“First, because a list of facts doesn’t make a person perfect for another. Context matters. And second, because you’ve been making a mighty amount of assumptions about Harthon, and while the business between you two is your own, it’s my job as your trainer to pull your head out of your ass. You can’t see your opponents from up there.”
He chuckled at his own joke, and I might have too, if I wasn’t so uncomfortable with his answer.
And I was only uncomfortable because he was right. I was making assumptions. Lots of them. But assumptions were a natural instinct, something that’d helped me survive in this dying world, so much that they’d become truths to me.
Maybe, this time, I’d been wrong.
Trying to ease the discomfort, I joked, “With all those insights, you should consider becoming a philosopher.”
“I don’t have the beard for it.”
“I don’t have the eerie voice to be a pretend-mystical being, but here I am.”
“You’ve got the weird-ass eyes and the strange capacity for staying alive, though. That’s for sure.”
Chapter 10
“Would you hurry up and decide?” Felda nagged. “Are we doing the dress or not?”
I didn’t want to glare at her for griping. I wanted to glare at myself, because I’d been staring undecidedly at the two outfits before me—a leather top and a dress—for an absurd amount of time.
For the last twenty-two years of my life, it would have been an easy decision to make. But for the first time, a small part of me wondered what I might look like in a dress. And I was certain it had nothing to do with what Callen had said to me three days ago in the garden, about Harthon being human and why he really turned Ana down.
Skies, I was so full of horseshit.
“I’m about to make the decision for you,” Felda declared.
I studied both options for the thousandth time. Both were the same deep hue of purple with a lower, more feminine neckline than I normally wore. Both laced up the front. Both were embroidered with gold and silver threads and would accentuate my eyes before the crowd of guests, which was apparently rather large. It was just that one had a skirt, while the other came with a pair of black trousers.
“Okay—”
“Not the dress,” I finally said. If we were attacked, the long skirt might lead to my death. Looking pretty meant nothing if a dagger landed in your heart.
Felda and Frannie made quick work of helping me dress, the old woman tightening the laces of my bodice more than I would have.
“Can we make it looser?” I asked, struggling to fill my lungs.
She tied a neat bow three eyelets down from the top of the garment, stepped back, and admired her work. “If I made it looser, your breasts would disappear. Now, you look like a proper woman.”
A little dumbstruck, I faced the mirror and stared at my breasts—my very lifted, very in-your-face, breasts. Well, as much as they could be with their small size. They peeked out from the neckline, a shadow of cleavage showing between the unlaced halves of fabric.
Felda appeared in the mirror behind me, a satisfied smile on her face. Frannie crept in next to her.
“Like I said, awoman,” Felda repeated. “One who’s fit for a Conquering Day celebration. Frannie?”
The shy girl nodded, a soft smile on her lips. “You look beautiful.”
I slowly turned in the mirror, scrutinizing my form. The top was beautiful, the tight laces molding the supple fabric to my figure, dipping in at my waist and flaring out at my breasts. The trousers were perfectly fitted, giving the illusion that I actually had hips. With my hair pulled back in a series of braids that knotted at my nape, I couldn’t help but agree with Felda. I looked womanly. Not frilly, but feminine in a fierce way. Though I supposed that ferocity had more to do with my eyes than my clothing. My unearthly irises were accentuated by the violet top and the sun-kissed pink upon my cheeks that’d come from sitting in the garden.
For a girl who’d participated in a fight to the death just a week ago, I looked damn good. And I was surprised to like that as much as I did.
A knock on the door pulled me from the vain thoughts. Then most of my other thoughts vanished, because Harthon entered the room, sucking all the air from it with each lazy step. Black leather boots gave way to onyx trousers that hugged his muscular thighs. His fitted jacket was the same midnight hue, darkening his irises and the hair that was left half-down around his shoulders. It was his standard regal Princeps attire, except this time, the metallic embroidering along his jacket was woven with purple thread, and the braids along his scalp were capped with a gold crown I’d only seen him wear once.
He held a second crown, a ring of intertwined vines adorned with the occasional flower.
His eyes raked over me, and I didn’t think I imagined the way they lingered on my breasts. I certainly didn’t imagine the warmth that unfurled along my skin.
The corner of his lips quirked as he approached. “Seems I win.”
