Page 17 of The Rat King
Avery
“DoesXavierknowyou’reup here?” a smooth voice said from behind me. I spun to find Link in rat-man form behind me. His faded brows arched over his sloped forehead as his eyes made an assessing sweep over me and the door handle I was fidgeting with. It had only taken me a few days to muster up the courage to sneak away and venture up to the fourth floor.
“No, and you’re not going to tell him either.”
At my words, he grinned. “And why is that, Miss Plath?”
“Call me Avery, and because your buddy Nighval was the one who suggested I explore the fourth floor.” I pulled a bobby pin from my hair and stuffed it into the keyhole. I had no idea what I was doing, but I’d seen people do this in movies. Considering this was the only locked room on this floor, it had to be the one Nighval was steering me toward.
“Nighval told you to try to break into locked rooms in the castle?” He quirked his lips to the side as he eyed me. When I didn’t respond, he said, “I knew following you up here was a good idea. I can always tell when there’s mischief afoot.”
A mechanism in the lock budged, so I wrenched the pin a little further. A pop sounded and the thin piece of metal snapped in half leaving one end jammed in the lock. Pinching the end, I tried to pull it free, but my fingers slipped. Shit.
Ignoring Link, because he very well knew that wasn’t precisely the message I’d received, I walked down the hallway to the next open door.
“What are you doing now?” he asked as he paced along behind me.
“There was a balcony in this room, I think. If they’re close enough, I could climb between them—”
“Oh no you won’t. Did it ever occur to you the room was locked for a reason? Besides, Xavier will have my head if he found out I was privy to your plan and didn’t stop you.” Link attempted to grab my arm as he chased me into the room, but I jerked it out of his reach. I got to the windows and as I tugged on the moth-eaten curtain his huge hand wrapped around the fabric above mine and as we tugged in opposite directions the fabric shredded.
I let out an exaggerated sigh as I glared up at him. “You’re on the Council of Warlocks, right?”
“Yes, why?” he asked.
“Well, Link, I’m going to be your queen, and Xavier and I will preside over the council, correct?” I raised a brow, thinking I had a checkmate.
“Something like that,” he said, and I got the impression that he was curious enough that he was going to play along.
“Well, then I insist that you let me do as I wish.” I put my hands on my hips as I waited for his reply.
“What do you think is in that room that you’re so insistent upon seeing?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Skeletons, mummies. Or maybe it’s where the king has imprisoned the witch who cursed you,” I said, giggling. But the wariness that eclipsed the warlock’s expression suggested that it hadn’t been an outlandish guess after all. I gave him a toothy grin. “I’m warm, aren’t I? See, that is exactly why I’m getting into that room.”
I poked my finger into his chest until he took a step back. I pulled the shredded curtains back enough that I could unlatch the window, push it open and slip out onto the balcony. Link followed and came up behind me as I surveyed the distance between the adjacent balcony leading to the room next door.
“It’s too far—”
“Exactly,” he said.
“I was going to say, it’s too far for me. You could make it.” I raised a challenging brow as I gestured for him to give it a go. When he only crossed his arms over his chest, I said, “Fine. I guess I’ll have to try.” I put my hands on the ledge nearest the building as if I would actually do it.
Right as I was about to hoist myself onto the ledge, Link stormed off, saying, “Come on. I’ll pick the lock.”
I clapped my hands in front of my chest and skipped after him. Acting classes paid off again.
Link squatted down by the lock so he could slip a cap-free claw inside and leaned his ear forward to listen. After a few tries, the pin I’d wedged in there popped out and a sharp ping sounded. He reached up, yanked on the handle and it turned. Eureka!
I rushed into the dim room stopping short when it occurred to me that wasn’t such a great idea. Who knew why the room was locked? And by the thick layer of dust covering the luxurious furniture, it had been that way for a long time.
I stilled to listen for a moment. Only silence greeted me and the sound of wind whistling through a gap in the windows in the adjacent room which lay ahead. Link flipped the light on, and I scanned the space. We were in a large sitting area with grand shelves that were built into the wall on either side of a massive fireplace. A still life of peonies hung above it and several pieces of spindly furniture were scattered around. The suite appeared to have belonged to a woman with very particular taste at some point in Ravsted’s history.
Wow. Did this room belong to who I thought it did? I grabbed Link’s arm, noting the thick muscle under my hand. The large man was equally as struck as I was. “Link, do you know who this room belonged to?”
His eyes met mine and he nodded.
“It was hers, wasn’t it?” I asked. I approached an ornate desk which might have been cream under the coating of grey dust and tried the first drawer. It opened easily. Inside was a stack of old letters bound with a simple leather tie. The swirling script was a little difficult to read, but I got enough that I understood I held the romantic correspondence between Xavier and Nighval’s parents.
