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She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Angry your little plan didn’t work, Princeling?”
Though the sentiment was not unexpected, her words still stung, with the knowledge that nothing he could say, nothing he could do, would ever be a match for the distrust his name provoked in her. Not just distrust…hate.Hate placed in her by his father and then compounded by his brothers, and by his cursed sister, ensuring that the world believed that all who possessed the Veliant name were monsters.
He wanted to scream. Wanted to pound his fists against the floor of the carriage, wanted to put a knife in his own heart, because everyone he cared about met this end. His affection was murder, his name poison, and he couldn’t escape it. “Is there anything I can do that will make you believe that I want you both alive and free? Anything that will make you believe I don’t conspire against you or your people?”
Valcotta opened her mouth, then closed it again, staring at him in silence for so long he thought she refused to give him any answer at all. Then she whispered, “Give me your knife.”
His heart skipped, hope rising in his chest only for it to be dashed as she said, “Let me go out there and die fighting. Die on my feet. And then make sure my people know it, so they’ll not suffer my shame. You do that, and I’ll die knowing you are a different man than your father.”
“No.” The word jerked from his lips, because gaining her trust only for her to lose her life was nothing he’d ever agree to. He refused to consider it. Refused to sit back and watch his soldiers slaughter her. “You get better and I’ll give you a knife to fight your way out.”
“I’m not going to get better.” A tear trickled down her cheek. “And if you wish to prove to me that all that passed between us wasreal, you’ll allow me to die with honor, not wasting away like this.”
Every part of him wanted to argue. Wanted to tell her that this was a mistake, that she’d recover, that he’d get her free.
Except that was a lie.
She was dying, and would denying her the chance to die on her feet be a mercy to her? Or to him?
Keris slowly pulled a knife from his boot, then pressed it into her palm even as indecision warred in his chest.
Valcotta stared at the knife for a long moment, then lifted her face to meet his gaze, her pupils so dilated that no color remained. “Thank you.”
“It was real.” His chest tightened painfully, making it hard to breathe. “I swear it, Valcotta. Everything I said. Everything I did. Everything I felt.”
“I believe you. But that doesn’t change who you are.”
Nothing would.
Sliding an arm underneath her, he lifted Valcotta upright so that she was sitting, then unfastened the knots binding her wrists, dropping the ropes to the floor.
“Tell them I untied myself while you were sleeping,” she said. “And attacked you.”
“You’ll be dead, so what does it matter what I say?” He couldn’t keep the bitterness from his voice, the darkness rising in his heart whispering that the world might be better if he joined her in the grave.
“It matters to me.” Clenching her teeth, she dragged herself to her feet, moving behind him, but he was painfully aware that if she hadn’t been holding on to his shoulders, she’d have fallen.
“Call the alarm. Tell them to stop the carriage.”
They’d kill her. It would be over in moments.
And he couldn’t do it. Couldn’t stand back and let her die. Couldn’t lose her like that.
“Do it!”
He’d get them to stop the carriage. And thenhe’dfight to get her away. He’d die trying to give her a chance, even if it was the chance to die free. “Guards!” he shouted. “Stop the carriage!”
The carriage lurched, nearly sending them both sprawling. He caught her, accidentally pulling the bandage loose from her arm, revealing the injury beneath. Rather than having healed into a pink line, the skin around the lesion was the grey of a long-dead corpse, and horror filled him as understanding dawned.
The carriage ground to a halt, and he jerked the knife out of her grip, shoving it in his belt just before the guards opened the door to find Valcotta in his arms. “Get me somewhere with a healer,” he snarled at them. “She’s been poisoned.”
And he knew exactly by whom.
36
ZARRAH
The world was a blur as she faded in and out of consciousness, first too hot and then too cold. Darkness fell, and Zarrah was vaguely aware of Keris lifting her. Carrying her out of the carriage and into a building, his voice loud as he berated the soldiers. Told them he didn’t want them anywhere near her because they’d damaged his prisoner enough.
