His eyes went cold. “Wouldn’t it?”
“No. I know you want to stop the Aetheric practitioner, and I’ll do what I can to help. I won’t leave the palace until it’s done. But when he’s put away, that’s it. Our work for the Lys’Careths is done.”
Rebuild the fortifications, Fox. Build them tall and strong.
For a moment he just stared at me, anger shimmering in his eyes. The light caught those threads of gold, and they flashed like the eyes of the tiger on his banner.
“Just to be certain I understand,” he said in a cold andcondescending tone they probably taught princes from birth, “you believe I’m angry at the possibility you might disappear before the practitioner is caught.”
“Why else would you care?”
“Of all the stone-headed…” Eyes firing with anger, he moved a step closer, and my heart beat faster in response. Because he was a threat…or because he wasn’t? And which was more terrifying?
“Are you determined to believe that I’m your enemy?” he asked. “That my interest in you is some sort of ruse? That I intend to use you?” A step closer. “Perhaps as bait to lure out the Aetheric practitioner.”
“I hadn’t. But it’s not a bad idea.”
“It’s a terrible idea. And if I were willing to do that, if I were the type of man who’d do that, wouldn’t I have done it from the beginning?”
“I’m just saying, it wouldn’t be a bad idea if we had a better way to counter what he can do.”
“You are the most ridiculously stubborn woman I have ever met.”
“And you’re a prince.”
“Yes, I’m well aware of that, and what you think of it.”
“Your Highness.”
We both turned toward the servant who’d suddenly appeared from the hedge.
“Yes?” the prince asked, his voice tight.
“Apologies, but there are belligerent guests. Drunk and demanding more wine. Talia has requested your assistance.”
“The guards can’t handle them?”
The servant delicately cleared his throat. “They claim to be relatives of the Empress Eternal.”
He worked to gather his anger, push it down. “To Oblivion with all of them,” he muttered, then looked back at me. “We aren’t done.”
I wasn’t sure there was much to discuss. So I said, “Yes, Your Highness,” in the most aristocratic tone I could manage.
He was muttering as he followed the servant back to the boardwalk.
I walked back to the pavilion, where Wren waited alone.
“Savaadh went with him?”
“With apologies for not telling you goodbye in person.” She glanced at me. “Prince giving you more grief about not going with Savaadh?”
“Yeah. How’d you guess?”
“I could see it in his face.”
“What?”
“Jealousy.”
