Page 98 of Crown of the Dunes

For weeks after arriving in Kelvadan, I had avoided looking at myself in the small mirror on the wall of the room assigned to me. Even when I had stopped wearing the mask so others might see my face, a strange apprehension had made my breath come quicker at the thought of facing myself in such a way.

Finally, I had caught a glimpse of myself in Keera’s mirror over her shoulder as I braided her hair, and some of the uneasiness at my own reflection started to fade. Now, I was struck with a strange notion as I inspected my face. The slight arch to my nose and the set of my cheekbones looked like a face I had almost forgotten but still saw in my dreams—and nightmares.

They belonged to my mother.

My knuckles whitened in their grip on the wish stand as I leaned so close to the glass that the tip of my nose nearly touched its smooth surface. The mirror fogged with the heat of my breath.

Then, my reflection smiled.

I lurched, my thighs banging into the washstand before me. It rammed into the wall and the mirror crashed to the floor, shattering on the stone.

My ragged breaths cut through the silence as I stared down at it. Slowly, I bent and picked up one of the dagger-like shards. Carefully, not to cut my fingers on its jagged edges, I held it before my face. With my other hand, I gently prodded at my cheek, trying to figure out how my reflection had made an expression I hadn’t felt myself make.

Something had been odd in my appearance when I smiled too, but as I tried to remember, it slipped through my fingers like grains of sand through an hourglass. Maybe it had just been the fog of my breath distorting my appearance or a trick of the light.

Or maybe my madness was growing.

I tossed the shard of mirror on the ground with the rest, wincing at the clatter. I would have to clean it up later, but for now, I craved Keera’s company. She was likely in her room, waiting for me to appear on the balcony.

I shouldered open the door to my room and stalked down the hallway. My mind still on the odd flicker of my reflection, I didn’t see the man turn the corner until it was too late. My shoulder slammed into his, and I stepped back in surprise. Encountering anybody in this section of the palace had been rare, as Aderyn and the riders seemed to have intentionally placed me out of the way.

“Sorry,” I grumbled, already sliding past him, when he cocked his head at me interestedly.

“Prince Erix,” he greeted.

I stared at his scarred face and copper hair—not a common color here in the Ballan Desert.

“General Warrick.” I inclined my head at him. While I hadn’t spoken to the man, Keera had griped about the ambassador’s presence on several occasions. Where Prince Calix didn’t seem to raise her hackles, General Warrick from Doran set her teeth on edge—I could tell from the way her fingers plucked at her clothes when she mentioned him, and how she described him as always seeming to be lurking around corners, as if he wanted to ambush her.

I seemed to be the one ambushed today.

“It’s just Erix,” I corrected him.

He grunted, and although his tone was neutral, I got the feeling he was judging my response. Leaning back on his heels, he rested his left hand on his hip and his right on the handle of the knife he wore on his waist.

“I must admit, I’m disappointed you gave up your title so easily,” he observed.

My gaze snapped up to meet his, but his expression gave away nothing.

“Not everybody needs to throw their title about, General,” I countered through gritted teeth. “Here in the Ballan Desert, we value strength above heritage.”

“But I hear you have both.” General Warrick shrugged, seemingly unfazed by my hostility. “As a man of war, I respect that strength. With things going poorly for Kelvadan, I would have thought you would want to remind people they have another option for strong leadership. But there is clearly much about your ways I don’t understand.”

Before I could think of a response beyond the beginnings of a snarl in my chest, he turned and walked away. Once again, my gaze caught on the way he rested his hand on his knife, but at this angle, the dim light of the corridor caught on the blade at his hip.

It was a serrated blade, large and curved in a way that would rip flesh open.

I stiffened as he turned the corner and was lost to my sight. A vision of ripped flesh—a wound of the type that would be inflicted by such a weapon—flickered in my mind. Archon Dravis’s slit throat.

Bile rose in my throat. With the dark clouds of famine looming on the horizon, and the Heart of the Desert trapped at the top of the palace never far from my mind, I had not had many thoughts to spare for Dravis’s murder.

Carrying a similar weapon was far from evidence, but combined with Warrick’s words about my claim to the throne, it was enough to send a shiver up my spine. I needed to tell Aderyn of my suspicions.

I strode purposefully down the hallway and out of the palace. Once in the courtyard, I hesitated. At this hour, Aderyn was likely no longer in the room in the barracks that served as her office but had headed to her home in the city for the day. Based on what Keera had told me about her time staying with Aderyn, it seemed she now lived in the home that had belonged to her parents.

After a moment’s hesitation, I turned toward the arch leading out of the palace courtyard. Half expecting the riders standing guard there to try and stop me, I lifted my chin, but they didn’t say a word as I stepped out onto the city streets.

The walk to the modest dwelling I remembered as belonging to Aderyn’s parents was short and went even quicker given the swirling of thoughts and suspicions in my brain. Keera had said she encountered Warrick while dancing at the coronation. Would he have had time both to taunt her and to murder Dravis? Had he manipulated Archon Dravis into making his protest at the coronation, only to eliminate him afterwards so he could not be exposed?