More worthy of the way she looks at me.
So when I hear them—those fat, self-important ministers and camp leaders—talking before I even round the corner, the shift inside me is immediate.
The fire in my veins goes from slow simmer to blistering boil.
“Business as usual for our most prestigious Lord of Fire?” a nasal voice sneers.
“That’s Gorran Flint,” Xavier murmurs quietly at my shoulder. “Representative from the Northern Pits.”
I hold up a hand to silence him.
“I hear he rushed back from the Vein simply to bed his female,” another minister says, amused contempt dripping from every syllable.
“Aye,” a third voice adds. “Who knew the Two-Face would turn lap dog for a woman?”
Laughter. Dry and ugly, crackling like old bones.
My vision goes white at the edges.
They speak of me like I am not within earshot—fools—but it is the mention of my Shula that incinerates the last of my patience.
Fire hisses along my fingertips. The torches along the wall flare in sympathetic anger.
I step into the doorway.
“If you are going to talk about me in my own castle,” I snarl, my voice rolling through the chamber like thunder, “perhaps you should close the door.”
They whirl toward me. Eyes wide. Faces draining of color.
I walk forward, slow and deliberate, long coat whispering around my boots. The Great Flame at the center of the throne room throws my shadow huge against the walls.
“I might forgive that,” I continue, heat rising with every step. “Gossip is a pathetic habit—but not a crime.”
I let the fire crawl higher along my hands, licking up my forearms, lighting the magma-veined sigils etched into my skin.
“But you had to mention my viyella.”
I stop at the base of the dais, looking down at them from the first step. My eyes burn, the bone-mask itching under the surface of my skin.
“And that,” I say softly, dangerously soft, “is not something I will forgive.”
Flames whoosh up from my fingertips, an arc of ruby-gold fire that races to the ceiling and curls there like a living serpent.
The ministers flinch as the heat sweeps over them, singeing their hair, reddening their cheeks.
One of the camp representatives—broad-shouldered, soot-streaked, clearly more accustomed to the tunnels than these perfumed fools—drops to one knee immediately.
“My Lord,” he stammers. “We meant no disrespect?—”
“You did,” I cut in. “You meant exactly that. Do not insult me further by pretending otherwise.”
Gorran Flint—pale and round as a forgotten dumpling—wipes sweat from his brow, his throat bobbing.
“We were… merely expressing concern, my Lord. With all due respect, some of us worry your attentions may be… diverted.”
“Diverted,” I repeat, tasting the word like ash on my tongue. “You think the Lord of Fire has grown weak because he has bound himself to a woman?”
Silence.
