The Vampire King Forgets Me Every Dawn

Liora put her shoes on before the king forgot her. One buckle had bent in the night. She worked it straight with a hairpin while Sorin lay beside her, watching with the exhausted interest of a man who had survived poison and disliked being reminded that ordinary objects still required repair. “Stay until the bell,” he said. “That's what you asked yesterday.” “Was I persuasive?” “You were warm.” His smile faded. Beneath her loose collar, the mark he had put there burned against her skin: a crescent surrounded by seven thorns. He had asked before making it. She had agreed because, at four in the morning with his mouth at her wrist, choosing him had seemed like an act she might be allowed to keep. Outside, the first birds made thin noises in the ivy. “Liora.” She looked at him. His hair lay untidy across the pillow. There was dried blood beneath one nail, his own, from the wound that made the mark. No one in his court ever saw him looking unfinished. “I know,” she said. He had not spoken the promise yet. She could not bear to hear another. She took the letter from his bedside table. He had written it after the physician confirmed the danger had passed. It identified her as the archivist who found the wrong bottle, asked tomorrow's king to question her before judging, and said nothing of the way he had cried when the poison stopped his heart for six breaths. Captain Iven had witnessed it. Orla had added her thumbprint. Two witnesses were not enough. The third servant had refused to enter after the alarm, and Liora had let her go. “We should have waited,” she said, touching the wax. “For the letter?” Her fingers rose to the mark. He sat up. “Do you regret it?” “Ask me tonight, if we are both still here.” She put the letter beneath his hand and went toward the door. Three hundred and twelve nights of work in the royal archive had taught her how far she could walk before sunrise. Once, she had stopped to watch the light on his face. The guards had dragged her out by the hair. She no longer stopped. Her crooked buckle caught the carpet. The dawn bell began. Sorin said her name once, as though asking her to turn back. By the time she did, his expression had emptied of her. He still knew the bed, the kingdom, the men who had tried to kill him in nine wars. He knew how to hold a sword and how to smile at someone he intended to ruin. Only the hours arranged around Liora were gone. She watched him find her collar open, her hair unpinned, and his blood drying under her skin. “Who are you?” “Liora Vale. The letter is under your hand.” He read it. She knew from the slight tightening of his mouth that the ink had changed. “It says you gave me poison.” “Last night it said I found it.” His black-glass blade came off the bedside table. He crossed the room before she could open the latch. Liora pressed her back to the door. He did not touch her throat with the blade; he held it between them, close enough for her to see her own frightened mouth in its dark surface. “Step away from the door.” “Put that down.” “You are in the king's bedchamber.” “I know where I am.” That stopped him more effectively than pleading had ever done. Her voice had come out tired and furious. A woman who had just helped a king survive should not have to measure the distance between a weapon and her breakfast. “Call Iven,” she said. “Ask him where he stood when you wrote it. You don't have to believe me. You do have to stop threatening me while you decide.” The latch lifted behind her. Regent Sabine entered with two guards and a physician. Liora stumbled away from the opening. Sorin lowered the blade, as if the witnesses had changed its purpose. Sabine saw the mark first. Her eyes moved from Liora's collar to Sorin's bare wrist. “Your Majesty. You must have been very ill.” The physician approached the bed. Sabine approached Liora. “Cover yourself.” Liora pulled the torn edge of her dress together. It was a kindness to nobody that she obeyed so quickly. “Was she here with my permission?” Sorin asked. “The night watch admits her for archive work. It appears she has enlarged the privilege.” “I asked for him to be examined after the cupbearer collapsed,” Liora said. “The physician brought the antidote. I found the poisoned bottle in the cabinet.” “A bottle you had access to,” Sabine replied. Sorin looked between them. He had known Sabine for centuries. Liora had to compete with that history wearing yesterday's dress and one crooked shoe. The physician spoke from the bedside. “The king was poisoned. I treated him. Archivist Vale fetched me.” “Then she may also have regretted it,” Sabine said. Liora stared at her. “If I wanted him dead, I could have let him sleep.” Sabine touched the crescent shard in her circlet. “And if you wanted him grateful?” Sorin's face closed. Liora could see the sentence reaching him: gratitude, seduction, a royal mark obtained from a dying man. “Did I ask you to bear that?” he said. For one moment she wanted to hurt him. She could repeat his words from the night, tell the strangers how he had held her hand against his heart because he was afraid it would stop again. She had bought his trust at enormous private cost. Surely she could spend a little of it to save herself. “Yes,” she said. “But I won't describe your bed to your council.” He looked down at the blade in his hand. Iven arrived with Orla behind him. The kitchen steward wore an apron stained with berry juice. She had run, which frightened Liora more than the guards. “I saw him ask,” Orla said. “The door was open. She said yes. I can tell you the words if she wishes.” “I don't,” Liora said. Orla folded her arms. Sabine's gaze settled on the mark. “A queen's claim cannot remain private. The council will require a blood-witness before sunset. Until then, the archivist should be held.” “Where?” Sorin asked. “The west cells are secure.” Liora heard herself laugh. It was not an attractive sound. “Yesterday it was the linen room. At least you're admitting what the room is now.” Sorin put the blade on the table. “She will remain in the archive under Captain Rook's protection. No cells. No restraints.” Sabine inclined her head. She had obtained the hearing she wanted. Liora went to the door. Sorin stopped her with a question. “What did I promise you?” She looked at the floor between them. At night he remembered nothing by magic; he learned her again, and sometimes chose her again. That was the labor nobody saw. This morning he wanted her to begin it with an intimate quotation while everyone listened. “A morning I wouldn't be ashamed to survive,” she said. Then she let Iven open the door and walked through it without waiting to be dismissed.