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And it only went colder with what came next.
“Well, well, well!” came a sneering voice from uncomfortably close.
Teigra’s looked down... Right into Pikra’s eyes.
She gasped and stumbled back, causing a laugh from the others.
“Look what we have here,” said the little woman. “If it isn’t a precious flower from Mestibes.”
“Come ’ere to gawp at us common folk, ’ave you?” spat Elexis, her prior brightness darkening. “Not even been ’ere a day and already wanting to stare at the silly northern folk and their funny little ways?”
“N-no!” stammered Teigra, glancing back to the empty entrance tunnel to the bathhouse. “I was just... just...”
“Well, Mestibes,” said the princess, her voice as dark and smooth as pomegranate molasses, “if you didn’t come to observe, you must have come to participate?”
In the corner of Zosime’s full, beautiful lips, crept a wicked smirk, confirming everything Teigra had suspected.
I could call her out! She’s the thief. And from a diplomatic carriage no less! Breaking the diplomatic seal? That’s tantamount to war! She is in the wrong here, not me! I could call her out! I could do it!
The princess’s smirk spread even further, as if reading Teigra’s mind.
After a beat, Teigra’s shoulders sagged in defeat, and she mumbled her response—too shocked by the implication of Aurelius already being in the bathhouse to fight back. And worse, now that she’d been spotted, there was no way she’d be allowed to run into that bathhouse to warn him. She’d be held down and arrested if she even tried. And lead them all to Aurelius while she was at it.
“I just... wanted to thank you for what you did on the road,” said Teigra, feeling detached from her own voice.
Zosime gave her a disgusted look. But no look could be worse than how Teigra felt.
“Look at that, ladies!” said the princess, raising her arms victoriously. “That is the civilized polities for you. You hurl insults at them, and they thank you for it. Is that all you are, huh? Are you sad little Mestibians? Or are you Ardorans? Are you delicate little flowers? Or are you roses with some fucking thorns?”
A cheer rose and another challenger rushed forward to face Zosime. The rest of the circle no longer looked intimidated but spurred on—all of them keen to show that they were nothing like Teigra.
As combat commenced, Teigra looked around for an option, any option, that might allow her to undo the damage she’d done.
She found none.
Instead, she walked numbly back from the circle, returning to the stands to sit in her silent shame.
28
AURELIUS
Aurelius undressed to full nudity and wandered into the bathhouse, breathing in the steam and scented oils—fragrant rosemary and invigorating grapefruit.
The maze of red-tiled rooms was mostly empty, occupied by a half-dozen vanquished wrestlers, too busy wallowing in their defeats to notice the arrival of a pale-skinned interloper.
As he walked through, his breath catching at each new doorway, Aurelius thought back to the Pentheon.
It seemed both an eon ago and like it had happened just yesterday. That inexplicable moment between the prince and himself had been seared onto his memory—the sudden feeling of heat and lust when they had locked eyes, a feeling he had revisited night after night in the privacy of locked doors.
And hanging heavy from that memory was the final image of Calix’s honey-gold eyes.
And his look of terror.
That fear was a reminder of what Aurelius was dealing with. They weren’t in Mestibes anymore—where a man of his own proclivities merely faced social exclusion. Ardora was the land of passion and fertility, where the man–woman breeding ideal was woven into the very fabric of society.
And that was just for regular people. But for a prince? And a crown prince at that? One with the responsibility of maintaining the honor, the status, and above all the bloodline of his entire house?
If Urosina was correct about Calix, then his desires wouldn’t be some little annoyance for him. It would be his biggest, darkest, most terrifying secret. A secret that could bring down his whole bloodline, and their crown along with it. A secret that could even lead to his execution!
