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Chapter Twenty-Seven

T he blood drains from my face.

My frame of view is narrow but clear. The adjoining room is small yet long—a repurposed bedroom, it seems. Two wing chairs point toward a makeshift stage, where a trio of women dip and twirl about on swathes of cloth suspended from the ceiling like swings.

A mellow beat carries idly, thumping against my breastbone, and upon closer inspection, I recognize one of the women.

She looks different this time, not as much like me without the intrinsic tailoring.

But she is not the reason bile claws at the back of my throat.

Illian lounges on the chair to my left, a glass of bourbon in hand. And though he’s angled away, I would know those ruby-red rings anywhere. Just like I know the profile, the boots, and the weathered hands of the man next to him, uniform or not.

My father.

Pain and panic lace between my ribs, knotting my insides, and I can’t seem to pull in a breath. The monster who murdered Emilia is conversing with the man who holds my noose.

I had assumed Illian was working with King Rurik, not with my father. Not directly.

Anton slides the wooden slat closed, and distantly, I hear him whisper my name. But my head is spinning, the room twisting, turning, like I’m on the bow of a ship being knocked about by vicious winds—

He cups my face, brings it toward his own. “Vasalie?”

I snap my gaze toward his but his expression isn’t one of concern. It’s urgency. “I need you to tell me what’s going on—and fast.”

I force a breath, hanging on to his green-gold gaze like an anchor. “That . . .” I rasp, “is General Stova.”

“And?”

I shut my eyes, squeezing them tight, but Anton runs his thumbs over my cheeks. “Look at me,” he commands.

With an exhale, I obey, forcing out my next admission. “Vasti-anna Stova,” I say. “It is the name I was given at birth.”

“You are his daughter?”

“Yes.” I breathe, rubbing my arms against a sudden chill. “I ran away. My stepmother was supposed to come with me, but he”—I swallow—”he found out.”

At that, Anton goes very still.

“Vasalie,” he says softly, “why were you running away?”

I turn my gaze toward the wall, as if I could see through it to the demon beyond. “Because he promised my hand in marriage to a suitor across the sea, effective immediately.” I look at Anton then, my fingers balling into fists. “I was thirteen.”

He lets out a curse, his hands falling away.

And the story breaks from me, a gush of water against a collapsing dam.

“My stepmother, she begged him. Begged him not to go through with it.” Because while I hadn’t known my suitor, Emilia seemed to.

I remember her shouting at my father, saying he was dangerous.

Vile. Not to mention how young I was—“My father had become increasingly violent over the years. And when he found our bags . . .”

I trail off at that, unable to say more, but it doesn’t matter. Anton must see it on my bloodless face.

He squeezes my arm. “I have to open the slat again; I need to know what they are saying. Do you need me to take you downstairs first? I can, but we may not have much time . . .”

“No,” I say, frantic, even as my stomach tightens. “I—can do this. I can stay.”

I want to stay. I have to know why they’re together.

A nod. “Squeeze my arm if you need anything.”

With that, he reopens the spy hole. When he leans in, I do, too, straining to hear over the music.

“. . . and you’re certain that she’ll go through with it?” Illian clanks down his glass on a side table.

My father shifts in his seat. “The little princess wants her power, prepped and presented like a cake in time for her next name day. I am the only one who can give it to her. She knows this.”

“Bold of you to think she won’t dispose of you and keep the crown for herself once Rurik is dead.”

King Rurik.

Dead?

“Laughable,” my father says, flexing a broad-knuckled hand.

“The army answers to me. If I perish by her hand, not even a Fate could maintain command over my men. Of this, she is aware.” His voice turns feral, then, bitter as gall.

“I earned their loyalty, plain as that. I raised them. Bred them. Proffered their earnings. I knocked them down and built them up again; their loyalty is to me. Aesir is no different. I’ve groomed her, primed her, ever since she was little. ”

So that was how he did it. The times he was gone, neglecting Emilia and me, he was there, making sons out of comrades, followers out of allies.

And Aesir . . .

“Furthermore, she knows the position Brisendale will be in once the Gathering concludes; we will need to create a strong front in case Razam retaliates—”

A shuffling sound next to me breaks my attention, and when I cant my gaze, I find Anton digging deep in his cloak.

“. . . logical, but women never are.” Illian stands and stretches, emptying the dregs of his glass. “I trust you will keep her in line.” His gaze skims over the girls before he bats a hand in dismissal. They slide robes over their scantily clad bodies and exit the room.

A clank draws my attention back to Anton, who fiddles with what looks like a golden tube or a miniature spyglass about as wide as my thumb and maybe twice as long. He positions it near the widest part of the spy hole, then twists it, back and forth—

“Let Rurik play his role,” my father says. “Everything will proceed as planned. Morta’s hell, his demise will be a relief.”

Demise.

Because my father is planning treason against his own king.

“Do enjoy your new bride,” Illian drawls, clapping him on the back. “I can’t wait to see that play out, old man.”

Their exchange knits together in my mind, and I understand with sudden, horrible clarity.

Princess Aesir is going to marry him. My father.

She is going to make him a king.

When Crowns divide, and nations collide,

Blood will run high as tides.

Nations collide.

The prophecy, Illian’s plans. There’s so much more to it than I’d imagined.

I dart a frenzied gaze toward Anton, but he’s .

. . occupied. Toying with a new trinket, one that looks like a miniature chest—wooden, rimmed in gold, brass hinges on one end.

I want to shake him. Is he not paying attention?

My father’s voice carries through once more, and I watch as he secures the brass buttons on a dark, wool coat—the one Emilia made for him.

“Greedy she might be, but I can satiate her well enough. I’ve had years to perfect my craft on girls her age.

You understand what happens in encampments, yes?

Free for the taking.” A snake’s smile inches across his lips as he holds out a hand.

The meager contents of my stomach threaten to spill even as a fire lights behind my eyes. Anton nudges me aside, having hooked the miniature spyglass to that strange, wooden box. He nudges it against the spy hole, then draws a key from one of the necklaces on his chest.

He places it in a small groove and twists.

Click.

Both my father and Illian turn.

In a dizzying rush, Anton pulls me away from the wall—

They heard it, the click. Had they seen us, too? Anton drops the slat back in place, but if he does it in time, I can’t tell. I open my mouth, but he presses a finger to his lips.

We listen.

The muffled sounds of voices slip through, though I can’t make out their words. Anton presses an ear to the wall. His eyes widen.

In one swift motion, he sweeps toward me. Grabs my cloak—throws it aside. I gasp. Underneath, I’m left only in a short scrap of velvet that hugs my bust and flares high around my thighs—

A garment appropriate for a place like this.

A knock pummels the door.

Anton yanks off his cloak, his shirt, then his pants, until only a pair of drawers remain. Snatching a wineglass, he slings the liquid across the ivory rug at the foot of the bed. The knock pounds harder, insistent. Then Illian’s voice, calling for Mistress Sezar . . .

Anton musses his hair. I realize, then, what he’s doing, and when his gaze finds mine, there’s a question there. Somehow, I understand. I nod my permission.

Keys jingle from outside the door.

Anton scoops me into his arms—and lowers me onto the bed. He wrenches the sheer canopy shut for the modicum of obscurity it offers. Drawing back the covers, he presses me deep into the sheets, slides my slip high enough to reveal my bare legs—

A click, and the door swings wide.

He covers my lips with his own.

One beat, two. His mouth moves against mine, urgent. Sell it, he seems to plead, coaxing my lips apart, one hand threading up the base of my neck and into my hair.

And so I do.

I curl my hands around his shoulders. Press up into him. Hook my legs around his waist. He deepens the kiss, his chest heaving; I pull him closer. My heart slams against my eardrums. Surely he can feel it, but he only leans harder against me, using his body to shield my own.

He is a client and I am his muse.

We are supposed to be here.

At least the light is dim, almost nonexistent, and the canopy veils us somewhat, but none of that slows my roaring pulse . . .

“It’s nothing,” comes the general’s voice, the door slowly screeching shut. “Let’s go.”

“You’re certain?” Illian says.

I rake my nails down Anton’s back, relishing the moan he releases onto my lips. And when he glides a warm palm along the back of my thigh, one escapes my own. Then he drags it up, up, until he captures my arms—

He raises them above my head.

Instinctively, my hands clench, but he opens them, parting my fingers with his, and the intimacy of it, that slow, languid glide . . .

Reality slips from my grasp, and I forget.