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“Then stop standing in my way.”

“You are not going back in there.”

“I wasn’t planning to,” I lied, my chin lifting defensively.

It was a stupid lie, and we both knew it. I was absolutely planning on sneaking back the second Manem turned his back. I would rather face ten more rogues with axes than sit in silence with my father. The King wasn’t protective in the way mortal fathers were; he was calculated, determined, and ice-cold.

“That tone is completely unconvincing,” Caspian said.

“I was defending myself.”

“And now you are being removed from the situation entirely.”

Before I could decide whether to argue further or try to duck beneath his arm, he moved.

In a flash of quiet, feral speed, Caspian lunged forward. His massive hand hooked around my waist, his shoulder buried into my stomach, and he lifted me effortlessly over his broad shoulder.

For a heartbeat, I went completely still from pure disbelief. Then my ribs hit the hard muscle of his back, knocking the remaining air from my lungs.

“Put me down right now!” I yelled, my fists slamming into his shoulder blades with enough force to bruise my knuckles, but he didn’t even flinch. “Who the hell do you think you are? I am royalty!”

Caspian didn’t slow his stride. His grip around my waist tightened until the leather of his glove bit into my ribs, hard enough to steal my breath.

Not that I wouldn’t have deeply enjoyed that exact dynamic in a completely different, entirely private context...

No. Stop. I forced the thought down, burning it away. I needed to stop thinking about completely inappropriate matters when my family was fighting off a full-scale assassination plot.

“No,” Caspian replied simply. His stride remained even and unbothered as he marched down the black marble corridor, carrying me away from the noise of the steel.

“I told you, I can walk!”

“I know.”

“Then—!”

“You think the lords in that throne room care about your title, Princess?” His voice rumbled against my back, low, cold, and entirely stripped of humor. “They don’t see a royal. They see a half-mortal mistake waiting to be put in the dirt. And they look at me and see a forsworn son holding steel.”

He turned a sharp corner, his weight crowding the silence between us.

“We are both dogs on a leash in this keep,” Caspian growled, his thumb pressing hard into my hip. “The difference is I know when to obey until the throat is exposed. So shut your mouth and let me move, or I will show you what real control looks like.”

Forsworn son—what did he mean? Aerynn never said Caspian was a traitor, and I definitely don’t remember reading anything about that in my reports before rotations home.

His gravelly voice didn’t strain, and he certainly didn’t care about my royal anger. That utter indifference made an explosive wave of irritation spike hot in my chest. I stopped fighting his grip after that—not because I agreed with it, but because I was carefully choosing my next move.

Caspian finally reached the threshold of the King’s vault. The massive iron-reinforced doors were slightly ajar, throwing a sliver of warm, ambient candlelight across the floor. He handled me with surprising care as he set me down, his hands lingering on my waist just long enough to ensure my feet were steady on the stone.

The moment my sneakers hit the ground, I spun on my heel, stepping directly into his personal space.

“I told you I could walk, Captain.”

“And I didn’t disagree with you,” he said smoothly. He leaned his shoulder against the heavy iron doorframe, his blue eyes tracking the flush rising on my neck, looking entirely self-satisfied.

“That doesn’t mean you needed to carry me like some kind of—!”

“Well,” a smooth, melodic voice interrupted near my ear, two familiar arms wrapping securely around my torso from behind. “You certainly know how to make a catastrophic entrance, Taur.”

An instant, hard-wired instinct flared. My hand automatically dropped toward the dagger hidden at my ribs before the voice registered.