Chapter Thirteen
The Assassin's Dilemma
Nesilhan
THE MORNING LIGHT filtering through the stained glass windows casts eerie patterns across the breakfast table, painting Kaan's sharp features in alternating shades of crimson and violet.
I push my food around my plate, hyper-aware of his gaze on me.
Yesterday, he insisted on us sparring again, my muscles ached from the heavy session.
Two weeks have passed since the corridor incident during which Kaan maintains constant surveillance over me, and the memory of it still burns beneath my skin like a brand.
"Not hungry, hatun ?" Kaan asks, his voice deceptively casual as he cuts into a piece of uncooked meat. Blood pools on his plate, and I wonder briefly if the chef prepared it that way on purpose, a visual reminder of the Shadow Lord's predatory nature .
"I find my appetite diminishes in certain company," I reply, meeting his eyes across the table.
His lips curl into that infuriating half-smile. "Strange. You seemed perfectly capable of tolerating my presence during yesterday's council meeting and our sparring session and our evening meal. Is it the morning light that makes me more intolerable?"
Heat rushes to my cheeks, but I refuse to look away. "The council meeting was a political necessity, the rest I was forced to do, and this breakfast is torture by choice."
"How refreshing," he remarks, taking a deliberate bite of his meal, eyes never leaving mine. "Most of the court only speaks such candid truths behind my back."
I open my mouth to deliver a scathing retort when a familiar scent teases my nostrils, jasmine and something wilder, more ancient. My stomach drops. Banu is near, and from the sudden alertness in Kaan's posture, he senses something too.
A shimmer of silver light dances at the edge of my vision, just behind Kaan's shoulder. I try not to react, but my fingers tighten around my fork.
Not now, Banu. Please, not now.
"Something wrong?" Kaan asks, his shadows coiling more densely around him. "You've gone rather pale."
I force a smile. "Nothing at all. Just... contemplating the many ways I might poison your food without detection."
His laugh is genuine, startling in its warmth. "Points for honesty, though I should remind you of our blood bond. My death would hardly be comfortable for you."
"Some discomforts are worth enduring," I counter, trying to ignore Banu, who has materialized more fully behind him, making obscene gestures that would scandalize even the most libertine courtier.
My eyes widen in horror as she begins a silent but graphic pantomime involving Kaan's shadows and what appears to be an extremely acrobatic position. I choke on my tea.
"Something amusing?" Kaan's eyes narrow, his head beginning to turn.
"Headache," I blurt, pressing my fingertips to my temple. "A sudden, splitting headache."
Banu freezes mid-gesture, then pouts dramatically at my interruption.
Kaan studies me, suspicion evident in his expression. "A headache? How convenient. And here I thought perhaps you were seeing ghosts." His shadows stretch toward the space where Banu hovers, but she darts higher, staying just out of their reach.
"Not ghosts," I say, rising from my chair. "Just the constant, pounding reminder that I'm bound to a monster."
Something flickers in his eyes, a momentary glimpse of hurt that he quickly masks behind familiar mockery. But it vanishes so quickly, I must imagine it.
"I need to lie down," I continue, pressing my advantage. "Unless you'd prefer I vomit across the breakfast table? I'm finding the smell of blood rather... provocative this morning."
Kaan rises with predatory grace, coming around the table. I brace myself, but he keeps a careful distance, his posture mocking rather than accommodating.
"Allow me to escort you to our chambers, then. We wouldn't want you collapsing in a corridor where just anyone might find you."
We walk side by side, but not touching; my awareness of him is heightened by the careful space he maintains between us. The blood bond pulses despite the physical distance, a constant reminder of our unnatural connection.
"Your concern is overwhelming," I say dryly.
"Anything for my beloved bride." His smile is as sharp as glass. " Though I wonder…is it truly a headache, or merely an excuse to escape my company?"
"If I wanted to escape your company," I reply, fighting to keep my expression neutral, "I would need a far more elaborate plan than feigning illness."
"Such as?"
"Elaborate requires planning. Planning requires privacy. Privacy is something you've denied me."
We walk in silence through the palace corridors, the tension from breakfast still crackling between us. Perhaps seeking to defuse it, or maybe from genuine curiosity, he says suddenly, "Tell me about your childhood."
The request catches me off guard. "Why would you care about that?"
He shrugs, a surprisingly human gesture for someone who works so hard to present himself as monstrous. "Consider it an attempt at conventional marital conversation. Unless you prefer our usual discourse of threats and violence?"
"I—" I falter, unsure how to respond to this apparent olive branch. "It was... normal, I suppose. Until it wasn't."
"Normal by whose standards? The Light Court nobles hardly live ordinary lives."
"We had gardens," I hear myself saying, memories surfacing unbidden. "My mother would take me there in the mornings. We'd name the birds that came to feed, making up elaborate stories about their secret lives when they flew away."
A ghost of a smile touches his lips. "A fanciful pastime."
"She believed imagination was as important as combat training." The words flow more easily now, carried on a tide of recollection. "She taught me to see possibilities where others saw only obstacles."
"She sounds unlike most Light Court nobles I've encountered. "
I stop at my chamber doors, suddenly weary in truth rather than pretense. "She was... special. She had a way of finding light in the darkest places."
"And when did this idyllic childhood end?" Kaan asks, his voice uncharacteristically gentle.
The tenderness of the moment shatters as her death rushes back to me, her broken body, the distinctive shadow burns on her skin. Burns from magic like his.
"When Shadow Court soldiers murdered her," I say, ice crystallizing around each word. "When men like you decided her light needed to be extinguished."
His expression darkens. "Be careful, Nesilhan."
"You were there," I cut him off, rage building within me. "My father told me everything. You were part of the shadow squad that crossed our borders that night."
Something flashes in his eyes, surprise, confusion?
"I've never crossed Light Court borders on raids.
Your father is either lying or mistaken about my involvement.
" His voice is dangerously soft. "Have you considered that the man who raised you to be a weapon might not be telling you the whole truth? "
The accusation strikes hard, momentarily stealing my breath.
"Rest well, hatun ," he adds, his tone deceptively light. "Hatred is exhausting when built on shaky foundations."
Without another word, he turns and leaves. I don’t linger but enter our room. I stay close to the door listening.
As soon as his footsteps fade, Banu materializes fully in the center of the room, her hair cycling through shades of silver and blue.
"Well, that was dramatic," she announces, crossing her arms. "Though I must say, that whole wistful childhood memory exchange was unexpectedly tender. Is the mighty assassin developing feelings for her monstrous husband? "
"The only feeling I'm developing is the urge to strangle a certain interfering fairy," I hiss, advancing on her. "What were you thinking, showing yourself like that? Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?"
Banu flutters her eyelashes innocently. "Me? Dangerous? I'm just a helpful friend checking on your well-being after you've been avoiding me."
"Avoiding you? I've been under constant surveillance! Kaan hasn't left my side!"
"Details, details." She waves a dismissive hand. "I needed to talk to you, and you weren't exactly making yourself available. Besides, you should be thanking me for my last intervention."
Heat rises to my cheeks at the memory of what her "intervention" led to. "Thanking you? You drugged me with faerie dust that made me…"
"Made you finally release all that delicious tension?" she interrupts, grinning wickedly. "Honestly, Nesi, you were wound tighter than a corseted virgin on her wedding night. You needed a good—"
"Don't say it," I warn.
"—fucking," she finishes smugly. "And from what I heard, and half the court heard, it was spectacular."
I lunge for her, but she darts just out of reach, laughing. "Oh, come on, don't be such a prude! You can't tell me you didn't enjoy it. The way you were screaming his name—"
"That wasn't me! That was your dust!"
She snorts inelegantly. "My dust doesn't create desires that aren't already there, sweet one. It just... lowers inhibitions. Removes barriers. Lets the true self emerge." She waggles her eyebrows suggestively. "And your true self apparently enjoys public displays of affection."
"I'm going to kill you," I growl, grabbing for her again. "Slowly. Painfully."
"Such gratitude!" She floats up toward the ceiling, just out of reach. She laughs, the sound like silver bells. "I best go, and let you calm down. Try not to do anything stupid like falling in love with Shadow Boy before then."
"I'm not—"
Before I can finish my sentence, she vanishes completely, leaving only the faint scent of jasmine in her wake.
"Damn it, Banu!" I call into the empty room, but there's no reply.
With Kaan believing me incapacitated and Banu gone, I have a rare moment of true privacy, a chance to work on the nightshade extract I've been developing in secret.