It wasn't really all that hard. Dain had left the adjoining door locked since I'd returned the key, but lockpicking is the sort of skill set anyone into climbing buildings tends to pick up, along with how to conceal a pair of bolt cutters and the ability to apologize convincingly to cops. I didn't have my lockpicks, of course, but I had Kamharida, and she knew a lot of the other human servants. Like any people who needed to do their jobs around the vagaries of scary bosses who might or might not remember to give them the right keys, they had illicit copies of master keys and a couple people who knew how to tickle locks open. Nobody had the keys to Dain's rooms (or, at least, nobody would admit to it), but Kamharida did get me lockpicks, and that was plenty.

I timed it for the afternoon he was due back from his three-day exile. Knowing the Queen, she would have sent him on a physically grueling route, and knowing Dain, he would have accepted the challenge with grim determination, as if he could ever prove himself to his mother. He'd be tired, glad to be home, and not paying close enough attention to realize that my scent was too strong to be coming from the adjoining rooms.

I hoped.

Plopping myself on his bed seemed like an extremely bad idea, however tempting it was. The position was great for seeing him come in through the door, but the connotations were rather more dangerous than I wanted. Dain didn't need his heart thrown in his face again. Conversely, the entry room made it way too easy for him to retreat, barring his access into his suite with my untenable presence.

I decided at last that he'd probably want to dump himself straight into a hot bath after being on patrol for three days. That bathroom was plenty big enough to hang out in, and I thought Dain might be willing to bathe in front of me, despite his modesty while in the palace. He'd climbed into bed with me wearing only a jockstrap; hopefully he had enough of that fae lack of nudity taboo to be uncomfortable with it only because of how people looked at him.

Halfway through a dog-eared copy of a pulpy sci-fi novel, I heard Dain come in. Even now, he didn't have a servant who was willing to actually be in the room while he was present, so I got the interesting auditory experience of hearing him mutter curses under his breath and drop things that clanged onto the ground. Armor, I guessed. The Queen must have sent him along the border with the Court of Mercy, to ensure things were remaining peaceful.

As I'd expected, he then walked to the bathroom, flung the door open, and strode directly in.

Stark naked.