Nocturna (A Forgery of Magic #1)(34)

Then Luka laughed so hard that he almost vomited onto the tiled floor he so admired.

When he made it to the sweeping corridor to his bedchambers, he paused. Alfie’s words rang in his head like the most annoying of bells: Please just go to your room and sleep it off.

“Pendejo,” Luka sniffed before leaning against his door, contemplating. At this moment, it was very important to do the exact opposite of what Alfie said. Very important. He pushed off the door and promptly stumbled to the ground, catching himself with a palm against the floor.

“Opposite, opposite,” he mused as he shakily stood. What was the opposite of going to his room and sleeping? Luka snapped his fingers as he cracked the code. “Going to Alfie’s room and staying awake!” He stumbled down the corridor and burst into Alfie’s room. He flopped onto the bed and watched the canopy spin over his head. On the bedside set of drawers sat a bottle of tonic Alfie drank to calm him when he was nervous. Alfie always seemed to be nervous.

Except when he was disappearing for months at a time without a single word, getting into trouble without asking Luka to come along, or even telling him. He seemed more than calm then.

“Stupid abandoning jerk,” Luka muttered before reaching for the bottle. It felt cool in his hand. Luka laid it against his forehead. It rolled onto his nose and balanced precariously on the bridge.

Luka plucked the bottle off his face, twisted the cork free, and took a long swig before throwing the bottle across the room, letting it roll toward the double doors to the balcony.

He rose from the bed, too annoyed to fall asleep. His mind fuzzy from wine and the tonic, Luka stumbled out of Alfie’s room. Drunk or not, he would give Alfie a piece of his mind.





11


The Blue Room


Her steps as silent as the rest of her was invisible, Finn took a tour of the palace.

She sampled the pork that she’d snuck in through and could confirm that it was worth all the praise. She bet her sweat improved the flavor. She walked in through the banquet hall’s open doors and watched the nobles dance, which proved to be less entertaining than expected. She listened in on conversations and mimicked the nobles’ scandalized expressions as they traded gossip.

“Did you hear he was caught with his mistress?”

“No.”

“Truly! And she gave him an ultimatum.”

“Again?”

“Again.”

When she grew tired of pantomiming gasps and looks of shock, Finn sauntered out of the banquet hall and went back to exploring. She knew she ought to leave, but she wanted to take her time out of spite. After all, she had nothing to fear, not with the vanishing cloak around her shoulders.

Finn walked through a wing of fine art, the library she’d peeked into earlier, and more parlors than she could count when she found herself in a quiet wing of the castle where there were no guards, no guests.

It was strangely empty and unkempt. Where the tiled floors gleamed throughout the palace, these were dull, as if they hadn’t been trod on or scrubbed for months. The curtains were drawn over ceiling-high stained glass windows. At the end of the corridor was a set of double doors. Curiosity gnawed at her. Why was this wing so deserted? What had happened here?

Before she could talk herself out of it, she pushed open the doors, walked in, and shut them behind her. The room was a sweeping parlor with a blue tiled floor and swaths of darker blue fabric draping across the octagonal ceiling. Much of the furniture was covered in white sheets, like petrified ghosts unable to move or speak.

Creepy, she thought, wrapping her arms around herself.

Musty nets of cobwebs hung from the curtains. A thick film of dust lay stagnant on the one table where the white sheet had slid off, like moss over a pond. She ran her fingers over it and marveled at how she could feel her fingertips traveling through the grime, but couldn’t see them. She made a tangle of intersecting lines in the dust and a little star with her pinkie. It looked like a phantom trying to scrawl a message. Finn the Phantom. She smiled. She liked that.

With a creak, the doors opened behind her.

Finn jumped, nearly forgetting she was invisible. Standing in the doorway was a boy, tall and a bit nervous-looking. He looked strangely familiar.

“Luka?” he called into the room. “Have you passed out in here?” He hovered at the door, looking too uncomfortable to walk in, as if something within this room had haunted him for far too long. His eyes were shining. He hurriedly rubbed them with the back of his hand.

He took a deep breath in and let it flow slowly from his mouth until his shoulders relaxed. His movements still unsure, he stepped in.

It was well past midnight now. What was he doing here? He was slim built, and from the little she saw of him thus far, she knew that every step he took was weighed and measured twice over in his head. There was a thoughtfulness to him and his furrowed brow. He looked delicate, even. Breakable. He was attractive, she thought, with his large gold eyes and the way his slim body tapered at his waist. He was endearing in his obvious weakness, like a puppy with a limp. Not quite guapo, but he was cute.

He scanned the room before he approached the table Finn was standing at. He ducked his head beneath it as if accustomed to finding someone sleeping under a table. His shadow zigzagged around him searchingly. She nearly snorted at the sight. What could the propio of some pampered palace boy be? The ability to make nice flower arrangements?