Tobias followed me out of his room and closed the door behind us. We walked to my chamber and entered through the secret entrance, which was hidden behind a bookshelf in the back of the library. I had begun a collection of historical Latin phrases in the last year, and I knew Homo Fuge would have been added. I pulled the book off its shelf, leather bound with thick, paper pages, and flipped until I found it.
“’Homo Fuge,’ found in English playwright Christopher Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus, which portrays the downfall of a professor who sells his soul to the Devil in exchange for infinite knowledge and power for a finite amount of time. The phrase appears in the scene when Faustus is in the act of signing a contract which would give his soul to the Devil.” I handed the book to Tobias so he could read it for himself.
“You’re kidding, right?” Tobias said as he scanned my entry. He passed the book back to me, and I placed it on the shelf.
“We should talk to my father about this. Who knows, maybe this has something to do with Him.” I looked at the clock, only to remember that it had been broken for six weeks. “How long until sunrise?”
“3 hours.”
“You should get some sleep. We’ll deal with this when my father is awake.”
“I can’t leave you, not after this.” Tobias stepped forward and gripped my shoulders, as Anan used to when he was very earnest about something. “You could be in danger, Kynder.”
“I will be fine until morning.” I stepped out of his hold.
“I can’t risk you getting hurt. I’ll sleep at the foot of your bed.” Decidedly, he left my room through the library entrance, I assumed to get a bed roll and pillow.
Quickly, I removed my dress and pulled on black sweatpants and a flannel shirt. I removed the pins from my hair- they amounted only to twenty instead of my estimated thousand- and splashed water on my face.
Tobias frowned when he came back through the secret entrance. “Since when has your father posted guards at your door?”
“Since he found out you spent the night that one time.”
His frown deepened, slowly turning into a smirk. He shook his head and spread his bed roll at the foot of my bed. “Now what would your father say? A boy in your room past curfew.”
This time I shook my head as I pulled back the covers. I wasn’t tired, so I sat facing the windows, which looked East, with my legs dangling off the edge of the mattress. The wind howled louder than usual, and hail began to pelt against my window. Tobias shut the curtains against the wintery darkness, then lit the lamp beside my bed.
“Leave one of them open, otherwise we’ll sleep through the sunrise,” I said.
“Planned on sleeping, did you?” He ran his hands up my thighs.
His lips were inches from mine. I exhaled slowly and leaned my head back. As he moved forward, I planted a kiss on his cheek and pushed him back. “Actually, I was.”
“You little tease,” Tobias tried to fight a smile and flipped my nose with his forefinger.
I smiled, laid down, and pulled the comforter to my chin. “We should try to sleep, though.”
Tobias snuck between the sheets and pulled my back to his chest, his arm encircling my waist. I tensed for a moment. “Is this okay?” he whispered.
I nodded and put my now-tattooed hand on his. My head fell forward in sleep and I awoke to the sunrise peeking through the curtains. Tobias was already gone, and I prepared with unusual care. The words on my thumb were raised and sore.
An hour later, I sat with my father and Tobias at a small, round table, with empty plates and my book of Latin phrases open before us.
“I still don’t know what to make of it. I know as much about Him as you do, Kynder. Anan and Tobias were our true experts. And this writing on your hand. It must be magic. Clearly it’s a warning of some kind. But we haven’t seen anything like it since, well, since the castle was built and we stopped living on the outside. The legend of magic died with that way of living. Some still believe, mainly those who follow Him.” My father looked with meaning at Tobias. He continued, “I understand you were there when the writing appeared.”
“Yes, I was."
“In my daughter’s chamber?”
I could see where my father was going with the conversation and rushed to intervene. “Father, he was merely accompanying me to retrieve this book.” I nodded towards the open pages in front of him. “Nothing more.”
My father sat back in his chair, his eyes darting between Tobias and me suspiciously. “If you say so.” He pushed away from the table and called for servants to take the plates. “I will speak with some of my advisors about this matter. Guards will be placed at all entrances to your chamber. If you are in danger, I want to know why and how we can eliminate the threat. Tobias, against my better judgment you are released from your usual duties to act as Kynder’s bodyguard. Keep her safe.”
“Yes, sir.”
As we left, my father caught me by the wrist and pulled me into a rare hug. “I don’t ever want to lose you. Distant as I am sometimes, I do love you.”
I hugged him back awkwardly. My father had never made such a speech, and I was unsure of how to respond. So I didn’t. I simply curtsied and left the room with Tobias. We spent the day in leisure, as this was a sort of day off for him. That night, we went to see if my father’s advisors had been able to help any. We walked past the guards and entered his chamber, which appeared empty. I walked forward and turned around to face Tobias, who still stood in the entrance. My father, hidden from Tobias’ view by the open door, slouched against the wall at an angle that looked nowhere near comfortable. Then I realized he wasn’t slouched against the wall. He was pinned there, a dagger through his shoulder and a sword through his stomach.
Tobias saw my face change and looked behind the door. Immediately he shut the door and began to help my father, removing him from the wall first and then motioning for me to assist him. We supported my father on our shoulders and walked him to the bed. Once he was horizontal, I removed the keys on a chain that hung from his neck. I closed and locked the door from the inside, then returned to the bed where Tobias was listening intently to my father’s gurgling speech. I was only able to hear his last breath. Tobias slowly closed my father’s vacant eyes with a trembling hand.
