He jerked me around to face him. “For someone in your precarious position, you don’t choose them wisely.”

“So I’ve been told many times before.”

One of his brows rose slightly as he studied me. “It’s curious that you had no reaction when the emissary revealed Dalbreck’s betrayal of Morrighan. Perhaps you don’t care what happens to your own kingdom? Or maybe you saw no truth in the emissary’s story?”

“On the contrary, Komizar, I believed every word. I simply didn’t find it surprising. In case you aren’t aware, my father put a bounty on my head because I fled from the marriage alliance. I’ve been betrayed by my own father, why not a kingdom? I’m weary of the treachery of all men.”

He pulled me closer, his chest still decorated with the finest work of Morrighese artisans—a gift from Greta to Walther on their wedding day. Thick dark lashes lined his cool black eyes. An arrogant glint filled them. I wanted to scratch them out, but I had no nails. I wanted to draw my dagger, but they had taken that too. I glanced down at the sword at his side embedded with the red jasper of Morrighan, almost within my reach.

“So weary you’d be foolish?” he asked. “It’s harder to kill a man than a horse, Princess.” His grip on my arm tightened. “Do you know what happens when you kill the Komizar?”

“Everyone celebrates?”

A faint grin lit his face. “The job falls to you.” He released my arm and walked over to the table, his hand resting near a deep gouge. “This is where I killed the last Komizar. I was eighteen at the time. That was eleven years ago. Kaden was just a boy. He barely stood to my navel. Small for his age. He’d been starved, but he managed to catch up under my care. A Komizar must raise up his own Rahtan, and he’s been with me since the beginning. We have a long history between us. His loyalties to me run deep.” His thumb rubbed the groove, as if recalling the moment it was made.

His scrutiny turned back to me, sharp-edged. “Do not try to wheedle your way between us. I’m allowing Kaden this diversion for now. My loyalty to him runs deep too, and you might make an interesting diversion for all of us. But make no mistake about it, you and your supposed gift are worth less than nothing to me. The emissary has a better chance of being alive at month’s end than you do. So do not orchestrate games that you will lose.”

His irritation fed me. My well-aimed wedge had hit its mark. You are making me fonder of games by the minute, I wanted to say. It was as if he could read my mind.

His eyes burned bright, molten with threat. “I will repeat, in case your dim royal ears didn’t understand the first time, your position is precarious.”

I returned his stare, knowing that soon I’d see his whole army of butchers wearing the swords of Morrighan at their hips, that for the rest of my life, I’d hear my brother’s and his comrades’ dying cries being thrown up a windswept cliff into my face, all because of him and his disregard for borders and ancient treaties.

“There’s actually nothing precarious about my position,” I said. “I’m wanted for treason in my homeland, and here you’ve taken my freedom, my dreams, and my brother’s life. Everything I care about is gone, and you wear my dead brother’s baldrick as proof. What more could you take from me?”

He reached up, wrapping his hand around my neck, his thumb gently tracing a line along the hollow of my throat. He pressed harder, and I felt the flutter of my pulse under his touch.

“Trust me, Princess,” he whispered. “There’s always more to take.”

I weep for you, my brothers and sisters,
I weep for us all,
For though my days here can be counted,
Your years of struggle have just begun.

—Song of Venda

CHAPTER EIGHT

RAFE

I sat at the table directly across from Kaden. Staring. Cutting him into small pieces with my eyes.

Why they’d brought me in here, I wasn’t sure. Maybe they intended to feed me. Or perhaps let me watch them eat. My hands were still bound behind my back. Kaden sipped an ale, periodically eyeing me, stewing almost as much as I was, I guessed. He had seen Lia kiss me. It ate through him like a stomach worm.

Several of the governors milled around, some shoving my shoulder and encouraging me to drink up, then laughing at their thin joke. A full mug rested on the table in front of me. The only way I could drink was to suck at the foam like a pig at a trough. That was a show they’d have to wait a long time for—I wasn’t that thirsty.

“Where is she?” I asked again.

I thought Kaden was going to answer with more silence, but then he sneered, “What do you care? I thought she was only a summer distraction.”

“I’m not heartless. I don’t want her hurt.”

“Neither do I.” He looked away, engaging a governor who stood just to his right.

A mere summer distraction. I stared at the sloshed foam puddling around the mug, thinking about Lia’s glare again when I said the words, her lip lifted in disgust. Surely she was playing along. The glare was just to strengthen our position. She had to know why I said it. But if she was playing along, she played her part too well.

Something else ate at me too, something I had seen in her eyes, her movements, the tilt of her chin, something I had heard in the hardness of her voice when we were in the cell. It was a Lia I didn’t know, one who spoke of knives and death. Just what had these animals put her through?