It seemed like the goddess had a very ironic sense of humor where I was concerned.
I looked down at my hands and thought about what it was like when power coursed through me. I had felt utterly invincible.
When we walked through the palace gates, Ahyana slipped her arm through Rokh’s and he was murmuring things in her ear while she giggled. Given what she’d said a few minutes ago, I assumed that she had already told him about her magic. I couldn’t imagine her keeping it from him. I wondered if it would make her feel more betrayed when she found out that he had been keeping something from her while she was being open and honest with him.
That led me to thinking about my own relationship and the trust between Xander and me. We weren’t quite there yet. We were working on it, and I hoped trust was growing on both sides as we were more vulnerable with each other, but I knew that we still had a very long way to go.
Not like Ahyana and Rokh, who were finishing each other’s sentences and looking so deliriously happy that it was a bit painful to be around them.
I wondered if it was hard for Zalira as well.
We arrived at the house, and this one didn’t have a guard outside. I remembered when Xander had taken me to Erisa’s safe house—he’d said there weren’t any guards so as to not draw attention to it. My guess was that Thrax had insisted on it so that no one would guess there was a precious person inside.
“I’ll leave you here,” Rokh said. “I’m going to walk Ahyana back to the palace, and then I’ll return for you.”
I nodded and thanked them both for accompanying me, and they left. I knew we had to be careful—Erisa still wanted me dead and there was an army on its way, but after discovering my aspect? I wasn’t quite as worried as I had been before.
The door opened slightly and I wasn’t sure what to make of it. Had it not been latched properly? I reached for it and then a hand clamped down on my wrist and yanked me inside.
Before I could react, a woman pushed me up against the wall and held a knife to my throat. She was almost as tall as Xander, had red hair and pale skin that was covered in blue tattoos.
“You must be Basileia,” I said, not moving so that she wouldn’t accidentally slit my throat. That could get both me and Xander killed.
She grinned and dropped her blade, taking a step back. “I am. You must be Lia. I’ve heard a high amount of nauseatingly good things about you.”
Thrax had been right. I did like her. “And I’ve heard almost nothing about you.”
“Doesn’t surprise me,” she said with a wink. “Thrax and his precious male ego are very, very intimidated by me.”
I definitely liked her. “Thank you for protecting Quynh.”
She sheathed her blade. “She will soon be my sister, so it is both my honor and my duty. Even if it weren’t, I suspect I would still do it. How does someone so tiny have that much fire and spirit?”
I was proud of myself that I didn’t tense up when she talked about Quynh becoming her family. It made sense that Quynh and Thrax would get married if they loved each other. I told myself it was a good thing. The more people who could love my sister, the better. She deserved to have that.
Especially if I wasn’t going to be around long enough to make sure that she was safe. “She’s always been that way.”
Basileia nodded. “Stubborn, too. If it were up to me, I would take her back to Thrace. I worry about her safety here, especially without knowing who your enemies are. But she refuses to leave.”
“That sounds like my sister.” I paused for a moment and then asked a question I’d been dying to have answered for a long time. “What do the blue tattoos mean?”
If she found my question strange, she didn’t show it. “Each mark is for an enemy I’ve killed.”
She had more of them than Thrax did.
“More than my brother,” she said with a grin, as if she could read my mind.
“How did you come to be in Troas?”
“Our mother wanted me to come check on Thrax, as we hadn’t heard from him in a while, and I arrived right before the attacks. I wish I had been staying in the weapons quarter so that I could have helped. By the time I got there, it was over.”
I was certain she would have taken out quite a few people, had she been given the chance.
“Thrax was gone,” she continued on. “I believe you went with him to Lycia?”
“Yes.” Someone else saying the name of that village filled my mind with images of all those people who had been slaughtered.
“When he returned he found Quynh and made sure she was safe. I found him at the palace. He entrusted me with watching over her because he didn’t know who else he could trust. He wanted to make sure that your enemies couldn’t find her.”
