Page 88 of The Nymph Prince

And he was smiling.

Why is he smiling?

“I like you, Prince Lorcan,” he said, slapping the arm of the throne and getting to his feet. He was much taller than he’d looked when sitting down. “I’ve never had someone speak such honesty to me. I feel that a battle of wits between us would be glorious.”

As he stepped off the dais, the men at my sides tightened their grips on their swords. So clunky the humans were, wearing heavy chainmail and metal armor that weighed them down and helmets that prevented them from moving their heads certain ways.

“Come. Follow me.” King James turned and walked toward a doorway to the right of the room.

I followed him, hiding my budding nerves.

I’d been stripped of my dagger upon entering the throne room, but I didn’t need a weapon in order to kill. If it came to that. I’d told myself I wouldn’t use my power of persuasion to gain his favor, but I would if I had to. Or I’d tell him to kill himself.

Either worked for me.

“I thought we could sit together and discuss business over a glass of ale,” King James said before ducking under an archway that led into another room. “Better than being in such a formal setting, don’t you think?”

“Sure.”

The room was simple with only a table, a few cabinets, and two floor-to-ceiling windows. Maybe by human standards it wasn’t bare, and it only seemed that way to me because Father hated unadorned walls in his palace.

“Sit,” the king said, pointing to a chair.

A young woman hurried into the room and went to the table against the far wall. She retrieved two glasses and filled each halfway with ale before rushing over and placing them in front of us.

“Thank you,” I told her.

Her brown eyes widened and she did a small curtsy.

King James flicked a hand at her. “Be gone, will you?”

The man was a complete prat.

I sipped the ale and tried not to cringe from the bitter taste. It was better than the drink I’d ordered when Alek and I’d traveled the surface together, but it was still horrid.

“What you said earlier,” I started after dabbing at my mouth. “How have my kind been troubling you? As I said, we keep to ourselves and want no trouble. We especially don’t want a war.”

Yellow-brown eyes held my gaze. “I’m unsure if you are trying to deceive me…or if you’re actually that clueless. Ships from my fleet have vanished, as if swallowed by the sea herself. The ones thatdoturn up again have pale-faced men who speak of creatures attacking them from the sea. Of beautiful women who lured sailors to their deaths. Now, that’s your kind, correct?”

“The sirens were killed by my father years ago,” I argued. “He wanted no quarrel with the humans, and when the sirens refused to obey his command and killed men anyway, he sent a force of men to dispose of them.”

“Do you call me a liar?”

“No,” I said. “I only express my shock at hearing the news. I assure you that neither I nor my father knew of this.”

“It seems some of your kind wishes for a war, then,” he said, glaring at me. “Disobeying their own ruler.”

Everything then became clear, and I regarded the king. “Is this why you intend to start a war with us? Because some of your ships have been attacked?”

“It is,” he said before taking a drink of his ale. Red trickled from his lips as he lowered the goblet and pinned me with a stare. “And unless you give me a good reason not to pursue that war, I will have no choice but to take you as my prisoner. Nothing personal, you see. But the heir to the kingdom of the sea is much too great of a bargaining tool.”

Only a truly wicked man could stare you in the eyes and smile as he spoke of your demise.

“I’ve come to discuss peace between us,” I stated, thinking of my friends outside the throne room. Ones who would be struck down if I couldn’t convince this despicable man of a truce. “But therewillbe war, regardless of whether we come to a truce this day or not.”

That had the arrogant grin slipping from his face.

“Explain.”