Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
T he Council Room was silent.
Then again, that was probably because its potentially loudest occupant was ostensibly missing.
I wasn’t exactly surprised that Rowan was late to a meeting about her own future, but I was slightly shocked to see the entire room taking it in stride. Well, for the most part.
One of the lairds pointedly cleared his throat in yet another obvious attempt to start discussions, but Princess Jocelyn stared him down. She didn’t remind him again that no discussions would begin until the princess arrived.
In fact, I suspected she never bothered to repeat herself. Nor that she ever had to, from the way the man was instantly cowed.
Korhonan’s eyes met mine with a bare echo of the same bafflement I felt, and I bit back a scowl at the unintentional moment of camaraderie. We were not comrades in anything, certainly not when I had to spend the morning wondering whether he had left Rowan in his bed or if she had already snuck back to her own by the time he left.
No, we were just two Socairans thrust into the chaotic kingdom to our east, only his clan was actively trying to take something from mine.
I still wasn’t sure I would be able to stop him on that front, having gleaned very little from the twenty minutes of quiet in this chamber, nor from my relentless thoughts the night before. But I damned well had to try.
That wasn’t to say I hadn’t figured out anything. I knew that Princess Jocelyn had strong feelings about autonomy, feelings that were shared by the queen, though the latter had said little this morning.
For Queen Charlotte’s part, I could tell that despite my concerns, she didn’t appear to hold the same resentment for me as her husband. There was more curiosity in her gaze, tinged with an edge of wariness.
Prince Oliver hid a great deal of scrutiny behind the easy smile with which he greeted the room, and the other lairds were giving small tells of their feelings toward my people in general, and me, specifically.
But none of that helped me with this morning’s problem.
The door banged open, and my hands twitched toward where my swords would be—if we hadn’t been forced to enter this room unarmed. No one else at the table reacted, though, aside from Korhonan’s startled eyes, which made me realize they must be used to this kind of entrance.
“Brother,” Prince Oliver called as the king entered with a face like a thundercloud.
His presence seemed to fill the room even before he did, his crown an unnecessary addition for a man with the undeniable bearing of a king.
“I was just thinking this room had gotten a bit dreary, but here you are to brighten things up.”
It was an effort to keep my expression neutral, wondering how quickly my father might order someone’s unclanning if they commented on his mood in the middle of a council meeting.
King Logan’s mouth only twitched upward before he went back to glaring at the two Socairans in the room, though I was gratified to see that at least his ire included Korhonan.
Was it prejudice against my people? Or only those…associated with his daughter?
“Rowan?” Queen Charlotte asked quietly.
He gave a gruff nod, and the room returned to silence once more. Several long minutes ticked by before Rowan finally graced us with her presence.
It was immediately evident as to why she was late. Last night, she had looked like a pampered princess. Today, she looked like a queen , something I suspected was intentional.
She didn’t have her father’s presence, but she commanded the room all the same when she strode in wearing an aggressively crimson gown, hair and cosmetics and tiara perfectly in place.
When she had been at Bear, it had been hard to picture her as a royal, let alone a Clan Wife. There was something bittersweet about seeing her this way now, something I refused to think too deeply about.
I looked away just in time to catch the narrowed emerald eyes of the king, who I was beginning to suspect was far more observant than his gruff demeanor implied.
“Apologies for my tardiness,” Rowan said airily, not bothering to make it sound sincere.
She sank into the empty seat next to Korhonan and my jaw clenched involuntarily.
“I daresay it was worth it,” he responded, beaming at her like a child who had been presented with a new toy.
I didn’t roll my eyes, even if I was wildly tempted to do so.
Having observed the interactions between the royals, it came as a bit of a surprise when the queen opened up the meeting.
“We understand you have terms for... allowing the alliance between Elk and Lochlann.” Whatever softness I had sensed from her was nowhere to be found when she fixed me with an irritable glare. “To be clear, we neither recognize nor condone the fact that you essentially claimed our daughter as your property for things she had no control over.”
I wondered if she would have recognized or condoned those things if she had understood the alternatives, but that argument was out of place here, so I only nodded.
“Understood.”
She appeared to be slightly mollified by my response, going on in a gentler tone.
“However, we do recognize that we are not in a position to overturn a decision made by the Socairan ruling party. Additionally, we are conscious of the fact that you respected her decision to leave when you could have chosen not to. So, we have decided to entertain these discussions peacefully .”
That was, frankly, more acknowledgement than I had been expecting. She was less volatile than her husband, yes, though I was realizing, no less formidable. Her approach was much less…hostile toward my mere existence.
“For now,” the king tacked on, and I gave them another dip of my chin.
That much had been understood from the outset. These negotiations were precarious, at best, for all parties involved.
“Are there any questions before we begin?” the queen asked, maintaining her control of the meeting.
“I have one,” Korhonan growled, all eyes turning to him as he glared at me. “What’s to stop your father from sending his men in to overturn this decision, as he did last time?”
In the hours I had spent pacing my floors the night before, considering the possible outcomes of this meeting, I had prepared myself to counter any accusations toward my father’s sanity.
I hadn’t been prepared for Rowan to have kept that secret. I scanned her features to be sure, and she averted her gaze before I could read it. No one contradicted him, though, not even with their expressions.
She hadn’t told a single person in this room about my father.
Some small bit of tension unfurled within me, though there were still plenty of obstacles to navigate. I pulled out an envelope with the letter I had obtained from him for unrelated discussions within Socair, having…repurposed it for today’s meeting.
“I have a letter with his seal, granting me full authority over these discussions.”
“What changed his mind?” Korhonan demanded, eyes narrowed.
Leave it to him to show a rare bit of initiative just in time to make my life more difficult. Then again, it was just as well to get this out of the way now.
“It isn’t for me to question the duke,” I said, letting him hear the echo of his own flimsy reasoning fired back at him.
He huffed irritably but said nothing else. Which was just as well, since I was eager to clear up a few things of my own.
“I also have a question,” I announced, a blithe smile on my lips. “What possible reason could I have for consenting to the very thing I went so out of my way to stop from happening?”
Rowan’s lips parted in disbelief, a sound escaping her that was reminiscent of Boris when I stepped on his tail. “Yes, I’m sure kidnapping me was a real burden on you .”
I shrugged, because in fact, it had been, but also because I wanted her to feel half as frustrated as I did watching Korhonan lean over her like an ill-trained guard dog.
“Funny you should ask.” A hard voice spoke up from my left. It was one of the lairds who decidedly disliked both of the Socairans in this room—the one who had introduced himself as MacBay. “It might interest you to know that our people have a great deal of love for their princess. That some of us took it quite personally when she was held hostage for months.”
His emphasis left no doubt as to where he fell on that issue.
“There are many who believe retaliation is the only way to prevent something like that from happening again.” Again, it was clear that he was one of those people. Someone who thought the best way forward was with a conflict that would cost countless lives.
I clenched my jaw but didn’t respond, processing his words internally along with the eager nods of a few other lairds.
I had known there were tensions, but I hadn’t realized from last night quite how much support there was for an outright war.
Another voice cut in, tired but no less steely—MacKinnon, no title. “Which is why the princess graciously agreed to entertain betrothal talks, once she realized some of the lairds were ready to march on Socair if no one intervened.”
My mind spun, not sure where to land first. This was apparently news to Korhonan as well, if the way he went rigid in his seat was any indication.
I might have taken some pleasure in his surprise if I wasn’t busy reeling from my own.
“It wasn’t...only for that,” Rowan said, placing a hand on Korhonan’s and frowning at the second speaker.
Her caveated denial did not appear to comfort her almost-betrothed.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, Lord Evander,” Prince Oliver spoke up. The timbre and the feigned amicability of his voice were so like his son’s, though his drawl was slower and more pronounced. “But a march on Socair would lead directly to your territory, would it not?”
“It would,” I confirmed, examining Rowan’s features once more.
She lifted her chin in defiance…the way she did when she was trying to hide something.
She had done it last night, too, but I had been too angry to put it together…just before she mentioned being with Korhonan. And now this. I had speculated more than once about why there had been no army at the pass when the snow cleared away. Not for lack of the Lochlannian Council trying, as it turned out.
Korhonan had made his intentions clear, yet she had apparently waited to consider it until the only other option was war. Again .
And last night, she had come to my room.
“So, you can see it’s in your best interest to be obliging, then,” Queen Charlotte took over, casting a troubled glance at Rowan’s tight features.
Obliging to what, though? My pulse thrummed in my veins, similar to how it had done at the Summit, my mind jumping ahead of me to a thousand possibilities.
“I can,” I acknowledged. “As I understand it, then, the purpose of this arrangement is a peace alliance between Socair and Lochlann?”
“Exactly.” MacKinnon sounded pleased at my summation, while Rowan was decidedly less so as she spoke over him.
“Not entirely.” Again, she looked at Korhonan, guilt playing over her features.
And again, I couldn’t quite make sense of her motives.
She wanted to marry, but not him? She didn’t want to marry at all, but found him the most suitable of her options if forced? She did want to marry him, and the timing was a coincidence?
His clenched jaw made me suspect that he also had no answer to those questions.
“You know perfectly well that Rowan and I were betrothed before this, and it had nothing to do with an alliance,” he said at last.
So that was where he had landed.
“No,” I agreed easily. “Just the threat of execution hanging over her head. I also know that you called that betrothal off yourself.”
It didn’t hurt to remind the room of that, to aid in whatever negotiations occurred.
“Because you took her,” he countered, losing his fight with his composure.
That was a convenient way to blame the way he had quit fighting for her entirely on me. Had he thought that marrying the captive princess of our enemy would come without obstacles?
“And you said it was of utmost importance that you marry quickly and produce heirs,” I reminded him. “So let’s not pretend politics doesn’t play a role here, shall we?”
He dropped his jaw in anger, but his tiny stalwart protector held her hand out. I wondered if he was embarrassed knowing that the feral princess was the more reasonable of the two of them at the moment.
“Yes,” Rowan huffed, cutting into my thoughts. “Obviously, the alliance is advantageous. Allowing it serves your people as well as mine, because not only will we avoid a war, we can resume trade. Isn’t that why you’re here?”
It was moments like this I remembered that she had been raised for politics, however little she usually let that show. She loved to hide behind her mask of ridiculousness, the same way she let her massive curls obscure her features the night before.
It was easy to forget she was the same woman who stared down her enemies unflinchingly and took up a sword in defense of soldiers she barely knew. Who had apparently made it her mission to stop a war these past few months.
“The alliance is not restricted to Elk, then?” I clarified, still trying to get a read on the situation.
On her.
If she only needed an alliance, or if she had intentionally chosen him. She narrowed her eyes at me, but it was her aunt who answered.
“It’s true that we’ve had other offers,” Princess Jocelyn explained in her no-nonsense voice. “Sir Mikhail from Ram sent one.”
I shouldn’t have been surprised. Only Mikhail would believe that he had something to offer an eighteen-year-old princess who was…passably attractive.
Gorgeous, my traitorous mind argued. It hardly mattered, because she was infuriating, I reminded myself.
“How ever did you resist that temptation?” I murmured in an effort to drown out my thoughts, and Rowan’s lips twitched in response.
“Lord Luca from Lynx,” the blonde princess continued.
I blinked several times. Arès had declined to mention that, but it was markedly different from her request to marry Korhonan. There was no reason I should say no to my new allies.
No reason I should want to.
Mikhail might not be a catch for her, but Luca was only a few years older than she was, and the brother of her only friend in Socair. She had laughed with him, and he had cast her more than one appreciative glance.
An alliance with my kingdom, with my ally, something to thwart Elk.
My heartbeat thundered in my ears. She didn’t belong to Luca, or to Clan Lynx.
From a Lochlannian standpoint, he wasn’t her best option, though, something I certainly didn’t note with relief, even as I went on to comment on it.
“That’s hardly helpful to you, on the opposite end of Socair from the mountains.” The trade routes would take twice as long and be nearly impossible in the winter. Not to mention the length of her journey home.
“Precisely,” Jocelyn agreed with a curt nod. “So, you can see that even if the princess’ preferences were not taken into account—and let me assure you, this decision rests entirely with her—Elk offers the most advantageous alliance for our people, and, quite frankly, yours.”
I returned her nod slowly, my mind racing.
The decision was Rowan’s. She had chosen Korhonan. Of Elk, Ram, and Lynx, that made sense. But there was another option, one that was infinitely better for Lochlann.
Better for her .
Maybe she would have chosen him either way. Political or personal?
There was only one way to find out.
“Yes, I can see that of those options, Elk would be the smartest choice for an alliance with Lochlann,” I began, paving the way for the second reckless, ill-thought-out decision I had made since she came waltzing into my life.
All of the reasons I didn’t want to marry anyone—specifically didn’t want to marry her—seemed to flee my mind in the wake of the word repeating in my head every time another candidate was thrown out for her consideration.
She wasn’t theirs.
She was mine .
“Of course,” I continued casually, studying her features for her reaction. “ If your primary concern is for the people, then undisputedly, your best option would be an alliance with Bear.”