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She’d spoken right over the Balenze proconsul—Tridian Vidal—and he turned a sharp, disgusted look on her. “You can see that he is in the middle of a conversation, can you not?”
“If you didn’t want to be interrupted, you should have closed the door.”
Alaric’s laughter boomed out, cutting off Vidal’s reply. “I always have time for one of Verol’s little projects. He does tend to bring me the most interesting things.”
Vidal’s neck reddened with irritation. “We are not finished discussing?—”
“Yes,” Alaric interrupted, “we are.” He waved the proconsuls off. When they were gone, he lifted an eyebrow at Clare. “Not going to close the door?”
The thought of being in a room with him with the door closed made her skin crawl. It was strange, the difference a three-foot by seven-foot slab of one-inch-thick wood could make. Locked or unlocked, it was hardly more than a symbol. But it was what the symbol implied. Left ajar, it implied that what occurred within the room was something anyone might witness without concern. Sealed tight, it conveyed that what occurred had reason to be hidden and wondered about and remarked upon.
The truth, of course, lay nowhere near that mark. The door’s physical position meant nothing to Alaric. He could do whatever he wished, whenever he wished, and if someone happened to see it and he didn’t want them to, well, he could always have Verol wipe it from their mind. So the open space at her back should offer her no comfort, and yet it did.
“I have no intention of taking up quite so much of your time that complete privacy should be necessary.”
He had one arm stretched long across the top of the couch, and he drummed his fingers idly against it. “Ah, but perhaps I intend to take up yours. Perhaps,” he said with a smile, “I don’t wish to be interrupted. Shut the door, Miss Brighton.”
She gritted her teeth and did. She also remained by it.
His gaze dropped to her bag, the one she still clutched in her hand as a statement to her intent to leave as soon as possible. Amusement lit his eyes. “You received my letter, I take it?”
As if the guard who’d delivered it to her would not have reported as much. As if that hadn’t been the entire reason he’d sent it with a royal guardsman rather than a courier.
“Yes. I came to inform you that I don’t work for free.” When she’d walked into this room, she’d had no notion of what she would say. But now that she’d made the declaration, it felt vitally important. Because what he’d demanded of her—playing on his whims, here at his beck and call—was all too close to what she’d run from.
His fingers stopped drumming. “At the risk of sounding self-important, you do if I say you do.” The words might be vaguely self-deprecating but his tone, laced with a dangerous edge, was anything but.
She needed to tread carefully. So she set her bag on the floor, a concession to his ability to keep her here however long he wanted. And she took a step—a single step—toward him. “You want their affection. Not simply the courtiers, but the entire kingdom. Do you think you will gain it if word spreads that you all but hold me captive here for your amusement?” Another step toward him. “The courtiers won’t care. But the rest? They’re starting to like me.”
He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his thighs. “Is that why you’ve been doing your little performances in the city? I told you I wanted them to love me, so you’ve decided to make them love you instead?” He chuckled. “An industrious little songbird, I see. But you know I could simply keep word of your…situation from ever spreading.”
“I’m sure you have better uses for Verol’s magic than containing word of me.” She paused a beat, then said what she’d puzzled out on her own, what she’d been wondering ever since he’d shown an interest in what she could do for him. “And he is only one man. Tired, at that, and getting older. I imagine his reach has all but exceeded your grasp these days.”
And he would not live forever, this man whose magic was a glue Clare suspected kept much of Alaric’s “peace” in place. And here she was, that man’s apprentice and potential successor.
His eyes narrowed, tension thickening the air. “I appreciate backbone.” He said it in a way that implied he might also appreciate crushing it. But then he leaned back once more, his hand returning to its previous idle drumming, and the tension broke. “Very well. Consider yourself hired in the traditional sense, then. I’ll have the payment details taken care of by the afternoon.”
The very dismissiveness of his answer kept her from feeling as if she had won anything. She felt, instead, like he was humoring her. She wanted to take a step back but forced herself not to. It was enough, she told herself, that he had leaned away from her. “What precisely am I hired for?”
“Not so very much. One song an evening, before the dinner is served. Put that useless little Songweaving talent to work for me. Since you’ve already proven it isn’t such a useless thing, after all. I want my court careless, Miss Brighton. I want to know what they think and say when they do not have the common sense to hold their tongues. Do you think you can manage that?” He didn’t wait for a reply. “But leave Numair from your grip. He’s already been careless enough of late, don’t you think?”
It wasn’t quite a threat. She didn’t know what it was, and he wasn’t giving her any signs by which to determine it. He was gazing past her, over her shoulder, as if she simply wasn’t worth looking at directly.
“He seems always careless,” she answered lightly. “And you? Do you wish to be careless?”
That brought his full attention back to her. “Power only affects me when I wish it to. And having allowed one song under your influence, I find the experience will last me quite some time.”
“Then I’ll see you tonight.” She turned for the door?—
“One more thing.”
—and froze.
“I expect you to be more present while you are here. Spend time in the public areas. Get to know my people. And if you hear anything interesting, bring it to me.”
She swallowed. “I don’t presume to know what you would find interesting, Your Majesty.”
He made a tsking sound. “Oh, I think you’ll recognize it when you hear it. Things like what Proconsul Miriam spoke so openly to you about. In this endeavor, consider yourself to have free rein to use that voice of yours as you see fit.”
