Boots thudded to a stop near our table, and I forced my gaze notto stray up, focusing my attention on the greasy mystery meat and the faces of my companions.
Unlike everyone else in the room, they appeared calm and unaffected—revealing none of the violence tucked away beneath their skin, none of the magic swimming below the surface, ready to surge forth at the first summons.
The moments ticked by, and the booted feet beside our table did not move. I finally looked up.
A soldier gazed down at me in an expectant way that told me he had been looking at me for some time—thatIwas the sole reason he had stopped at our table. He rubbed at his lip, drawing attention to the dark spaces in his mouth where teeth should be. “You look familiar.”
My stomach sank, and I resisted the impulse to touch my hair. It was a nuisance. The fiery red did not make me inconspicuous. Even if red hair wasn’t a characteristic of witches—of blood witches, to be exact—it had always marked me as different from others.
He assessed me. Not quite a leer, but something else. Something deep and probing and suspicious. The suspicion that these same men had impaled those people stayed with me. I did not want their focus on me and yet I had it.
I offered a weak smile. “I am sorry. We’ve never met.”
He cocked his head to the side. His toothless smile gave him an odd appearance, as though his mouth were a large, gaping maw. “Do I detect a hint of the south in your voice?”
I swallowed thickly. Yes. Of course he did.
I shot a helpless look at Vetr.
He didn’t know who I was. I winced inwardly. Or rather, who I had been. I’d never shared my roots with him. I’d told myself it didn’t matter anymore and that forgetting the past was part of moving forward.
He knew only that I had been Fell’s wife. It wasn’t that he didn’t care about me—he was wholly invested in me as a member of the pride. I did not doubt that. I was a fire-breather, after all. It was only that my life as a human held no interest to him.
He had no idea when he chose me for this rekon that I would potentially be recognized. If I had told him, I doubted I would be sitting here now.
“I spent a little time in the south as a child,” I quickly supplied. No sense denying the truth he heard in my voice.
“It’s nice to hear the sound of home on your tongue,” he mused, appraising me. “You live here now?” He flicked thick, sausage-like fingers around us. “In this shithole?”
I shot another quick glance to Vetr, seeking guidance.
Vetr stared back, his features schooled into a neutral expression, and I realized he would not be weighing in on my behalf. From the glacial glint to his eyes, I could infer he was not happy with the attention I had brought our little group, but he was waiting to see what I did … and said.
Well, I didn’t like it either. I could do nothing about it, however, except be as cordial as possible until this soldier moved on. “Hereabouts,” I said. “In the area.”
He wagged a finger close to my face. “You bear a strong resemblance to Lady Tamsyn. Does she not, lads?”
At the sound of my name, my stomach plummeted to my boots. The soldiers nodded in agreement even as the self-appointed speaker of the trio snapped his fingers and added, “Or, to be more accurate, Lady Dryhten, since you married the Beast.”
Since you married the Beast.
He was speaking as though my identity were decided and he could not be swayed. Dread climbed up my throat, mingling with the steam gathering there. I compressed my lips, trying to smother both.
I shook my head, pretending I did not feel Vetr’s ice-hard stare on me. “I’m sorry. No—”
“Uncanny.” He bent down, dipping his head closer and blasting me with breath that reeked of fish and sour ale.
I parted my lips carefully and attempted to speak again. “You are mistaken, sir.”
He peered at me so closely, I was certain he could count each individual pore on my face. “Aye, it is you.” He nodded with growing certainty. “I served in the palace for a time, had guard duty at the bailey gates. I used to watch you and the other princesses run all over the courtyard. Sometimes you would ride out for picnics, remember?”
I almost nodded, beset with that sweetly faded memory.Other princesses.
I stole a glance at Vetr, gauging his reaction to this revelation. Those frost-colored eyes of his stared straight ahead. The slash of his nose, lips, and eyes were brutal as always, carved from granite, the very mountains from whence he sprang, and yet there was something colder in his icy gaze, more brutal in the severe lines of his face, and my throat thickened.
The soldier went on. “Sometimes I was dispatched with other guards to watch over you and the other princesses on your outings.” He motioned around his hair in an almost whimsical gesture. “Your hair was in curls back then.”
I remembered those days. The picnics with our governess in tow, beneath the watchful eyes of palace guards. After picnicking we would sometimes set up canvases on easels to sketch the countryside, which was gilded with wildflowers. A properly genteel pastime for gently bred young ladies. A lifetime ago.
