AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Aurelius ran his thumb over the smooth surface, fighting back the swell of tears.
“My brother deserves someone who can make him happy. Someone who can return him to who he was before all of this wretchedness. And I believe you know just how wretched this really goes.”
Her eyes bore an answer to a question he had long wondered.
She knows what he truly is. Her goons don’t. So she won’t say it out loud. But she knows the truth.
She knows that Calix is a satyr.
“Why?” he whispered.
“He will never achieve happiness if he commits to this lie. I have laid doubts within my own family—taken all the steps I can to have my mother try to interfere. But it’s too far along. It’s all moving too fast. The city is now behind this insanity. So for this to work, I need your help.”
He stared at her. “You want the throne for yourself?” he said with a bitter laugh.
The thump from her goons came without need of a command. Zosime’s eyes were resolute. Her face lacked even a shred of deception. “I want it for him. For everything that he is,” she hissed.
The coin weighed heavy despite the lightness of the wood. Was Zosime really saying what he thought? Permitting him to pursue Calix? Get Teigra out of the way, and then he could have him? No more interference?
None of this made sense. There were so many questions. And after all, he’d made a promise to Calix: no more games, no more meddling.
The tearful words of their final meeting rang in his ear: If you care for me at all, please, just let me go!
“How can I trust you?” he said, thinking back to another time he’d seen Zosime outside a pub. “Last time we made a deal, it was nothing more than mockery.”
Her lip curled. “I have never made a deal with you before.”
“Yes you did! A month ago? Outside the Storming Stallion! You promised—”
The big one slammed him hard once more. The princess glowered. “I don’t know what you are trying to start, but I’m not playing. Do we have a deal or not?”
He pushed past the confusion and the haze of wine. His hand closed around the coin.
As much as he tried to let Calix go, the fates were pushing them together. And given a warlord would soon be visiting those very fates to plot the demise of his homeland, who was he to reject his own destiny?
“I’m in.”
67
TEIGRA
Teigra leaned into the warm water. The scent of rosemary and sweet fig laced the steam.
The Bathhouse of the Crazed Cetus, near the docks and frequented primarily by Ondocian sailors, was almost empty at this time of night—particularly on the female half. It was neither the biggest nor the nearest bathhouse to the embassy, but it was the one she had started using out of necessity.
Her usual routine in Ardora had been to rise early and bathe before breakfast at the Fragrant Forest Bathhouse—the main facility for the merchant classes of Ardora, located in a discreet spot in Green Heart Park, where the towering trees over the brick line made it seem like you were bathing in the middle of a distant woodland, rather than in the center of a bustling city.
That routine, however, had ceased after the Rose Rain Ball.
Having the gaggle of young maidens outside the embassy gate was one thing, but having them all flock around every time she was naked and wet? That was another.
She hadn’t told Calix about the walk with the queen. As close as they’d become these last few weeks, she couldn’t risk the possibility that he might also realize what his mother had—that he could just ditch her and find a local girl instead.
She was sure he wasn’t that calculating, that there was some true connection between them. But she still couldn’t risk it. Mestibes was counting on her.
She stayed for longer than usual in the warmth. Back at the embassy, Ms. Securia and Jaspar would be working long into the night. She’d provided some assistance around the edges in preparing for the siege, but they’d not tasked her with anything major.
She was sure that was because the current negotiations required experienced hands, and not because they suspected any ulterior motive in the prince’s courtship.
