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At all.

My gaze narrowed in on the place she held his hand.

Namir glanced over at me when my body stiffened, and his shadows thickened over my hand and arm when my magic gathered within my chest.

Possessiveness; it had to be possessiveness that my monster was reacting to.

But why was she reacting to that?

“It’s good to see you, Halla. I’m afraid Diora here is my mate, so I’m going to need my hand back.” He winked at her, and she sighed happily as she released him.

“I’ve so hoped you’d find her.”

“As did I.” He squeezed our combined hands lightly. “Where’s your mate today?”

He caught my attention with that one, and I looked over at him with interest.

“Oh, the old bastard’s out hunting for more of my favorite fruits again.” She rolled her eyes, though there was a fond smile on her face. “He’ll start to miss me in an hour or two and come running home empty-handed.”

Namir chuckled, and I finally looked at the woman. My eyes narrowed in on her throat, and widened as I followed the strange markings over her skin.

I’d forgotten about that part of the connection, in my tent earlier.

As the bond developed, markings in a lost, ancient language would slowly appear on the pair of fated mates’ skin in the shimmering gold of magic that none of us could possess or change.

This woman, Halla, had found her fated mate and chosen to bond with him.

Stars, there were so many questions I’d like to ask her.

But if Namir was close with her, maybe he already knew the answer to those questions.

“Diora prefers black and gold,” Namir explained, catching my attention again. “We were hoping you could help her out.”

I thought I might’ve missed some part of the conversation, but had no desire to announce my distraction out loud.

“We’ll bring coins afterward,” I added hastily, not wanting her to think I was hoping she would just hand over her wares without any financial gain.

“Oh, nonsense. The king’s fated doesn’t pay here.” She waved it off, then gestured me back behind her stall. “Let me see what I have that will fit you. I’ll need to measure your hips, waist, and bust.”

I released Namir’s hand, assuming he would stay close. He hadn’t wandered away even when I’d tried to force him to thus far, so I couldn’t imagine he’d choose that moment to leave me.

Halla pulled out a long strip of fabric with lines on it, and I eyed it suspiciously.

Noticing me staring, she frowned a bit. “This is just a measuring tape. It goes around you, to tell me how wide you are.”

Ah.

I nodded, like I’d known from the beginning. The last thing I wanted was for everyone in the city to know that I was clueless about so many things.

She circled me, quickly wrapping her measuring tape around me in a few different locations. My eyebrows lifted when it went around the middle of my breasts, but she was moving it somewhere else before I could feel violated.

“Do you know your height?” She continued measuring.

I looked at Namir.

“No. She’s had… an interesting life,” he explained without actually explaining anything.

“I’ve never seen measurements like these before. You haven’t been feeding her enough,” Halla tsked at the king, stretching her tape from the top of my head to my toes. “I’ll have to alter something.”