Chapter 9 #3
Lory had a faint feeling of the room shrinking around her.
Perhaps it was that Anees had sat down on her one side while Bleek was sitting on the other, hand still at her back.
And from the other end of the room, Khayrivven prowled closer, his towering form halting mere steps from them, cold gaze leveled on Bleek.
“Nothing about your character indicates you need to touch her.”
Bleek cocked his head, a groomed brow raised. “A true nobleman would give a lady comfort in times of need.” Lory wasn’t sure she imagined the challenge in his tone, but did it matter what a nobleman would have done? This wasn’t the palace.
“You’re not a nobleman, and I’m not a lady.
I’m a thornling who needs to get tucked into a dress and learn to fake as best she can to speak, move, and act as if I was,” she clarified, getting to her feet and veering out of Khayrivven’s way as she returned to the center of the room, her breathing slowing under the force of her steel will.
Panic wouldn’t help her. Not here, and not when she finally got assigned the death of a fellow human being, be it on a mission or at breakfast. When she faced Bleek again, his flustered expression nearly made her regret her harsh tone.
“Sir,” she amended, wishing she could look at Khayrivven instead to read from his eyes if she’d gone too far.
Thank the Guardians, Bleek recovered quickly, pinning a polite smile as he got up from his chair and followed her to the center of the room.
“Let’s do that, then.” He offered her an open hand, indicating a bow.
“Let’s teach you how to fake nobility. It’s my only task in this endeavor.
Dresses and disguises are Frier’s department, and weapons and killing, Falcrest’s. ”
Lory didn’t feel Bleek’s touch as she placed her hand in the phantom’s, but as she was led in a small circle to Anees’s counting of the rhythm of a dance, she could feel Khayrivven’s eyes like the graze of the burning star that was going to sleep outside the window.
The hallways were empty when Lory left the blue room over two hours later, her feet sore from painfully gracious steps and unnatural spins and turns, her arms heavy from holding them over her head for minutes on end, Bleek’s instructions guiding her across the floor under the scrutiny of Anees and Khayrivven, who both didn’t speak again other than to criticize when she fell out of character, to remind her what would have happened had she done it at court.
According to them, she would have died half a dozen times in the last hour alone, and she wasn’t even wearing one of those restricting dresses.
She was halfway to the corner when Khayrivven caught up with her, nearly startling her to death with his silent approach, and pulling her into one of the same alcoves where she had once confronted him about their first kiss, when he’d spread the story that he’d set her on fire with a torch for her supposed improper approaches.
Lory was still catching her breath when he spun her around, back to the wall, and pinned her hand next to her head on the rough stone.
“Tell me that this is as hard for you as it is for me,” he whispered, his face half cast in shadows as he studied her face with intent eyes.
“Tell me that having him touch you is as torturous to you as watching it is to me.”
This time, Lory’s breath caught for an entirely different reason.
“You didn’t need to stay and watch,” she told him with less bravado than she’d hoped, but Khayrivven’s eyes flashed dangerously, the quip clearly hitting a mark, even when spoken as a jest, to eradicate that tormented expression from his face.
“Oh yes I did.” Exasperation snuck into his whisper, desperation even. “I need to get myself acquainted with the idea of another man leading you across the dance floor tomorrow night.”
“For the mission?” Lory prompted, processing that look on his face. She’d seen Khayrivven in many states, had seen a desire so deep it could destroy her and the wrath of the Guardians in his eyes, but jealousy? That was an emotion she hadn’t believed Khayrivven Falcrest capable of.
“You will need to do many despicable things throughout your years as an assassin, Lory, that’s for sure. Dancing with those pricks at court is only one of them.”
Lory rested her head against the wall, ignoring the heat pooling in her belly at the hungry look in his eyes.
“Jealousy is a petty trait,” she repeated what her mother used to tell Evven and her when they had sat at the side of the street, watching the wealthy people of Dunai promenade along the bazaar, splurging with jewelry and fine fabrics they surely didn’t need but looked oh so pretty, and Lory had voiced her thoughts.
“I’m not jealous.” A dangerous flicker flashed in his eyes as he lifted his free hand and brushed her cheek in a whisper of a touch all the way to her chin.
He gripped it lightly, tipping her face up.
At any point, she could have pulled away, could have freed her wrist from his loose grip, had she wanted to, but the fire smoldering in her core dictated otherwise.
“You can dance with every last man in this entire kingdom,” he growled, his mouth mere inches from hers. “As long as it is your choice. But if it were mine, it would be me. It would be me and no one else.”