stifle in the afternoons. We can find something else if you'd rather."

Frightening, this loss of control over his words. "I believed—I thought the room was yours. Domina."

"Ahh." She draws the word out, crossing her arms over her chest, and turns to lean against the edge of the table beside him. Her brow has furrowed—but not in anger, and he cannot summon new alarm at her expression. "And the reason you haven't left that room in three days?"

"The door was closed, domina."

"Right."

He has done wrong. He's not sure how, exactly, aside from the obvious travesty of his behavior tonight, but he is aware of how to apologize for this. He knows he is graceful as he slides from the chair; he knows, too, how he looks when he prostrates himself on the floor at his mistress's feet. Danarius had forgone more than one penance at the sight of Fenris's abasement before him. His damp hair slides over his shoulder in a white tangle.

"Domina," he says, and adds, just in case, "Mistress. This slave is not worthy of your kindness. If it pleases you, correct me, that I may serve you better the next time."

There's a soft thump on the rug, and Fenris flinches at the unexpected hand wrapped around his arm to pull him up again. "That is not necessary," his mistress says, her face flushed as she pushes from her knees back to her feet and brings him with her. "That will never be necessary as long as you're in this house, Fenris. I promised myself I would make this transition as easy on you as possible and let you do whatever you wished, but please, don't do that."

He does not know what to say. She pushes him, not ungently, towards the chair again. When he is seated she circles the table and drops into her own chair, stacking the books and papers forgotten until this moment on the far side of the single, still-burning candle; then she folds her hands on the walnut table and looks him directly in the eye. "I think," she says, voice steady despite her still-colored cheeks, "we'd better have a talk."

—

She does not wish for his prostration when he has erred. Neither does she wish him to stay in the room she calls his a moment longer than he desires; he is to roam the house at will and assign himself his own tasks to complete. Her sister Bethany he must under no accounts call anything but her name, but the rest he may address as he pleases, with the mistress's own preference towards her surname.

Training equipment will be provided if he wishes it. The mistress's brother has no small skill with a greatsword either if he desires to spar, so long as they swear not to kill each other; he is welcome to make use of the yards and dummies set up for her brother's use. If he is hungry, he should go to the kitchens. If he is tired, he is to use the bed in his room to sleep. If he is bored—a foreign concept—he must find Orana and ask for suggestions with which to entertain himself. His time has become, in short, his own, and unless instructed otherwise he ought to spend it wholly without reference to his mistress or her family until further instructions are required.

Fenris hates it. By the end of it his gut roils; this can be nothing more than a trap, a scheming plot to ruin him for Danarius's service. No magister, even foreign, could take a slave worth what he is and do nothing with him.

She did not wish to displace him so thoroughly, she tells him, nor be the one to fight his master. The duel had been set between Danarius and her father, Malcolm; then Danarius had tricked her father away from the city in order to exercise his right as challenged to set the date of the duel. Only he'd chosen the very next day instead, her father leagues from the city and trapped in a rumor, and Hawke's choice had become fight as his second or—face the loss of it all.

So she'd fought. And she'd won, and now Fenris sits here in a dim library across from her, even his value taken from him.

Ignorant to the disorder of his thoughts, she asks him at the end of it if he can remember the path to his room. He can and he tells her so, but the mistress rises anyway, tucking her crimson robe more securely around her waist and knotting the tie at her hip. A different route leads them downstairs, outside and through the courtyard via small square pavingstones; halfway across her toe catches on an uneven lip and she cups a flame in her hand to light the rest of her way. A minute more and they have passed from the courtyard to a hallway he recognizes, and then his door (his, if she is to be believed), and the click of the latch behind him. No sound of the lock. Only the fading moon through too-tall windows, an untouched blue coverlet, and white bookshelves stacked with useless books.

Eventually, he pulls a pillow from the headboard and lies with it on the carpet at the foot of the bed. Daring enough for now; if she means to snare him, surely this alone will not trip the wire.

He can still feel her magic in his skin.