Chapter 20 The Word No
I had dragged my work into the courtyard because my office felt like it was shrinking around me.
Stone walls, thick tapestries, air that never moved power had a way of turning rooms into cages if you stayed in them too long.
Out here, sunlight warmed the paving stones, the scent of grass and oil and steel mixing together.
Guards trained along the perimeter. Servants crossed the space with baskets and ledgers. Life moved.
I was leaning over a makeshift table beneath an olive tree, parchment weighed down by inkstones, when the sound ripped through the air.
Not raised voices.
Not an argument.
A shout raw, furious, unrestrained.
I straightened instantly, heart jolting hard against my ribs.
Another shout followed. A woman's voice this time sharp, shrill, edged with panic.
I didn't think. I moved.
Boots struck stone as I rounded the corner
And I saw my sister fly.
Isla's body left the ground as if she'd been thrown by a giant's hand.
She sailed through the air in a flash of pale silk and tangled hair before slamming into the courtyard stones.
The sound was sickening bone and breath driven violently from her lungs.
She skidded across the ground and came to a halt near the fountain, gasping, hands clawing uselessly at the stone.
I stopped so suddenly my breath caught.
Because Dante stood at the center of the courtyard.
Only dark trousers clung low on his hips, fabric damp with sweat. His chest rose and fell hard, skin streaked with dust and sunlight, muscles drawn tight and alive like coiled steel. Every line of him spoke of movement of strength held barely in check.
A sword hung loose in his hand.
Not raised.
Not lowered.
Ready.
He looked like he'd been training no, fighting and whatever had happened before I arrived had already crossed every line it possibly could.
"Are you insane?" Dante roared, his voice cracking across the courtyard like thunder. "Do you not understand I am not interested in you?"
Isla tried to push herself upright, slipping on stone, silk torn, hair disheveled. For the first time, I saw real fear on her face not wounded pride, not outrage.
Fear.
Dante stalked toward her, each step slow, deliberate, lethal. The sword lifted slightly with him, the sunlight flashing along its edge.
"Of all the women in this land," he said coldly, every word razor-sharp, "you believe I could be with a traitorous lowlife like you?"
My mind stalled.
My eyes betrayed me.
For half a heartbeat—just half—I was no longer Queen, no longer strategist, no longer survivor of two deaths.
I was remembering.
The same shoulders.
The same arms.
The same body that once lifted me effortlessly, spun me laughing across a battlefield slick with blood, carried me half-asleep through a war camp because I'd worked myself past exhaustion.
I was staring.
Actually staring.
Completely useless.
The sword lifted higher.
Isla screamed.
"STOP!"
Alexander's voice tore through the moment from behind me.
I flinched back into myself as if struck. Reality crashed down all at once too fast, too loud. I suddenly saw everything.
The guards frozen mid-motion.
Servants pressed against walls.
Nobles staring from arches and balconies, mouths open, eyes bright with horror and fascination.
Too many witnesses.
If Dante killed Isla here
It would remove one of my greatest problems.
It would also ignite a diplomatic catastrophe that would drown us all in blood.
I opened my mouth. "Dante—stand—"
He turned before I finished.
His head snapped toward us, eyes blazing, something feral and ancient burning there. Alexander stood rigid beside me, fury and fear twisting his expression into something almost unrecognizable.
Dante's lip curled.
"Keep your pet on a leash," he growled, voice low and vicious, "before I end her."
The words seemed to vibrate through the stone.
Isla whimpered behind him.
Dante looked back at her, sword still in hand, gaze merciless.
"This is your only warning," he said, cold and absolute. "The next time you throw yourself at me, you will meet my blade."
No threat.
A statement.
Then he turned.
Just turned and walked away.
He didn't look back. Didn't care that his shirt lay discarded near the training rack, that weighted practice gear sat abandoned where he'd dropped it. He left the courtyard like a storm that had decided it was finished destroying things for the day.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
I moved without thinking, crossing the space quickly and scooping his shirt from the ground. The fabric was warm. Heavy. Real.
I turned sharply to the nearest guard.
"Take my sister to the infirmary," I ordered. "Now."
The guard snapped into motion immediately, shouting for assistance as others rushed to Isla. I didn't spare her another glance.
She wasn't my priority.
Dante was.
I followed the direction he'd gone, steps quick and purposeful, my grip tightening on the shirt in my hands.
"Where are you going?" Alexander demanded behind me, his voice sharp with accusation and something dangerously close to panic.
I didn't slow.
I didn't turn.
"To make sure," I said coolly, each word edged with steel, "that my sister didn't start a war by not understanding the word no."
And this time
I meant every single word.