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That vicious tear between his desire and duty? It was familiar to Aurelius. In a boy he once loved.
It was... heartbreaking.
There was an almighty roar of celebration, accompanied by the clatter of a thousand implements of death.
Aurelius didn’t need to look down. He already knew.
The beast was dead.
Calix pushed himself back from the edge and their forearms parted. “Farewell, Your Excellency,” he said without facing him.
A sudden urge came over Aurelius to reach out and stop the prince. But he was already gone into the press of his people.
In the ring, among the gutted carcass, the victors soaked up the applause. And Zosime grinned right at him. It was a sick, mocking grin. The grin of someone who believed the beast had no option but to die.
His blood turned to fire.
To Dimethan with that!
Aurelius pushed through the crowd, going after Calix. Suddenly, his momentum stopped. A hand gripped his arm. Its owner’s voice fluttered by his ear, warm and female.
“Perhaps not, Your Excellency.”
He turned to see a halfway familiar face, one that had been at the periphery of every social event in the last few weeks, but which he hadn’t formally met. She had the bearing of true nobility, and everything about her—from her confident posture, sumptuous fabrics, and glinting jewelry—screamed two words.
The first was Ondocian.
The second was snake.
“High Envoy Fabulosa, I believe? Charming to finally meet you, but perhaps another ti—”
Her grip tightened, surprisingly strong given her slender frame. When she next spoke, it was not in Dynosian, but in Voresoma, the ancient language of nobility and diplomacy. A language which practically no one else in the stadium would understand. “The Ardorans may not wrap their royals in a swaddling blanket, and I will confess that Calix may not be quite as popular as he was a few years ago, but do you really want to see what happens if they think their prince is under threat?”
Aurelius paused, allowing his anger cool. As rationality once again took hold, he stole another look at the princess. Her expression had changed. The grin had faded, replaced with annoyance.
That bitch!
She’d planned this. That was why she had sent him this invitation. She’d chosen a time and place where she would be indisposed, where she knew that Aurelius could sneak a moment with Calix without her intervention. Knowing that Aurelius would take it. Knowing that there was a whole crowd of loyal killers if his frustrations got the better of him.
“Perhaps we should talk? Beyond this wretched stadium?” said Fabulosa.
“Indeed,” he said, suddenly wishing to be anywhere else but here.
They left the soldier’s quarter quickly but cautiously, careful not to seem as though they were fleeing. When they were back in common streets, Fabulosa plucked a white rose from a passing archway, smelling it with a sigh. “An interesting man, isn’t he,” she said, returning to the common Dynosian tongue.
“Who?”
“Come now, Herald. Take it from one gossip merchant to another, you have hardly been masking your intentions at our little social gatherings.”
“Should I consider it flattery that you have been watching me, High Envoy?”
“Oh, I didn’t have to look too hard. What a pity you can’t find some way to meet him alone.”
They walked in silence through pretty streets, flowers blooming over eaves and along roofs of pubs and blacksmiths.
Aurelius weighed his options.
On the one hand, she was a snake. He couldn’t explain how he knew. You didn’t meet them very often, but when you did, you just knew. She was an untrustworthy, lying, conniving snake, and she would cross him as soon as it was convenient. Cornel Securia was like that. The archon was as well. The sort of person you never wished to be indebted to.
