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“I’m bearing up under the burden of secrecy so far.”
“I know. I thought we were done with secrets. But I can see the surest way to undermine our treaty is to reveal to the Tenebrans they are facing an enemy too powerful for them to fight.”
“Heistoo powerful.” Cassia finally admitted it. “They won’t win against him.”
“Not alone.”
The way he said it struck Cassia.
“Lio?” she asked.
“My actions during the attack came across well, I suppose,” he said. “The Acting Council invited me to return to Tenebra with them in a long-term capacity as Orthros’s diplomatic representative during the transfer of power.”
Cassia sat up again, although her head spun. “Lio…that’s…incredible. Just think of the night you left Tenebra. We could never have imagined something like this could be possible. This is what you’ve dreamed of and worked for your whole career. Tenebra doesn’t just want a Summit. They don’t want to lock Orthros’s diplomats in a fortress. They want a Hesperine ambassador to join them.”
“You know they would be thrilled for their Tenebran thrush to change her mind and return with them to work toward her sister’s vision of Tenebra.”
The future Cassia had felt certain of turned on its head. She did not recognize it, and she did not know what to make of it.
“Well,” Cassia began, “it’s clear what we must do.”
“Cassia, aren’t you tired of doing what we must?”
“Of course. But this is better. We could do what we must together. I think I could bear that, as long as I’m not apart from you.”
“We need to talk about whether this is what we want.”
Tenebra. Again. Another tent in another camp full of soldiers. Another rebellion.
No, it would be different this time. She could see her sister vindicated. This would not bring fear and grief, but victory and peace.
She would be with Lio. In Tenebra. But with Lio.
“We would have to keep us a secret,” Cassia realized. “Still.”
“My display after the attack made it obvious to the embassy what I feel for you.”
A memory flashed in Cassia’s mind, and she touched a hand to Lio’s lips. “You put your mouth to my wrist to heal me. Did they see?”
Lio looked away. “Benedict watched your blood drip down my chin.”
Cassia stroked Lio’s beard. “Then we don’t have to lie anymore.”
“It’s not that simple. Callen and Perita tell me the embassy is busy gossiping about my unrequited love for you. Apparently, I’m eligible to share in their admiration of you, but not to act on it. Since I saved your life, most of the Tenebrans are tolerant enough, as long as my devotion to you does not stray beyond the boundaries of a minstrel ballad of courtly love.”
“Oh.” Cassia’s heart sank. “Then they don’t know what I feel for you.”
“We have succeeded in preventing accusations of Hesperite heresy against you from undermining the treaty. We ought to consider what political impact it would have if they knew you were not only planning to stay in Orthros, but planning to stay with the ambassador.”
It was all right for Lio to love her, Hesperine though he was. It would never be all right for a whore’s bastard to love anyone, especially a heretic. A whore’s bastard who violated her betrothal promise to Tenebra’s beloved Flavian, no less. Cassia would fall from her Kyrian pedestal so fast, she would break when she landed.
“So we would have to keep on as we have during the embassy,” Cassia said.
Lio didn’t answer right away. “I can’t see any other solution.”
She would be with him for stolen hours at night. Come sunrise, she would have to miss him all day. No polar night. No slow starts under stained glass windows over coffee. No breakfast with Zoe and the goats.
When they were in front of other people, she would miss him, although he stood a pace away. No kissing in front of their friends. No dancing together before their people.
