Isara turned to Ashterion again.
And smirked.
“Because your wife must be truly dreadful in bed,” she said, voice like honey over acid. “If you’re spending your nights with a lowly human.”
The throne room froze. Utter silence. Even the guards faltered.
Darian, the idiot, snorted.
Xyliria’s lips parted, but no sound came.
Ashterion’s lungs stopped working.He nearly barked a laugh. Nearly choked on it. A bubble of hysteria pressed beneath his ribs, half-amusement, half-terror.
Gods, she’s insane.
Insulting Xyliria was one thing. But insulting her sexual prowess? In her own fucking throne room? That was suicide. Beautiful,blinding suicide.
And yet, there Isara knelt, bloody and smirking and alive.
Ashterion exhaled slowly through his nose, locking his expression down tight. Because if he laughed—if he so much as smiled—Xyliria would carve it off his face.
“Such a… reckless little tongue,” Xyliria murmured.
Isara grinned.
Darian shifted behind her, shoulders tensing like a male ready to lunge if it came to it. Stupid. Brave. Completely fucking useless.
Xyliria walked a slow arc around them, hands clasped behind her back.
“I should kill him for that,” she said lightly, nodding toward Darian. “It would be fitting, wouldn’t it? Strip away the comfort. Make you beg. Remind you what happens when a human whore dares to mock her betters.”
Isara’s jaw clenched, but she didn’t look at Darian.
Ashterion sat frozen. Every instinct screaming. Every nerve razor-sharp. He knew her moods. He knew the moment before violence. Knew the pitch of her voice when she meant to kill. But not today.
“No,” Xyliria said at last. “Killing him would be too merciful. And I do so loathe mercy.”
She stopped in front of Darian and tilted her head.
“I have a better plan.” She turned to Isara again, eyes gleaming. “You see, darling, today isn’t about you insulting me. It’s about what you’ll do to make it right.”
She raised a hand. A guard stepped forward, dropping something to the floor with a dullclang.
A blade. Long. Thin. Serrated near the tip.
Xyliria raised a single, graceful hand. The doors behind them swung open. Another set of guards entered, dragging a third figure between them. Small. Slighter than the others.
A girl.
Her tunic hung off her frame, clearly a size too big, one shoulder torn. Blood matted the dark strands of her hair where it had crusted near her temple. She couldn’t have been more than eighteen. Barely past maturity.
Ashterion’s pulse thudded.
No.
He knew what this was.
From the shape of the blade, the timing, the smug satisfaction pouring off Xyliria in waves, he knew exactly what she’d prepared.
