Page 5 of Tides of Shadows

We claimed a corner table. Roderick ordered ale for the group, and I settled in comfortably. I wore fitted trousers and my favorite leather coat, deep navy like the sea, high-collared and tailored to accentuate my figure. Palladium buttons shaped like anchors gleamed with every shift. I knew I looked too fine for the room. I also knew someone would notice sooner or later.

For a little while, I could pretend it wasn’t my problem. The four of us played cards. Kael lost every hand, and I laughed until tears came down my face. Brenn and Roderick rolled their eyes. I forgot the storm clouds gathering over my head.

“Hey, doll,” a slurred voice called toward me. A sailor, face flushed from drink, eyes unfocused. “Your laugh is so pretty, why not smile for us? We play cards too, lass. Though with you, the stakes would be your clothes.”

“Not interested,” I said coolly, not glancing up from my hand.

“What’s this! Some noble bitch with her lazy dogs, thinks she’s better than us? A few thrusts between those legs and you’d drop the attitude.”

In that instant, Roderick and the brothers rested hands on the hilts of Veymaris’ daggers. I turned slowly, meeting the sailor’s gaze, ready for what was to come.

A tall figure seized the drunk by the shoulder and yanked him back. The stranger had dark hair, a wide shadowed jaw and a black leather tunic stretched over a muscled frame. An eerie calm settled on his face as he twisted the man’s arm and murmured into his ear.

“First, the Lady clearly doesn’t want your drunken company. Second, can’t you see they’re not like you, you filthy rat? They’re here for the Gathering. If you don’t want half the White Guard in here, I suggest you plant your ass on a stool. And third…” His voice dropped to a growl. “…if you so much as glance at the girl again, I’ll pin your face to the nearest candlestick.”

Silence blanketed the tavern, murmurs rippled outward. The drunk sailor looked as if he might faint. He swayed, muttered, and stumbled back to his bench, almost toppling on the way. Those nearby shot furtive glances at the stranger. Though the situation was under my control, it seemed only courteous to express my thanks.

I rose to approach him. He stood a head taller than me, though I matched most men in height. Fine lines framed his green eyes, he was perhaps a few years older.

“Thank you for the help,” I said, meeting his stare, “but I believe we could have managed one drunk sailor.”

“Him, yes. But the tavern’s full of drunks, and you don’t need a brawl. You shouldn’t be here at all. This isn’t a place for an island heiress.”

The fact that he recognized me startled me. Then again, with my clothes, my bearing, and the timing of the Gathering, I wasn’t exactly a puzzle to solve. Before I could retort, he leaned closer, his breath hot against my ear, his words pitched low enough for me alone.

“Be careful. Little siren of Veymaris.” His gaze swept over me, slow and deliberate, and then he turned and walked out of the tavern.

A shiver chased down my spine, my skin flushing red where his voice had touched it. By the time I found the words to answer, he was already gone.

Roderick gave me a look, and we both agreed. It was time to slip out quietly and avoid any more trouble.

Chapter

3

The stone walls of the palace gleamed beneath the morning sun, as if they wished to remind all who truly ruled this world. White City, the biggest metropolis on the continent, had its own pulse. And now that heart beat faster and stronger, for the Gathering of the Ten Families was about to begin.

I passed beneath the wrought iron gate, my boots striking against the worn stones of the courtyard. I stopped for a breath. This place had always carried a chill, even when the city sweltered in heat.

The last time I had stood here, I was six. I remembered clutching my father’s hand, lost among the sea of silk gowns, tunics, and polished armor. The palace had seemed endless, a labyrinth from a fairy tale. The circle of the main building, perfect and majestic, had made my own heart race. Each of the Ten Families possessed its own quarter within those walls, a slice of the circle, private chambers they could claim whenever they came to the capital.

Now I returned not as a child, but as the representative of Family Veymaris. And I felt the unwanted weight of that name heavy upon my shoulders.

I crossed a long corridor and emerged onto the Inner Court, a vast square at the center of the palace’s ring. Here, everything happened: councils, alliances, public quarrels, and the quieter bargains struck in the shadow of pillars. Today it was near empty, save for servants hurrying with chairs and decorations, preparing for the arrival of the Families. But even in its silence the square whispered, as if the stones themselves remembered every betrayal, every marriage forged, every drop of blood spilled.

At least the fountain still flowed at its center, a tribute to the element of water.

I paused beneath the open sky, tilting my head upward at the marble towers that ringed the square like sentinels. A voice, cold as tempered steel, sliced through the air.

“And so, the rumors prove true. The Veymaris still draw a breath.”

I turned and saw her. Cassandra Cavareth. Her gown shimmered in hues of gray and gold, rich enough to blind, and a heavy diamond collar lay upon her neck like a crown. Each stone glimmered with deliberate power, marking not only wealth but also the ancestral heritage of the element of air. She was beautiful in a cold, inhuman way, time had hardly touched her. Not a woman, but a statue carved from perfection. Her long blond, almost white, hair fell like silk down to her waist.

She stood before me, her gaze sweeping from my boots to my hair, studying me as one might examine an unwanted creature that had strayed into royal grounds.

“Lady Cassandra.” I inclined my head slightly, just enough to acknowledge her rank. Every Family had its pride. None were born to kneel.

“Is your Family truly so desperate that it must send a woman?” Her lips curved faintly. “How old are you, child? Nineteen? Twenty?”