She nodded.
“So it’s true?” He shut his eyes. She could see him chastising himself. “I’m sorry to be so bold. Your companion looked reluctant to leave you.”
“She was. I only have a moment. And yes, the rumors are true.” Esme’s voice came back to her, the words in her mouth as steady as the ground they stood on.
“They say you’ll burn in the light, like one of the undead.”
“If I were a revenant, wouldn’t you be in terrible danger right now?” The frustration in her voice might have been impertinent, but she couldn’t stop herself. Yes, she was cursed, but she was not evil. She didn’t drink blood. She wasn’t undead.
The corners of his mouth twitched. “I suppose I would. But for one thing, I don’t believe a revenant would be so beautiful. And for another, I have a fairly remarkable sword.” He tapped the hilt at his side.
“Remarkable enough to kill a revenant?” she asked, arching an eyebrow.
His answering smile was blinding. It was brighter than sunlight, but she could stand beneath it without fear. Something bloomed in her chest, so sudden and huge in the dark cage of her ribs that she thought she would burst.
“It has been in my family for many generations. Some say it was goblin-made. Another story says it sprang up in the middle of a faerie ring.” He shrugged.
“Which do you believe?” she teased him.
His eyes blazed. “I don’t need to believe either of them. The right weapon in the right hands is its own kind of magic,” he said.
Unbidden, a vision of the hands that had cursed her awoke in her memory. “I know that to be true,” she whispered. “And yet I do not even know your name.”
His face softened. “Rylan Sedgewick.” He offered a small bow. “And yours?”
“Surely you must know my name, Sir Rylan? Isn’t it dragged out along with the rumors?”
“I would rather hear it from your own lips,” he said.
“I am Esme. My father is the Duke of Lanford.” She dipped her head, acknowledging his bow.
“I am better pleased than you know to make your acquaintance. And while I am being overly bold—what is it that makes those beautiful gray eyes of yours look so sad?”
“My own shadow,” she whispered. “It hunts me.”
Instead of being starred with disbelief or narrowing in horror, Rylan’s eyes glittered with a warrior’s hunger.
“Have you not found a way to make the hunter into the hunted?” he asked.
Esme shrugged. “When I am out of direct light, my shadow is powerless. I must avoid the sunlight. Moonlight. Fire. Then I am safe.”
“But it still imprisons you,” he protested. “A life without light is nothing but an enormous shackle.”
“Indeed it is,” she agreed. “But it’s the best that can be done. Fire doesn’t burn a shadow. Axes pass through it. I am the only one who can touch it.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Esme saw Margaret hurrying toward them.
“My maid is coming,” she said simply.
Rylan’s face fell. “I must see you again. Please.”
“It’s impossible. I can’t leave the tower,” Esme said, the words crushing her with the weight of their finality. “My father doesn’t allow visitors.”
“You left the tower this evening,” he countered.
“It was a matter of utmost importance,” she said.
“So is this,” he assured her, and though there was jest in his voice, his eyes burned with a coal of truth that made her breath hot in her lungs.
Margaret was getting closer, her step quickening when she saw Esme was speaking to Rylan.
“I will wait,” he assured her. “Every night, no matter how many it takes. I will be out here.”
“I can’t let you do that. Not when I have nothing to offer you.” The words broke in her mouth, their new-made edges so sharp she swore her tongue was cut.
“Give me a token to remember you by, then,” he bade her.
Esme swept her hands across the cloak—the pockets were empty. She had no handkerchief, she wore no brooch. Her panicked fumbling sent a wayward lock of hair tumbling out of the wimple that bound her neck.
She shoved it back and then froze as her hands brushed the ribbon that held the rest of her hair. The same ribbon she’d waved to acknowledge his victory.
How appropriate.
Hurrying, she yanked the ribbon free, and the length of blue satin, woven thickly with silver threads, slipped from beneath her wimple.
Rylan held out his hand and she pooled the ribbon into it. He curled his fingers over it as gently as if she’d laid a flower in his palm.
Esme turned, expecting to find Margaret at her back. Instead, she was startled to see her maid hurtling past them. Esme spun again, nearly as dizzy as the dancers. Her eyes found the head of untamed gray hair even before she spotted Margaret.
They didn’t need to go to Anne after all.
Anne had come to them.
With her walking stick aiding her limping gait, she stomped to Esme and Rylan, who stood transfixed. Margaret raced over, breathless and unkempt.
“You’ve gotten yourself out of the tower. Good girl.” Anne’s voice creaked and cracked and she spoke—as usual—without preamble or politesse.
“I thought you commanded me to come.”
Anne cackled, low and smoky. “I did. The dregs in my teacup said you were due for an escape. I suppose Margaret didn’t mention that to you.”
She had not. Esme looked at Margaret, who had set her jaw so tightly that her chin jutted. She turned her attention back to Anne.
“This is not exactly an escape, as you well know. A change of scenery, perhaps, but unless you come bearing a way to break this curse . . .” Esme let the unsaid end of her sentence hang in the air.
Anne sagged beneath the weight of it. “You know I cannot do that. When they killed my daughter, they took away the only person who could undo the hex.”
Rylan jumped, his hand going to the hilt of his sword. “Your daughter was the one who cursed the Lady Esme?”
“Aye. Her own baby sickened and died on the day of Esme’s christening. Blind with grief, my daughter twisted a bit of magic that should never have been done. She gave her baby Esme’s name and then stole Esme’s shadow. She thought if she bound her own baby’s spirit into Esme’s shadow, it would slip into Esme’s body from the shadow, becoming flesh again.”
Margaret stepped forward, her eyes narrowing at Rylan’s obvious interest. “It didn’t work that way. Which is why Esme must stay in the dark; why she is not . . . available, as other young ladies are.”
Rylan looked unswayed by her attempt to put him off. “So the spirit—Lady Esme’s shadow—why does it not have a body of its own? One that would allow it to walk in the light, as well as in the dark?”
“It could,” Esme answered. “If it made space for itself first. If I am killed, and my spirit left my body, there would be room for it to come in.”
“Which is why you must stay out of the light,” Anne said sadly. “If Lady Esme is exposed to direct light from the sun, the moon, or a fire, it kindles her shadow.”
Esme’s palms pricked with nerves when she looked over at Rylan, certain she would see him either backing away in horror or else politely fighting the urge to do so. As she read the expression on his face, she was stunned. Deep lines had appeared at the sides of his mouth as his full lips pursed in thought. His eyes were lit with a warrior’s delight in the challenge of strategy.
“If you would pardon my abruptness,” he began, and Margaret snorted.
Anne brought the end of her walking stick down on Margaret’s foot hard enough to make her yelp.
“My bones are telling me to be quiet and listen,” Anne growled at her. “They just told you the same thing.” She turned her withered face back to Rylan. “Go on.”