The soldiers start for us. “Wait,” I say. Two of the males grab me by the arms. I jerk and twist, trying to free myself, then a third one comes and snatches up my feet and I’m fucked. “What kind of deal? I’ll tell you whatever you want to know,” I shout, twisting in my captors’ arms so I can see the king. He’s already taking a paper from some servant or adviser or whatever he is, and is looking it over as though we never existed. “Troi killed the queen.”
The soldiers holding me freeze and turn me around so I’m facing Khalmos. “I mean, he hired the assassin.” The king looks at me then, eyes assessing. “Of course he did,” he says. “The question is, do you have proof?”
He already knows the answer to that.
Beside me, Katya follows along quietly. Then without warning, she twists around and calls out to Khalmos. “Are you going to kill us?”
Fuck. I can hear the tear in her voice, and it’s like a knife to my heart. She wouldn’t be in this mess if it wasn’t for me.
The king gives her a solicitous smile. “No. You’re much more useful to me alive than dead.” He turns back to the paper in his hand. “At least for now.”
If I thought telling Katya how much I risked for her would endear her to me, I was very sadly mistaken. The first thing she does when we get back to the slave camp is round on me. “What were you thinking?”
I let out a breath and drop my head back. I really don’t want to deal with this right now. “I was thinking I didn’t want those assholes to hurt you.”
“So, you thought it was better to risk both of our lives on the presumption that the king would just forgive you? Because of what, your charm and good looks?”
“You think I’m good looking, huh?” I waggle my brows.
Pressing a hand to her forehead, she rolls her eyes toward the ceiling, and says, “Oh my gods. It’s like I’m trying to have a discussion with a pigeon.”
“A pigeon?”
She pops her hip, folds her arms across her chest, and gives me a glare that would make a lesser man shudder. It just makes me hard. “Yes, Aemon, a pigeon. Was there another creature you’d rather be compared to? A dung beetle, perhaps?”
That was uncalled for.“I’m so sorry for trying to keep you alive,” I reply, my voice dripping sarcasm. “Next time, I’ll just hand you over to Fredrick and let him have his merry way with you. Is that what you’d prefer?”
“Are those the only choices? Really? You or them?” She takes a step closer, craning her neck to look me in the eye. “How about all of you leave me and my family out of your political pissing match? What about that option?”
“I was trying to help you.”
She clenches her hands into fists at her sides. “I didn’t need your help,” she replies, loud enough to turn the heads of all the miners in our vicinity. Fuck. The last thing we need is to attract more attention, especially from the guards.
“Maybe we should talk about this somewhere more private.” I take her by the forearm and try to pull her away from watchful eyes, but she wrenches her arm free of my grasp.
“I don’t want to go anywhere with you.”
“Katya.”
“I was less than two days’ ride from home. Two days and I would have had my mother’s help. I didn’t need you.”
“Oh please. Those assholes at Duje would have turned you in the second you knocked on their door.”
She scoffs. “Wow. You must really think I’m stupid.”
Great. Here comes the ‘I’m a big girl and I can take care of myself’ speech. “I never said you were stupid, naïve maybe, but not stupid.”
“Naïve is relying on a pretty male I just met to jump in and save me. Stupid is waltzing into Dom Duje, an escaped prisoner, and expecting to be greeted with open arms. Those people hated me when there wasn’t a price on my head. You really think I’d trust them now? I’m talking about my mother who has connections and could have found someplace to hide me until things got resolved.”
“You don’t think Duje was being watched? Come on, Katya. They would have caught you before you even had the chance to talk to her.”
“And this is better?”
I’ve got half a dozen expletives burning a hole in my tongue, just waiting for me to hurl them at her beautiful, bitchy face, but I bite them back. “I thought I had a handle on Troi, alright? Obviously, I was wrong.”
“Obviously.” She folds her arms across her chest and taps her foot, waiting for…
“What?”
