Chapter 8
Chapter
Eight
The reception was still going when they returned, the court seemingly unaware—or unconcerned—that he and his bride had vanished for one glorious hour.
The music had shifted to something slower, and the silver fire had dimmed to a steady glow.
Courtiers and representatives from all realms except the Real milled about in clusters, drinking wine the color of midnight and murmuring in all the various languages of the realms.
Adric stepped through the arch with Cora at his side and felt the room turn toward them as a single body.
The court had been waiting for them to come back.
He saw it in the way conversations paused, the way drinks lifted in subtle salute, the way Vorian, his general, caught his eye and inclined his head.
Cora stood beside him at the edge of the hall, once again in her gown, the vial of his blood resting against her throat. She glanced up at him, her smile soft but genuine.
“Thank you,” she said, the words warm against his heart. “It meant a lot to see them.”
“You don’t have to thank me for that.”
“Yes, I do,” she said. “That was your first moment of freedom in pretty much forever. You could have gone anywhere—any realm, any corner of any world you’ve been locked away from—and yet you took me to a college campus in Florida.”
“I took you where you wanted to be.”
Her smile quivered, and he saw the tears well in her eyes. “It was kind of you.” She drew in a breath. “Now I want to ask you to do one more kind thing—let me take Finn back with me.”
He stiffened, realizing only then the silent hope he’d been clinging to—that she had decided to stay with him after all. That the Real visit had been a sweet farewell to mark the beginning of a wider life they would build together.
“No,” he said, his voice harder than he had intended. “Your uncle stays.”
Something cold flashed in her eyes, and the space between them seemed to grow even though she didn’t take a single step back. “You’re punishing me.”
“That is not my intent,” he said, working to keep his tone level as he fought the urge to get down on one knee and beg her to remain.
“Dammit, Adric, you have what you wanted. The curse is broken. You’re free. You can go anywhere, do anything—so why the hell do you insist on keeping my uncle here as a hostage?”
“He is a guest. Not a hostage. And he stays.”
“Why?”
A few courtiers had begun to drift closer, as if sensing scandal. He took her elbow and steered her across the room to the tapestry he had commissioned with Soren’s image. Perhaps some of the dragon’s loyalty would rub off on his cantankerous bride.
“Why?” she repeated.
“Because you are leaving me.” The words came out with a snap.
She took a step back, clearly noting the tone. He was not a man with a quick temper—it behooved a king to remain calm and level—but around Cora, that was proving difficult.
“In other words, you’re punishing my uncle because you’re pissed at me?”
“I am not punishing him at all. He is quite taken with life here.”
“He’s the dean of a college. His life is more than just sitting in a library and reading.”
“He is content,” Adric said, this time more firmly. “And he stays.”
“Content?” she retorted, practically spitting the word. “He’s living in a haze. And what about excitement and wonder and love and, oh, every other emotion people long to experience?”
“I wish him to stay.” That was all he could say. All he wanted to say.
She didn’t need to know how her uncle fit into the bigger picture. Not yet. The barriers were a dying Emperor’s fear made manifest, and they were never meant to be permanent. Adric intended to bring them down—slowly, deliberately. To do that, he needed Finn’s scholarship.
And keeping Finn at the castle kept Cora tethered to him. A very happy coincidence.
“He thinks he’s dreaming, Adric. He’s not comfortable. He’s delusional.”
“He is safe. And he is useful.”
The words came out harder than he intended, and he saw her flinch. Good. Let her understand that he was still the king of four realms, even if she made him feel like a schoolboy who’d been told his crush was walking home with someone else.
“Is this Kali’s idea?” Her expression hardened. “Did she tell you to keep him?”
“Kali advises me on many things. I make my own decisions.”
“Right. Your own decisions. Like the decision to save your brother’s life only if I offered myself as your bride.”
He said nothing.
“You’re keeping my uncle as a hostage.”
“I am keeping a scholar in the finest library in five realms.”
“Bullshit.” She crossed her arms. “It’s me you’re punishing,” she said, her voice low.
“No. Not a punishment. Insurance.” That, at least, was true. Though only part of the full truth.
He watched as she frowned. Then her expression cleared and softened. “I will come back to you. You don’t have to hold my uncle as insurance.”
“Perhaps not. And yet I am.”
He could see she wanted to continue the argument, but he also saw that she knew it was futile. “Fine,” she finally said. “I’ll leave tonight.”
He shook his head. “You cannot leave before the betrothal ceremony is complete.”
She frowned, reaching up to touch the vial. “Isn’t it?”
He did not answer. He let the silence work.
“Wait. Wait. Hold on. You asked for my hand in exchange for Chase’s life. I gave it. The curse broke. I kept my end.”
She wasn’t wrong. That was exactly what he had asked for and exactly what she had given. The fact that he had let himself believe the night might become something more was his own foolishness based on tradition, not on the necessity of the ceremony.
But all he said was, “The match must be proven.”
Her body went rigid. “What does that even mean?”
“That we are compatible. In bed.” He tried to keep the amusement—and the desire—out of his voice.
“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“It is part of the ritual.”
“Bullshit. You’re making that up.”
“I am not.”
“Right.” She crossed her arms. “Convenient timing on the ritual, Adric.”
“It is tradition. As old as the realm. The match must be proven on the night of the betrothal. And,” he added, “it’s not as if we are wed, only engaged. We should take advantage of that lovely loophole as often as possible.”
She held his gaze for a long moment, then cocked her head. “Proven. Seriously?”
He watched as she searched his face for the lie. She didn’t find one.
He expected her to grudgingly concede. Instead, she smiled at him. “Not a problem. You can tell the Powers That Be we already tested that one. And we’re pretty freaking compatible. In bed, anyway.”
Her gaze moved over him, and he felt his body respond to the heat of it.
“As for the rest?” she said. “We’re more like two pieces of sandpaper rubbing together. I’m leaving.”
And then, as he watched, his heart filling with awe for this incredible, infuriating woman, she turned and crossed the hall toward Chase, who stood by the main doors, watching her come.
Adric watched, too, a thousand thoughts running through his mind, all vying for attention. And not a single one was helpful.
He expected her to stop when she reached Chase, but instead she glided past him with only a brief touch of her hand to his arm as she continued toward Finn, who had appeared at the edge of the floor with two glasses of something pale and effervescent in his hands.
Cora reached her uncle, took one of the glasses, then said something that made Finn laugh.
Then she let her uncle pull her onto the dance floor as Adric stood under the dragon tapestry and watched his bride dance with another man, and even though that man was her uncle, he felt something dangerous flow through him.
He said a near-silent curse as he turned his back on the dancers, then crossed to the bar and took what the barman handed him without asking what it was.
One sniff answered that. A whiskey distilled in the Realm of Retribution. He tossed the shot back, swallowed the liquid fire, and held out the glass for another.
The barman poured. Adric drank. He was passing the glass back to repeat the ritual when he saw Cora glide past in Finn’s arms, her face alight with a wide, bright smile more brilliant than any she had ever offered him, even during their jaunt in the Real.
He told himself it didn’t matter. She was his in all the ways that mattered, even if she would not admit as much, even to herself.
“Was she worth it?”
“Kali,” he said, not bothering to turn.
She had approached, as always, with the stealth of a cat.
She was the King’s First Blade. His good right arm.
Yet so often she irked him simply by being near.
Ironic, he supposed, considering how very, very near the two of them had been at various times throughout his reign.
But that was over, and she’d never owned his heart.
He turned and met her violet eyes, now shining with a mirth he was not in the mood for.
“We will speak tomorrow,” he said.
“Of course. Tonight should be your time to mingle with your guests and show off the little mortal on your arm.”
“She is mortal, true. And yet she is so much more.”
“I suppose she must be. I know better than anyone the skill it takes to grab your attention. And I certainly know all the intriguing games you like to play in the dark.”
“Is it truly your goal to irritate me? I have no desire to expel you from my court, but I do not need courtiers who play games.”
Anyone else would have stopped. Kali stepped closer. “No? I seem to remember enjoying a variety of games with you.”
“I never played those kinds of games, Kali. You always knew your place in my court, and that place was not permanently in my bed.”
She stepped back, the lift of her chin telegraphing that he’d struck a nerve.
“No games, my lord,” she said. “But as your advisor and your friend, you must know that the Court will talk. A betrothal without bedding? That will feed the gossip hounds for weeks.”
He scowled. Of course she’d overheard. Kali had ears everywhere.