Page 31

How had he worded it?

As soon as circumstances allow,Memnon says to me through our bond.

I give him a look. “I want the ‘circumstances’ in question to be that we have to fall in love.” I can live with that.

His eyes flash. This is what Memnon thought he had in the bag yesterday.

“Or,” I add, “if you’d prefer, we could simply get married—” I feel an instant spark of hope from the sorcerer. “Then immediately have it annulled.”

Spark gone.

I smile. Oh, I think I could easily relish this.

Reluctantly, he nods. “We might have to make another vow for it to work, but let me see if the magic will simply adjust to the new meaning behind that clause.”

He closes his eyes, focusing on the vow, and after a moment, I shut my eyes and do the same.

The circumstances needed for us to get married are that we must first fall in love.I repeat it over and over until I believe it. That malaise that has clung to me all day gradually lifts.

When I open my eyes, Memnon is studying me curiously, his head tilted, a small smile of his own curving up one side of his mouth.

“Do you feel better?” he asks.

I nod, sitting back on my haunches in the tall grass. “I think it worked. Did the vow…affect you too?”

Memnon gives a sharp nod. “I was under its compulsion as much as you were. I don’t feel its effects any longer, but if they come back, we will need to make another unbreakable vow.”

Or marry. But he’s smart enough not to propose that.

The sorcerer is still studying me with that peculiar look on his face that’s part amusement, part curiosity. It’s tempered by the somber air he has about him, but it’s making me oddly self-conscious.

I tuck a lock of hair behind my ear. “What are you thinking about?” I ask.

Memnon’s gaze is steady. “That I should’ve given you control long ago.” He stops speaking, and I think that’s it. However, after a protracted moment, he frowns as more words are pried from his lips. “I’m also replaying your last day as Roxilana over and over again in the back of my mind,” he adds unwillingly, “but I’m trying not to let you see how I’m slowly suffocating on my own pain.” After he finishes speaking, he grimaces. For all that we are connected, Memnon still has his secrets.

Or he did until now.

I didn’t really want to hear that either, if I’m being honest. Memnon is more palatable when he’s heartless and cruelly devious. Now that we have this arrangement, that’s where I want to keep him.

“I’m fine,” I say, trying to brush over the events. “I’m alive.” But Memnon also violently lost his mother and sister, and unlike me, they’re not coming back. He has to come to terms with that as well.

I clear my throat, eager to turn the conversation away from the past.

“I don’t want you to hurt my friends ever again,” I say.

Memnon’s eyes sharpen. “You’re going to need to nuance that command.”

My knee-jerk reaction is to argue with him, but I can begrudgingly admit he has a point. I literally just showed him a memory of two supposed friends betraying him. I fought them both, and if I hadn’t been able to hurt them, I would be long dead.

“You are not to hurt my friends unless there’s a reasonable cause for it,” I amend.

Shit, there’s definitely room for Memnon to abuse that rule. Whatever. I can fine-tune the command later.

I draw in a breath. “Now that you know what happened between us long ago, I want to talk about the other reason I called you here.” The real reason.

He waits, arms casually slung over his knees, watching me again with that look in his eye as dusk bleeds into darkness.

“You told me not so long ago that I have enemies,” I say.