Penelope and Prince Charming (Nvengaria #1)(66)
Damien’s throat was parched. It was far too hot in the room—he had to open the window. Petri would not like it, but Petri was in the cool hall, not the stifling bedroom. Besides, Petri had made certain that Damien’s bedchamber windows had a sheer drop to the back of the house, no overhanging trees or convenient ivy to climb.
A high blank wall would make no difference to a logosh, Damien thought, but Rufus and Miles must have caught the thing by now and sliced it to bits. Or Titus. That boy had a blood lust that made Damien’s father’s seem tame.
Damien unlatched and pushed open the casement, the hinges creaking in the quiet. He closed his eyes as a refreshing breeze touched his face, cool laced with damp. They might have rain this evening.
The silence outside matched the silence within. No servant plucked vegetables from the gardens for supper, no guests strolled the hedged walks. No aristocrats rode in the park, no grooms exercised horses. In short, no Englishmen, no Nvengarians, no one at all.
Damien pulled his trousers over his bare backside and exited the room. The hall was blissfully cool. In a window seat near the end, Petri slept, his head thrown back, a soft snore coming from his throat.
Damien watched him in disquiet. Petri had never fallen asleep at his post in his life, no matter how tired he’d become.
“Petri.” He shook the man’s shoulder.
Petri’s head lolled, but he did not waken. Damien straightened up, grim and alert.
Had the wine at the betrothal ceremony been tampered with—the thick, blood-red wine that Sasha had carried so lovingly all the way to England? If that were the case, Damien, who’d drunk far more of it than Petri, should still be fast asleep.
He’d heard of enchanted sleeps, in fairy tales. But why not? A logosh had turned up during his betrothal ceremony, and Damien was following a prophecy he did not quite believe in. Why not an enchanted sleep as well?
He returned to the bedroom. Penelope slept on, her bare body relaxed, beautiful. Damien wanted nothing more than to climb onto the bed, drape himself over her, and drift blissfully to sleep. He fought the urge, drawing a long breath.
Damien pulled a fold of the rumpled coverlet over Penelope, who never moved, then leaned down and kissed her cheek. He rummaged in a drawer until he found a long, finely-honed Nvengarian knife Petri had thoughtfully left for him.
Before Damien left the room he closed the window again. A shame, because the weather had cooled, a few white clouds casting shadows over the heated afternoon. But he wanted no logosh or any other magical horror climbing in through the window while he was gone.
Petri snored on in the hall. Damien left him there and ascended the stairs to the attics. The first servant’s room he looked into held a mob-capped maid, fallen backward on her bed fully dressed, one foot dangling. She must have felt the fatigue, retired to her room, and was overcome with sleep before she could even lie down properly.
In another bedchamber, he found Rufus and Miles—or at least, he assumed these were his footmen in the tangle of at least eight bare legs, four ending in the dainty plump feet of English maids. He rolled his eyes and closed the door.
He left the servants’ quarters and journeyed downstairs. In the still house, he found sleeping guests and servants everywhere. The butler, Mathers, sprawled on a padded bench under the bust of Damien his footmen had erected, his hands resting on his ample belly.
He discovered Michael Tavistock in the sitting room with Lady Tavistock’s head on his shoulder. Meagan was curled in a chair nearby, and Egan MacDonald lay on the hearthrug, his kilt hiked above his brawny knees. He had a fine Highland snore.
“Damnation,” Damien muttered, more to keep himself awake than for need of expression.
If the sleep were enchanted, why? Why would a mage go to the trouble of sending an entire household to sleep?
To kill Damien and Penelope in peace, of course.
Then where was the assassin, and why had he not struck? A trickle of sweat rolled between Damien’s shoulder blades. He softly left the ground floor rooms, making for the stairs, and Penelope, again.
Chapter 19
Another question, Damien wondered as he ascended the stairs. Who was the mage? He knew of one man, Nedrak, who could cast spells over a long distance—and he suspected it had been Nedrak who’d tried to force him and Penelope together the first night in her bedchamber in order to break the prophecy.
But Damien doubted that even Nedrak could cast a spell from fifteen hundred miles away that affected an entire household. Enchanting two people was one thing—more than a hundred, another. So, the sorcerer must be nearby, probably within Damien’s entourage.
The fact that someone here was betraying him made Damien feel ill. He’d been so careful vetting the men and servants who’d volunteered to take this journey with him. He and Petri and Sasha had scrutinized every one of them, but he supposed Alexander would send only a very clever man who could hide in plain sight.
And if the culprit were Sasha himself …
No, Damien could not believe that. Sasha had been fiercely loyal since the day Damien had unlocked and opened the cell door of Sasha’s prison with his own hand.
Sasha, filthy, stinking, and looking barely human, had heard Damien’s voice and crawled to him, weeping. He’d clung to Damien’s boots and said brokenly he’d never given up faith that Damien, the true prince of Nvengaria, would come for him. The guards had tried to pull Sasha away, but Damien had lifted the man, so emaciated he weighed next to nothing, and carried him out of the dungeon himself.