AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Well. I am certainly the last thing he wants now.”
“And what do you want, Soli? If he had asked you to choose him tonight, would you have said yes?”
Solia did not answer. But that was better than a no.
Tonight had been a disaster. But Cassia would not let it end like this for the two people who had lost so much for her sake.
She and Lio would keep trying to bring Soli and Tendo together, Cassia vowed. This negotiation was not over.
41
Nights Until
NOTIAN WINTER SOLSTICE
15 Ourania, 1597 IS
BY ANCIENT LAW
At last, Lio stood in the Imperial throne room with his partner. He and Cassia waited before the dais where the Empress would soon take her seat. Their Trial brothers were at their sides, along with the unlikeliest of diplomatic bodyguards, a Tenebran liegehound.
The auras of the courtiers were more dazzling than the gold that bedecked the chamber. Every murmur was an exchange of power. The air was thick with countless layers of emotions and perfumes from all over the Empress’s vast lands—intrigue and jasmine, honor and sandalwood, calculation and patchouli.
Lio, as an immortal, was unable to hear the ancestors speak, but the ceremonial wooden masks on the walls seemed to communicate their presence to him. He felt the urge to offer them a bow for admitting this young diplomat from far away into their presence.
Somehow, despite his twisting path, Lio had restored his career as an ambassador. This was what he was meant to be. A champion of peace, even when no one would listen, in the center of this tangle of people whose choices would determine the world’s fate.
“Are you glad you didn’t resign from the diplomatic service?” Cassia’s breath was warm upon his ear, her voice soft beneath the veil spell he held around them.
He rested a hand on her lower back, breathing in her scent—courage and roses. “I would not have missed this for the world.”
Everything was changing. The Empire and the shadowlands were on the brink of contact; Blood Komnena was on the brink of gaining—or losing—Solia. Lio did not know what was to come, but he was certain of one thing.
Cassia would be his through it all. Tonight, he would make that clear before the great powers gathered in this room.
“You are still willing to go through with it?” he asked her.
She didn’t hesitate. “Of course.”
The certainty in her voice fed his Craving for her, and yet he still sensed her despair. Their plan to secure Solia’s future with Tendo before this moment of reckoning had failed. “I’m so sorry, my rose.”
“We must simply do our best to pick up the pieces afterward,” she said.
“Perhaps the pieces will come together now,” Mak encouraged from Cassia’s other side. “What’s about to happen could help knock some sense into Tendo.”
Lyros sighed. “Since our efforts to do that were unsuccessful.”
“Solia may even have a change of heart when she sees who’s waiting for her,” Mak said. “Although the Empress’s throne room is an uncommon place for a family reunion.”
Cassia arched a brow. “Not at all an unusual setting for our family’s dramas, it seems.”
Mak shook his head. “This is why Lyros and I had the good sense to become warriors and avoid our loved ones’ political nonsense.”
“It’s a shame you two have gotten yourselves attached to Cassia and me,” Lio said. “There will be many throne rooms in your future now.”
Mak chuckled. “Small price to pay if it means we’re close enough to punch a jinn the next time one tries to toss you into a magical jail cell.”
“That won’t happen again.” Lio shuddered and wove his arm tighter in Cassia’s.
