Page 41 of Fit for a Prince (Fit For A Crown #1)

Chapter thirty-eight

T he blood drained from my face, my hand going limp around the sword’s hilt as I let it slip through my fingers. I stared up at the stands.

Cedric’s palm was latched to his mouth, his eyes wide enough for me to see them all the way across the stadium. It was then that I recognized that exact expression. I’d seen it once before, in Ivalon, except he hadn’t been looking at me back then.

What have I done?

The sword dropped harmlessly onto Lochlan’s chest. His face filled with almost as much shock as mine as the sword’s tip barely nicked his brow. He slowly rose to his feet, the pieces of the puzzle still jumbled in his head, not yet creating the same picture Cedric had put together.

I let him see too much...they all saw.

“What is this?” the king boomed from his seat. “Why has the fight ceased? ”

No one said a word. The crowd’s eerie hush was petrifying, but not as much as Cedric’s knowing expression. He exited the stands.

He can’t leave.

I dropped the other sword and ran for the exit, only to remember that there were guards at every corner. I looked toward the second exit, then to the stands, but there was no place for me to escape. I had to find Cedric. I had to explain what he’d seen.

“Get the girl!” the king commanded. “Bring her to me at once. I don’t care if she’s dead or alive.”

I felt like I was in a dream. Guards came at me from all angles, but I couldn’t even see straight. I was exhausted, and all the training I’d relied upon was nowhere to help me now. I stumbled back, trying to make my mind work again so I could think my way out of this.

Lochlan grabbed my arm.

“Come with me,” he hissed, dragging me faster than I could say no. “I’m not done with you yet.”

There was no time to argue or even consider what was going on. He picked a set of guards who must have been loyal to him and pushed straight through them. I let out a sigh of relief, only to suck it back in as he elbowed a guard who was definitely not on his side so he could barge into the armory .

He dropped my arm and grabbed a spear from the wall, hastily barring the door with it just before someone slammed into it from the outside.

The spear splintered from the impact, but it didn’t snap yet.

While I was busy being distracted by the cracking spear handle, Lochlan pulled aside a tapestry and revealed what looked like a brass door knocker.

“Here, now!” he commanded, then grabbed the knocker and pulled. Another slam snapped the spear, wedging it in the door frame just enough that it still couldn’t open. I ran to Lochlan’s side, watching in awe as he revealed a hidden door and a dusty hallway. “Go!”

I darted inside and he pulled the door shut behind us, sealing us in at the same moment the armory door burst open.

We ran down the hall, both of us puffing like chimneys.

The space widened up to an old cellar, filled with dusty barrels of ale that appeared to be so old that the contents had already evaporated.

I braced my hands on my knees, sucking in as much of the dusty air as my lungs could handle as I waited for the room to stop spinning.

The world was about to come back into focus when it was ripped from me once again. Lochlan snatched me by the throat, slamming me up against the nearest stone wall hard enough to make me see stars .

“What was that? ” he shouted, his rage nearly crushing out all the air I’d just regained. “You’re supposed to be a lousy prince’s bride.”

“I-I—”

“You’re not some princess,” he growled, loosening his grip just enough to let me steal a breath. “Who are you? Who are you!” He shifted his grip to my shoulders, shaking me with each crack in his voice.

I can’t.

“I...I’m Diaspro.”

“There’s more,” he growled, his nails digging into my shoulders. “Who taught you how to fight like that?”

“D-Damon.”

“Damon couldn’t have taught you that,” he said. “That wasn’t a mere self-defense move. What you just did was tactical, precise, and executed with a flawlessness that only comes from years of practice. Damon couldn’t have trained you for years .”

I tried to shift free from his grip, but my body wasn’t cooperating with my wishes, and his fingers were cemented to my shoulders.

“I guess I’m just a natural,” I said, my mouth cottony. “Perhaps you’re simply not as good as you think, or you’re merely exaggerating my skills to make yourself feel better. ”

“I’m not exaggerating.” He looked like he was on the brink of going mad, his arms quivering from his pent-up rage.

“I don’t lose sleep over an exaggeration.

I don’t have to avoid an exaggeration because she clouds my thoughts, and I don’t keep exaggerations alive because I obsessively care about unearthing their secrets! ”

“You care?” I narrowed my eyes, my breathing still shallow as he pulled back an inch, rage still filling his soul.

He let me go. The release was slow but rough, like the snap of glass that left a few shards behind. I could still feel the imprint of his hands on my shoulders, the light throb of new bruises tattooing my skin.

“I care for nothing.” He stepped back, letting me breathe yet somehow still stealing my breath. He had never looked so little like Atlas as he did now. He was his own beast. “A prince cares for nothing. That way he is always willing to give up everything.”

Just like Damon.

“If you don’t care, then why didn’t you let the guards kill me?”

“Because you vex me,” he said in a throaty voice. “You’re not who you claim to be, Diaspro, and I refuse to let your secrets die with you.”

Footsteps echoed down the hidden hallway, snapping our attention to the entrance. My first thought was that the guards had found us, but a second later, two familiar faces burst into the room.

“Cedric? Atlas?” I clutched a hand to my chest.

“Looks like I’m not the only one who remembered our old hiding spot,” Lochlan snorted.