7
Darcen wasn’t present at breakfast.
Meront seemed to be trying to finish his oats in record time.
Perhaps because Alixa had decided to join us at our table. Ceaselessly, the noble-born female from Coraldeen peppered him with questions about his ability to hear gold sing under a full moon.
All Moongold heirs had the ability, and even some nobility, which was why they were the wealthiest kingdom on the continent.
Meront grunted yeses and nos.
Celestine was still picking at her breakfast when I finished mine. Her elbow was on the table, and her chin in her hand. She dragged her spoon through her oats, appearing to search the room. I didn’t need to ask to know she wondered where Darcen was.
It wasn’t like the Coraldeen prince to miss a meal.
Our game of Featherfate had been discovered by Priestess Renisha soon after Celestine and Darcen had returned from the cupboard. Though the priestess didn’t believe our rehearsed excuse, she’d simply sent us to wash up for dinner.
We hadn’t talked about Celestine’s kiss, nor my own. After a tense and quiet dinner, she’d meandered up the stairs in a daze. I’d followed, wishing to escape the warmth at my back from the ever-pressing gaze of Voran Valadorn.
But I didn’t visit Celestine before curfew. Not knowing what to say—how much to say—I’d gone to my own room.
Though I still hadn’t been able to decide on anything, I took Celestine’s hand and pulled her from the table with me.
Meront scowled, as if betrayed by us leaving him alone with Alixa. I wasn’t about to feel bad for him because a pretty noble was fawning over him.
Murmurs and eyes trailed us to the stairs. I realized why when we reached them, and the prayer hall fell silent.
Prince Voran halted halfway down the stone steps.
His unbound hair failed to soften the severity of his features. His plush lips hitched to one side, revealing a slight dimple. That almost-smirk shone in his eyes as his fingers swept over the stone railing.
He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to.
Celestine linked her arm through mine. “Ignore him, Ayla.”
Even before that kiss, ignoring the wolf prince’s presence was like trying to walk normally through a ballroom with a broken slipper heel. Impossible.
But I let her tug me up the stairs.
As we passed him, his head turned. Our eyes locked, and within that single missed heartbeat, his pupils expanded.
Held breath rattled from me as soon as we reached the top of the stairs. We quickly walked down the hall to the stairwell entrance. Celestine waited until we were climbing to the north wing before speaking. “Rumor fails to give him enough credit.”
Unsure which rumor she meant, I didn’t respond.
“He’s utterly terrifying.”
“The face and hair?” I tried to jest. “Or his size?”
“All of him.” She feigned shivering. “I’ve not been that close to him since he arrived. If I had…” She pushed open the door atop the stairwell. “Well, I wouldn’t have let you go into that cupboard with him.”
But she had. They all had.
Though we knew Voran couldn’t harm us here on the isle, it didn’t quite sit right. Still, it had been my choice. For some foolish reason, I’d thought I could rid my fear of him by kissing him in that cupboard.
I couldn’t discern if I’d failed or if a different fear had taken root.
“You knew he couldn’t hurt me.”
Arched yellow windows lined the hall that spanned the length of the fortress. Bookshelves adorned the other side, interrupted by doorways and locked doors. Upon wooden benches beneath each salt-and-mildew-speckled window sat forgotten books.
“We couldn’t be certain, though, and for that, I’m sorry. But it just looked like…” Celestine paused to ponder it, her gaze lifting to the cobweb-laced ceiling. “He almost appeared curious about what we were doing, then unwilling to back down. Challenged by the way Meront glowered at him.”
We stopped by a bench seat.
“He did say that he hadn’t played Featherfate before.” I closed my mouth before I told her that I’d then called him a liar.
“Oh?” Her eyes lit. “And what else did he say?”
I sat and brushed a moth from the bench, then patted the wood. “Tell me about Darcen first.”
“Fine.” She joined me with a forced sigh and a smile that didn’t falter when she said, “I think we’re fated.”
My mouth fell open as my brows jumped.
Noticing, she laughed. Then she peered up and down the empty wing. “I had wondered before the game. Being near him now…” Her low voice turned wistful. “It’s been different. And when he kissed me, I felt weightless. Like I’d never truly been kissed before.”
Celestine had kissed quite a few males. She’d even lain with one.
“And the look on his face afterward…” She bit her lip. “He almost looked scared, Ayla. Spooked.”
“Have you spoken to him since?”
She shook her head. “I’m worried he might not want it. He wasn’t at breakfast, and he hasn’t…” A sigh interrupted her. “He’s Meront’s friend, and the only Coraldeen heir.”
Which meant Darcen wouldn’t be permitted to wed someone who didn’t hail from his kingdom—even if they were a princess. As for Meront, I wasn’t sure what he’d make of his good friend being fated to his twin sister.
But I was almost certain that, due to the political barrier, he’d advise Darcen to reject her so that she’d be free of lifelong hurt. An accepted bond was eternal.
So was marriage.
I took Celestine’s hand and squeezed it. “Perhaps he ate too many berries, and he’s suffering from a stomachache.”
“Perhaps.” Her laughter was weak. “So what happened with the evil prince?” She swayed into me. “Did he threaten you?” she asked. “Or simply glare at you until Haynes ripped open the cupboard door?”
For you, I can try to be gentle.
I tensed.
Celestine felt it and released my hand. “Ayla,” she hissed. “What happened?”
“Well, uh…” I hesitated.
Studying me, she gasped. “Menacing Mother. You did kiss him.”
My cheeks began to heat. I poked at a notch in the wood beside my leg. “A little.”
“A little?” she repeated, aghast. “But… how?” She blinked repeatedly. “They don’t call him Raxon’s claws for nothing. He’s his uncle’s dutiful hunter. An assassin. He’s—”
“I know who he is.” The last thing I wanted was a lecture. I gave myself one every time I caught myself recalling that kiss. A kiss far from dreadful. “I don’t need judgment or ridicule. It was just a game.”
“Defensive.”
“Sorry,” I muttered. “I suppose I’m just a bit unnerved by…” I waved my hand. “Well, by it.”
Celestine didn’t respond for some moments. When she did, her tone was wary, each word spoken carefully. “You know, no one knows if you actually kissed the wolf prince.” Shrugging, she said, “Perhaps it’s better to keep it that way?”
Surprise parted my lips.
There had indeed been nary a glance my way over dinner and breakfast. But…
“Haynes saw.” I couldn’t be sure he’d seen us kissing, but he’d certainly seen enough to suggest we had. “He told everyone there would be no bad tidings for us.”
Celestine huffed. “Everyone knows he likes to stir the conch shell.”
Yet Meront believed him.
I didn’t mention that. Instead, I argued, “It shouldn’t even matter. Like I said, it was just a game. Aside from it being five minutes of tasty gossip, who really cares if Voran played Featherfate and kissed me?”
“Uh, a lot of people would care. He’s the enemy,” she said slowly, as if I’d somehow forgotten. “And you don’t earn a ridiculous moniker like Raxon’s claws without committing countless atrocious deeds. He was trained to kill before—”
“He’d even learned how to control his inner wolf,” I finished for her. “I know.” I’d heard it all. Perhaps more than anyone else in this fortress. “Don’t worry. I certainly don’t plan on gloating about it.”
“Good,” she said.
My skin suddenly felt too tight. I stood. “I should head to the vegetable garden before my absence is noticed.”
When I reached the door to the stairwell, Celestine asked, “Was this little kiss horrible?”
Fighting a smile, I said with my back to her, “As horrible as he is.”
Before the door closed behind me, she sang, “Liar.”
Three bathing tubs were not enough.
The rock walls between them granted an illusion of privacy while we washed. Afterward, we were to drain and refill the tub for the next person.
Nonsense, I thought, when we could simply fill it for ourselves and then wash off the sweat.
Steam trailed me from the washroom to the well in the small room across the hall. It was more of a large stone basin than a well, filled with boiled water throughout the afternoon. A tedious job. So the well-workers were given the mornings to do as they wished or rest in preparation.
Celestine wiped her glistening brow, her pants sodden. “I cannot wait to go home.”
The pail clanged against the lip as I leaned over the well to fill it. “Are you almost done?” It appeared to be half full, and many females had already bathed.
“A few more trips to the kitchens. Alixa has barely done three pails all afternoon.” She helped me lift the pail free of the well. Water sloshed over the rim onto the damp floor. “She won’t be quiet about Meront.”
A whisper of annoyance clenched my hand around the handle. “She adores him.”
“I think you mean obsesses over him,” Celestine spat. “She had the nerve to ask me if he sleeps naked.” Trailing me back to the washroom, she made a disgusted noise. “As if I’d know, and as if I’d tell her if I’d had the misfortune of finding out that he does.”
My eyes rounded. “No.”
“Yes,” she hissed.
We passed two cubicles, and I lowered my gaze. While I emptied the pail into the tub, Celestine slumped against the mildewed wall beside it, cheeks flushed and her arms crossed. She blew a piece of blond hair from her eye. “This is torture.”
Dryly, I repeated the priestesses’ overused words, “We must all do our part.” I shook water from the pail, then returned to the well room. As I filled it again, Alixa came through the door from the kitchens.
“There you are,” she said to Celestine.
Moongold’s princess gave me a desperate look.
But I gestured to my pail as I waddled out of the room with it. “I’ll see you at dinner.”
She called, “If I’m not there, please come fetch me.” But she may as well have said come rescue me.
I waved in response, and did my best to keep water from sloshing onto the floor. After filling the metal tub again, I set the pail beside it and went to tell next in line that a bath was ready. Leaving the washroom, I looked down to tighten the ties of my evening robes.
And walked straight into a slippery wall.
My nose protested the contact. Stepping back, I rubbed it and mumbled, “Sorry. I wasn’t watching where—” I fell quiet when the male turned, and I found myself staring at an incredibly large and very bare chest.
Prince Voran.
It should have come as no surprise that he was too impatient to wait for the males’ turn in the washroom. Instead, he’d used the single tub in the laundry room—intended for priestesses who didn’t wish to wait for us to finish bathing.
I failed to hide my shock. Failed to look away, much less move.
Tattoos snagged my eyes. Like those I’d glimpsed on his hands. Curling slashes that adorned his chest and curved around his arms. Scars, I realized. Ink-filled scars.
Claw marks.
Water hung from the sharp clefts of his collarbones and sluiced over the mountainous peaks of his chest. His slicked-back hair exposed his features in a way that felt more improper to see than his naked torso.
In a way that made me wonder if one of his parents had been a descendant of the goddess—for he’d inherited a strange sort of beauty.
An intimidating mixture of alluring and fierce.
Of course, he noticed my perusal. His eyes were waiting for mine. When they met, his narrowed slightly.
Heat climbed my neck to flood my face.
His smirk was as sinister as his gaze. It moved behind me to the wards awaiting a bath on the bench seat in the hall. He then stepped far too close to whisper, “If you want us to kiss again, we should probably find somewhere more private than this.”
With that, he left me gaping at his muscular back.