Page 58 of Sworn to the Shadow Throne

I swallowed hard. “I hope this isn’t too prying a question, Your Majesty, but what is your magic? I can feel it…testing me.”

“Empathy,” she said. “I can sense emotions—not thoughts, so the sanctity of your mind is safe. And…apologies for the prodding. Sometimes I can’t help it.”

There goes any hope of pretending I’m not half out of my mind right now.

That explained the calmness. The feeling that lying to her would be not just futile but somehow rude. I’d never encountered such a power before, but it explained, with sudden and perfect clarity, how she managed that beast of a husband.

“So you knew I wasn’t a crazy person from my emotions?” I asked.

“Something like that.” Her grin, so real and sparkling with an undercurrent of playfulness, solidified my initial good feeling about her.

Isca was quiet for a moment. I had the uncomfortable sense she could feel exactly how tangled up I was. “You’re angry.”

“I don’t know what I am,” I admitted. Which was true. The anger was there, yes, but underneath it was something more complicated than I could put a name to yet.

“I’m not going to tell you that you shouldn’t be. You had every right to know who you were sheltering. But can I tell you something about Owain?” she asked. “Not as a queen, just as a friend.”

I said nothing.

She took it as permission. “He hides himself.” Her gentle voice seemed to tiptoe around my emotions. “His brother has never made it easy to be the one standing just behind the throne.” Something flickered behind her eyes, older than her years and a little tired. “Owain learned very young that his name opened doors for other people’s agendas.” She glanced at me sidelong. “That’s not an excuse. I want to be clear about that.”

“But it’s a reason,” I said slowly.

She held my gaze. “You don’t owe him your forgiveness because he’s a crown prince. You don’t owe him anything. But I think you already know he isn’t careless with people… Otherwise, you wouldn’t be this upset that he was careless with you.”

I pressed my lips together and said nothing. I looked away, toward the soldiers, the horses, the glinting steel—anywhere but her knowing eyes. Isca let the silence sit without filling it, which I appreciated more than I could say.

She stood after a moment, smoothing her skirts. “I’ll let Owain tell you the rest,” she said. “We all have important decisions to make before nightfall.”

None of which I felt remotely prepared for.

Chapter 17

Owain

The schick of steel sliding against steel cut through the fading light.

I should’ve heard them coming. More than forty men and horses were loud. The rumble of hooves, the creak of leather, the ringing of armor. Any other day I would have. But the moment my lips had found hers, the world had simply ceased to exist beyond the warm press of her mouth and the feel of her skin beneath me, in the molten pull running through my veins that felt vast and primal and unshakable.

I’d missed every sign because something had snapped into place.

Even now, with my pulse still roaring and steel glinting through the broken doorway, I could feel a certainty so ruthless it left no room for argument. The pressure that had built within me since I’d woken up that first time to meet her eyes had released into incandescent certainty. Today, a piece of my soul had honed into a sharp point and driven itself out of my chest to anchor itself irrevocably to her.

That feral, worshipful piece of my soul understood that she was meant for me. Something precious, something to provide for, to protect, to claim.

Mine.

My teeth edged toward a snarl before I caught myself.

I lifted my head slowly, the taste of her still on my tongue, the newborn thing between us burning within me. Annoyance stirred at the audacity of their intrusion on such an intimate moment. It hadn’t yet grown into rage, but it was close, simmering beneath my skin as I met the eyes of the last man I’d expected to see.

That the bloody royal family of Darreth had found themselves in the borderlands between Larethia and Gelida set every alarm bell in my head ringing.

Nisien questioned me first. “Have you seriously set three kingdoms on edge to meet your lover in the middle of nowhere?” he asked, voice low, likely so the women wouldn’t overhear him interrogating me.

“Nice to see you too, arseholes.” I bristled. But I knew better than to react strongly with the mad king nearby, even if he was—sort of—my friend. “No,” I clarified with forced calm, while slowly lifting the hem of my borrowed tunic. “I’ve been recovering.”

Even in the dimming light, the stitches Lunette had used to keep me together were plain to see. The dark, sideways, lopsided lines in the shape of an X were still ringed with mottled yellow and purple bruising. It hurt terribly, but my body seemed to have forgotten that earlier in the heat of the moment—just like my mind kept straying back to her now.