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He cares about me.

“So,” I say, failing to find the right words. “Where are we going?”

He favors me with a rare smile. “It’s a surprise.” Roark extends his hand toward me and waits.

I look at his big, calloused hand and can’t help feeling like taking it will seal some kind of pact, something that neither of us will be able to turn back from or stop once it begins. As much as the thought scares me, my heart also pounds in excitement at the idea of anything involving Roark and myself. The dark prince and I together… A tingle runs down from my chest and to my belly where it blossoms into warmth that floods through me.

I want this. I need it.

I take his hand and he gently pulls me toward a crowded street of the city.

The section of the city just outside the palace seems affluent. We pass through what appears to be a residential section full of huge, towering homes that are large enough to be hotels, but many have a single mailbox outside their ornamental gates. Though the architecture varies wildly, there’s a unifying medieval theme that still gives the feeling that I’ve stepped into some odd portal to the past, and were it not for touches of the modern world here and there--namely the guns worn at rich men’s hips--I could almost believe I really had traveled hundreds of years backwards.

Without car engines running and honking, there’s a completely different kind of noise to the city. I hear only the scuff of feet on pavement, conversations we walk past, laughter from open windows, and even the faint sounds of music from the occasional bar we pass.

I squint up at a particularly large building with rustic stonework adorning the outside. It must be ten stories high, maybe more. “Who owns these places?” I ask.

“The top tier nobles,” says Roark. “We call them quarters, because their women are entitled to dye a quarter of their hair blonde. Many of them are cousins to cousins of mine. Some are from other cities within the Shrouded Kingdom like Lancaster or Deerwood. But Quarters are the only nobles with any real power in royal affairs. A few hundred years ago they won the right to call special councils to petition royal decisions. It’s ultimately just an illusion of power, because the monarch still has final say, but it makes them feel important.”

“It’s still strange to think you’re pretty much in charge of all this,” I say. “All these people and all this wealth, they’re all your subordinates, really”

Roark makes a thoughtful face. “In a sense, maybe. Power isn’t as absolute as it seems. Our history is full of kings, princes, queens, and princesses who have made the mistake of believing their power to be without limit. The nobility and the common people have the only power that matters in the end. They have numbers, and no formal documents or big chairs will ever change that. Betray the people, and they betray you.”

“That seems cynical,” I say.

“When my father was alive, he made me work with tutors every day until I was twenty. I spent over an hour every day of that time studying history. I learned history is full of men and women who think they are above the patterns of the past.”

“If you don’t mind me asking,” I say a little carefully. “I heard you haven’t shown any interest in becoming king, but it sounds like you took your studies very seriously and you know a lot about this.”

“Want to know the truth?” he asks, blue eyes sparkling down at me as we pass out of the residential area and into branching streets lined with shops. “I’ve never desired the throne, but felt one day I would take it. Part of that duty is marrying, though. I can’t become king without a queen, and my mother has the ‘honor’ of arranging potential marriages for me. It’s no secret that she wants my brother to rule, so she has been careful to arrange… disagreeable matches with me.”

“But if she had arranged the right match, you would have accepted?” I ask. I feel hopeful that he won’t answer wrong, even though I don’t think I know what the wrong answer would be.

He laughs a little, coming to a stop outside a huge gothic style building that looks to be eight or ten stories high. “Probably not, no. Most arranged marriages involve one willing party, and call me a savage, but I want my woman to want it. All of it,” he adds with a mischievous glint in his eyes.

I blush, looking away. “I see. And you can tell when a woman wants… it?” I ask.

“Of course.” His thumb brushes my burning cheeks as he tilts my head up gently. “Flushed cheeks are usually the first sign. Dilated pupils are also a dead giveaway,” he says as a smirk creeps across his face. “Hardened nipples tend to send a pretty clear message as well.” He moves close, making a shield with his body between myself and the people traveling down the street, and then he brings a hand up to cup my breast.

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