Page 7 of Lady of the Drowned Empire

My nostrils flared as I snatched my arm back. I couldn’t tell her, couldn’t think it. She couldn’t know. I couldn’t predict how she’d react or if she’d accidentally give us away.

Do you really need to ask? I thought.

“Yes,” she hissed, her dark aura flickering behind her. “There’s something new. It wasn’t there the last time I saw you.”

I rubbed my arm, stepping back in case she tried to grab me again. You’re so dramatic. You saw me ten minutes ago.

Her dark eyebrows formed a V. “You’ve been gone twenty.” She stepped toward me, recapturing the space between us. Cornering me, her eyes darted to my chest, to my heart, to the place where Mercurial’s Valalumir had entered, sealing my fate with his. She couldn’t see the mark, the star, only the armor I wore. I had not been wearing the armor of Asherah—broken in my fight with Haleika—when I’d left this room, but now it was around my neck and shoulders, intact once again.

“Something changed. Something happened out there,” she said.

A lot of things happened tonight.

Meera was leaning in now, her hazel eyes filled with a mix of grief and concern.

I stared forward, refusing to acknowledge her, not wanting to bring her any additional worry.

I’d tell my sisters as soon as this circus was over. They needed to know to truth—we had to prepare, to plan. To get our revenge. To fight.

But not yet.

I looked across the Seating Room to Tristan and his grandparents on either side of him. Lord Trajan sipped a glass of water. Lady Romula, Master of Finance on my father’s council, clutched a glass of wine in a hand dripping with silver rings and bracelets.

Tristan’s grandmother was one of the most prominent leaders on the Bamarian Council, the Council Arianna would soon head.

I could only focus on the soft brown eyes that made my heart ache all over again. Tristan. Loving and losing a cousin sentenced to death by the Emperor because of magic outside their control—magic society deemed evil—wasn’t something anyone should endure. Not being allowed to grieve or mourn, being forbidden from honoring the dead because by Lumerian decree, they were monsters—that had been my fate for two years with Jules.

Now, Tristan faced the same pain at the loss of his cousin Haleika. And on top of his grief, on top of mine, we were being torn apart.

Lady Romula had already ended our engagement earlier tonight—or, at least, she’d ended the possibility of our engagement. Tristan had never actually given me a ring even after two years. And from the look on her face—cracked lips pressed into a smirk, eyes narrowed in disgust toward me—I knew she’d already spoken to Tristan. Despite the hurt and pain she’d caused him and me, she looked rather pleased with her plan.

I needed to talk to him, to make sure he was all right, to find some closure for what we’d been and what we’d tried to be. I needed to be there for him—especially because Haleika’s death, in so many ways, was my fault.

I wasn’t sure I’d ever fully forgive myself for the role I’d played in it. When I closed my eyes, I saw her lying dead, her body broken by the akadim that had killed her—that had eaten her soul. I could see her lover, Leander, dying while trying to save her. I was haunted by the vision of her transformation in the arena and could so clearly see her becoming a monster. I could see myself driving a burning stake through her heart. And I could hear the agonizing screams she’d made, screams that had stopped when Rhyan—my apprentice, my guard, my friend, my love—had ended her pain by cutting off her head.

I clutched at my heart, my breath coming short as the whole scene played before my eyes. The fear and adrenaline I’d felt in the arena still pumped through my veins.

I’d done what I’d had to do to survive and protect Rhyan’s life. But I didn’t know how I was going to live with it—the knowledge of the lengths I was willing to go to in order to protect those I loved.

Or the knowledge of what I’d done to Tristan, the boy I’d known my whole life, the boy I still loved so deeply…just not the way I was supposed to. Only one person had ever owned my heart like that.

A dark shadow pierced through me, pulling my attention away. It was the shadow that had haunted my nightmares since I’d last seen Jules. The dark swirl of energy emanated from the powerful aura of the Imperator.

His dark eyes met mine, as his fingers flexed at his side, dancing over the hilt of his sword. A small grin played on his lips. He sent out a sensation of victory—he’d wanted my attention, and he’d gotten it. A shudder ran through me.

Phantom fingers pressed into my back, into the open wounds he’d ordered and reopened when he’d tortured me months earlier. My hands automatically squeezed into fists, and I had to fight to uncurl them, to not reveal the effect he had on me. He wasn’t touching me now. He wasn’t close enough to touch me. But I wasn’t safe from him. Nor was I safe from his warlord, the Bastardmaker, or the Imperator’s horrible son and heir, Viktor.

Being removed from the line of succession and losing my status and station as heir meant I was more vulnerable than ever.

I pulled my gaze away and automatically searched the room for the one set of eyes I knew would bring me comfort, would make me feel safe. Emerald green eyes.

But Rhyan wasn’t here. He’d been called away in the last hour, sent to guard the outer walls of the fortress.

There was so much happening in Cresthaven that I hadn’t considered how odd it was for there to be such a last-minute change in guard. Or how strange it was for Rhyan to be ordered away from my side. Since he’d been placed on my security team as one of my personal bodyguards and escorts, he had rarely been called away from me—unless he was needed to hunt akadim.

Over a dozen soldiers stood guard before me now. Not one wore the gold of Ka Batavia; not one served Bamaria or was loyal to my family and country. My father had been publicly murdered, my sisters openly attacked, and instead of increasing my protection detail, I’d been left more open and exposed than ever. Where was Aemon, the Ready? Or our soturi, our army?

I was surrounded by the foreign Soturi of Ka Kormac, men loyal to the Imperator—my enemy. Every soturion before me was male and wore silver armor styled like the pelt of a wolf. About half had the black beady eyes of the Bastardmaker, the disgusting excuse for a man who’d carried Jules away on the Imperator’s orders. He was the monster who led Kormac’s soturi.