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“Well, I don’t want them in my castle. I don’t care if their magic is good or bad.” He pointed threateningly at Urban. “Find him. Find him, and get rid of him.”
Urban’s eyes flared with shock. “Me?”
“Yes, you! You’re the head of my army, aren’t you? My leader in protecting the kingdom and providing its security? Well, secure my castle.”
“But I’m merely a mortal human. Only magic can even begin to detect other magic.”
“I trust you to ferret this scum out the mortal, human way, because I forbid any more magic inside my walls. Is that clear?”
“Not at all,” Urban started incredulously, but Caulder was done talking to him as he stormed from the room, his crew of guards following him.
Urban jerked up his hands in frustration. “Un-fucking-believable.”
Chapter 27
Vienne
“You know,” Yasmin said conversationally as her husband departed the Blue Chambers. She turned to smile at Nicolette. “From what you and Prince Urban said, this woman sounds like she might actually be the real deal. Maybe I should get a tattoo from her too, to prove to my husband they’re not so evil after all and that he is my one true love. Where did you say she was staying again, darling?”
“Oh! She’s at the Cotton Maker’s Inn,” Nicolette answered. “The top suite. But she plans to leave tomorrow, so you’d have to visit her today.”
“Yasmin,” I started cautiously. “I’m not sure Caulder would appreciate you getting a mark after we just saw the way he reacted to Nicolette’s.”
But my sister merely laughed off my concerns and waved a hand. “Oh pish. He can never stay mad at me. Why…” Smile brightening, she added, “We should go together and each get a love mark. Don’t you think, Vienne?” Her sharp smile slid toward Urban. “Maybe your one true love isn’t even the prince, here.”
Urban merely narrowed his eyes. “I doubt I would’ve been able to bring her back from the dead if I wasn’t.”
Or share dreams with each other, I silently added.
Yasmin sniffed, her smile deflating. “Maybe she wasn’t dead when you decided to put your High Cliff mouth all over hers. Maybe she was merely passed out from the pain. She had just given birth and lost all that blood.”
“What the hell does it matter to you?” Urban snarled, glaring. “The only person it affects is me, and my life is none of your fucking business, so who the fuck cares about any of it?”
“Oh, I think it might affect Vienne, who happens to be my sister, which I have a vested interest in.”
Urban glanced toward me, unable to argue, since his mark did affect me quite a lot… In our dreams.
“Please,” Nicolette started, growing visibly shaken. “Don’t fight. This is all my fault. If I hadn’t gone to that woman and brought the dark magic into the castle, none of this would be happening. Now we’re all in danger.”
“Oh, sweetheart, no,” I told her kindly. “The danger was already here. Your visit to the priestess only made us aware of it.”
“Well, I don’t want to be aware of it,” she complained passionately. “I want to go back to when everyone was safe and free from any kind of darkness.”
And she ran from the room in tears.
I sighed, not sure how to make her understand she’d done nothing wrong.
“You should go after her and talk to her,” Yasmin suggested.
I nodded and hurried from the room after the young princess. But I only got halfway down the hall before I slowed to a stop.
Wait a tick. Yasmin had never worried about soothing Nicolette’s feelings before. Instantly suspicious, I backtracked to the opening of the doorway and peeked inside to find that only Urban and Yasmin remained, with no servants lingering about.
And she was back to staring at his codpiece. “Do you really think you can find this dark…whatever that’s wandering around the castle?”
With a tired sigh, Urban ran his hand through his hair. “Hell, I don’t know. But I’m certainly going to try. I don’t want dark magic around my sister or…other people in the castle any more than the king does.”
Yasmin laughed lightly. “Other people, hmm? You mean, my sister? You can say her name, you know. Vee...yen. You don’t want dark magic around Vienne.” Wandering closer to him, she sent him an encouraging smile. “Go ahead, Prince. Say it. Say Vienne.”
