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Riven chuckled against my hair and kissed my head. “No, the exact opposite actually. I could barely sleep after that first kiss. I hadn’t meant for it to happen, it just... did. And then when I kissed you in Cereliath I knew I wouldn’t be able to stay by your side without it happening again,” he admitted. I pressed a kiss against his neck.
“It was Syrra that put the idea in my head. It was something you said to her on our way to Cereliath. She figured you were carrying a broken heart from your time in the Order. She made a joke about growing up surrounded only byikwenira...” Riven shrugged. “It would make sense if that’s where your attractions lay.”
“Not justikwenira,” I said, tasting the word for myself. It was so much better than calling Halfling’s females.
“Syr had me worried after that.” Riven pulled me closer to his chest. “You were healing in that pool for days and I was annoying everyone, pacing around. I couldn’t sleep, I didn’t eat. I just needed to know you were okay. When Syr asked if I was sure you had the same... longing, I second guessed myself. Wondered if it had all been in my head. The first time you had tried to stab me, and the second could have just been part of our cover.”
“It wasn’t,” I said truthfully. I was tired of hiding, and each confession was easier to share with him.
“Thank fuck for that,” Riven said, pulling me to him for another kiss. Eventually our lips parted, exhaustion finally covering both of us in sleep. I slept the whole night through in Riven’s arms—no dreams, or nightmares. Just peace.
THE NEXT DAY, WErode to the outskirts of Koratha but could go no farther. At least not together.
I wore my black cloak and hood, the sword clasp shining from the polish I gave it that morning. I would be entering the capital as the Blade but Riven would need to find his own passage.
“I’ll wait for you at the cavern, just like we said,” he murmured against my ear. We let our horses graze along the tree line as we said goodbye. I breathed in the scent of him, the birch and dew relaxing me.
I nodded, my back still tight. We would only meet again if both of us fooled the guards, and I fooled the king.
If the king decided to keep me at all.
The ability to plan our next attack rested on how well I could manipulate Aemon. How much information I could glean during our audience.
Riven’s arms wound around my waist under the cloak. I rested my head against his chest, his heartbeat as steady and solid as the rest of him. We didn’t speak. There was nothing left to be said that hadn’t been whispered to each other the night before. Now, we were savoring the last moments before we parted, unsure if we would come back together again.
I was the first to break away with a soft kiss to Riven’s mouth. He pressed his hand against my face; I could feel the roughness of his calluses on my cheek, proof of the years he had spent training. I lifted my hand to his face so he could feel my own.
He smiled before kissing my brow in a light caress, letting me mount my horse.
“Maybe I’ll be the one waiting for you,” I said, my tone lighter than I felt, before steering my ride toward the city and leaving him to wait for nightfall to follow.
The city was in chaos. I rode through the first gates, left open for anyone to enter. Only two guards stood watch in the towers. Inside the walls, people were shouting and yelling at one another, bartering over scraps of food and clothing, fighting in the streets as guards tried to corral the crowds. It was only worse in the next ring. Merchants stood at their carts with bemused looks as their tables sat empty. News of the blast had reached the capital and, panic-stricken, people had bought out all the goods. An empty cart was usually the heart’s delight of any merchant, but now they stared at the emptiness not knowing when their next shipment would arrive. If it ever would.
I couldn’t help but feel guilty as I passed more crying people. We had known what we were doing, the chaos and strife it would inflict. All I could do was acknowledge their pain, their worry, and make a silent vow that I would try as hard as I could to ensure their suffering was worth it.
The guards standing outside the palace walls waved me forward. I entered through the wrought iron gates, creaking as they opened. The white stone of the palace looked gray against the overcast sky, as if it knew the people wept below.
Two Shades waited for me at the servants’ entrance to the palace. I didn’t say a word to either of them. I had expected the king would want to see me the moment I arrived in the capital.
Inside the palace, servants buzzed about, too engrossed in their whispers to even notice the Blade passed them by. I preferred the hum to the usual silence, even though I knew they were speaking of Silstra. Wondering who was responsible for such a blatant attack on the king, not even realizing that the culprit had just walked by them.
Even with my hood on, I kept my face neutral. I didn’t know what I was walking into, what the king had heard, what the Shades had learned. I could be walking to my death, but I suspected they would have sent more than two novice Shades to collect me if that had been the case. As long as my wrists were free of shackles, I would take it as a good omen.
I trailed behind the Shades up the wide marble staircase and into the windowed wing. I looked up to see the first droplets of rain hit the glass ceiling. The clouds began to swirl and darken. I suppressed my smirk. Added rain would only slow the establishment of trade by land. The rain would muddy the roads and leave the carts slow, or even stuck. A favor from nature herself.
I stood at the towering doors to the throne room and took a deep breath. The doors swung open, and I left my two escorts in the hall behind me. I bowed my head as I approached the throne. There were two smaller chairs sat on either side of the king, not gilded in gold like his, but ornate and beautiful. The princes sat in them.
I tried to keep my breath steady as I removed my hood. I had not expected Prince Killian to make it to Koratha so quickly. Even at a healthy pace, he shouldn’t have been in the capital for days. He must have rode through the nights, like we had to Silstra, knowing that his father would need him.
I bit my cheek. I would have to be even more careful in what I told the king.
“Rise,” King Aemon spat. I could see the anger etched in his face, deepening the few lines that marked his eyes and forehead. His hands were clenched in fists against his throne, so tight that his knuckles were white, his cheeks a flaming red.
“I send you to take care of the Shadow, and you return with my dam blown to bits! My trade routes in shambles!” I didn’t need to pretend to flinch as the king’s words struck deep into my chest. I had failed by not attacking him sooner. I let that failure rise and rest along my face.
Damien was hunched over the armrest of his chair, fingertips pressed together as he watched me. I could see the hope dancing in his eyes, wishing his father would take his rage out on me in a more physical way. Or even let him attend to the lesson.
The scars on my back did not burn as they usually did under his gaze. My muscles didn’t tense. Whatever hold Damien had kept on me for the past three decades had broken. Had it been the day I brokered an alliance with his father’s enemy? The day I laid down my life to ensure the dam was blown? The healing bath that leeched out the infection I’d carried in my back?
