Chapter 16 #2
Biyu clenched the comb tight enough that her hand turned bloodless and pale.
She jerked up to her feet and nearly slammed her knees against the edge of the vanity on her way up.
“Because you think I’m a traitor and that I’m planning something nefarious.
That’s why you want to hurt me! And I’m sure if we weren’t bound together now, you would have killed me yesterday! ”
“I wouldn’t … I wouldn’t kill you.” His voice lowered, softened, and she knew if she took that as a sign of weakness, he would snap her up cruelly.
Because it wasn’t weakness; it was something far more terrifying than if he had shouted.
There was a ferocity in his voice, in his expression, that chilled her down to her being.
“I would never want to hurt you, or kill you, princess. And I’m warning you to not put me in a position where I might have to do either. ”
Biyu flinched back and nearly dropped her comb. He made his point very clear—he didn’t want to hurt her, but he would if he had to. He didn’t want to kill her, but if she proved herself to be a traitor, then he would do what needed to be done.
Whatever attraction and desire she felt in that moment vanished.
She turned herself away from him and sat back on her bench.
Her hands shook the entire time as she brushed out her hair.
The silence was nearly deafening and she couldn’t bear to meet his gaze for fear of what she would find.
He had already made himself clear and she couldn’t forget their positions in all of this, couldn’t get caught up in a moment of weakness.
He was loyal to Drakkon Muyang.
She was plotting against him.
Biyu repeated the lines in her head over and over as she carefully tied her hair back.
She had to redo it three times, her hands shaking so badly she couldn’t get a good grip with the hairpin.
By the fourth time, the low bun was lopsided and not nearly as neat as Lin would have done it, but it was best she could do at the moment, so she chose to focus on picking her jewelry instead.
It was the only thing she could fiddle with before having to face him again, and she didn’t want to do that.
She had selected a gold hairpin with violet flowers dangling off thin chains on the end of it, so to match that, she chose a set of earrings and a necklace with lilac-colored gems. It was perhaps a bit too much purple, but it was her favorite color, so she figured it would be fine.
It wasn’t like anyone would care about what she wore.
Nikator’s stare burned the back of her head and she resisted the urge to peek at him.
She normally would have been done at just that—clothes, hair, and something perfumed—but she picked up the small silver box containing reddish powder.
It wouldn’t hurt to do makeup, would it?
She wasn’t skilled in it, usually opting to let the maidservants do it—since Lin’s hands had grown shaky with age and she sometimes couldn’t draw ornamental designs on her forehead, or anything that needed too much precision.
Before she could begin experimenting, Nikator said, “Are you ready yet? We’ll be leaving shortly.”
Biyu reached for a thin angled brush. “Leaving where?”
“To the gardens.”
“You’ll let me go there? Why?” She still didn’t turn around to face him.
She twisted the brush in her hand and hesitated over what to do first—cream, powder, rouge, paint?
She couldn’t remember what the first step was.
She could vaguely remember the maidservants applying face powder, then doing her eyebrows, maybe her cheeks after that?
At what point did they draw between her eyebrows?
“Because His Majesty summoned you.”
The brush clattered onto her vanity top.
Her nostrils flared and her pulse raced.
She tried to control the horror clawing beneath her skin, causing goosebumps along her flesh.
She didn’t trust herself to look composed, so she only stared at her reflection in the small, handheld mirror.
Her skin was pallid and ghost like. “Why—” She swallowed, her voice growing shrill. “Why does the emperor want to see me?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Did you—” She whirled around to find him leaning against her door, his arms folded over his chest, and narrowed gaze focused on her. He appeared too casual, like he had simply mentioned the weather, instead of telling her that she would be walking to her doom. “Did you tell him?”
“No,” he said sharply.
She waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t.
He only continued to glare at her. Biyu’s lips trembled and she fought the urge to vomit, or faint, or …
or do something to embarrass herself further.
He already knew she was terrified of Drakkon Muyang; she didn’t need to make him think that she was more scared than usual because of her treason.
She had seen the way the emperor handled traitors; once, in the beginning of his reign, he had purged all of the people in the palace who still aligned with her father.
Then he had called everyone to the throne room.
She could still remember the scent of iron, the pungent rot and death that pervaded the air.
He had a pile of corpses in the center of the room and he sat upon them, blood oozing and dripping from the stacked, severed bodies.
She remembered the cruel smile that had twisted his lips. The wickedness that had graced his beautiful face. “Are there any more traitors in our midst? Come, join your brethren.”
He must have realized she was a traitor. She shouldn’t have involved herself. She shouldn’t have thought she was smart enough to pull this off. Or stealthy enough. Or strong enough. She was just weak-willed Biyu. She was useless. She was—
“He doesn’t know.” Nikator’s words snapped her out of her self-deprecating, spiraling thoughts.
Biyu flinched. “But how do you know?”
“Because if he found out you bound us in a cursed marriage, he wouldn’t wait to summon you. He would come here himself and force you to explain yourself.”
“Then why—” Her voice cracked and she laced her hands together to keep from trembling so hard. “Why would he call for me?”
He watched her carefully, silence stretching thin between them both. Then, finally, he said, “I’m not sure, but we should hurry.”
Biyu released a shuddered breath. She wanted to run.
To scream. To cry and go somewhere else away from all these people.
She hated being on precipice of life and death at all times, because being an imprisoned princess meant that she could be executed any day now for whatever reason—she wasn’t supposed to even be alive, actually, since most usurpations resulted in the immediate deaths of all royals.
Even if Drakkon Muyang didn’t know she was a traitor, he could do whatever he wished with her life.
She was only alive because of his whim.