Thrain tilts his head. “Queen Avina had questions about a decades-old marriage accord with a Salt Prince. I, of course, explained how plans change with nobility. I must admit my shock at the heartbreak in her eyes when I explained how unenthusiastic you were to wed her during the war.”
How am I still the only one not to know about this? And gods dammit, I wanted to mill her then!
“What have you done?” He growls.
Thrain’s smile widens. “I’ve told you, brother. I have worked too hard for too long to become King of Treland. That woman with two deliciously convenient bloodlines,” he nods to Avina, who sashays out of the hallway and straight to the wine bottles, “is the key to the whole damn country.”
Sigvid punches his brother in the gut, then removes a dagger from his boot and holds the blade to Thrain’s heart, embedding the tip under his skin. “You talk about her like that again. I will slay you here and toss your body on the fire.”
Thrain laughs. “Like what, Sig? You make a great show of giving a shit about her, but all of Treland knows she is nothing but a pussy you will discard when you tire of her.”
“Fuck you, Thrain,” he says with a low growl, placing more pressure on the dagger, which cuts deeper into his skin, trickling crimson blood over his crisp white shirt. “She is more than that, ass!”
Thrain tilts his head to the side.
Is he wearing powder?
“What would that be? You know what I see, brother? I see a fat, golden key I can stuff in a tower once it opens the right doors.”
Chairs sliding against the wooden floors signal the gathering's focus shifts to the brothers' tension. Before anyone can intervene, the front door opens.
“Mother!” Thrain greets her as if Sigvid’s dagger was not just under his skin, staining his tunic and vest.
Everyone shifts to greet Frida, Kar, and Ingirid, leaving Sigvid heaving in the back corner. He watches Avina pounding back her second goblet of wine out of the corner of his eye.
He stuffs his dagger back into his boot while Thrain makes an extensive display of hugging their mother. While the others remain distracted in the entryway, he stalks over to the shockingly set dining table.
When did Thrain give a shit about where people sat? He chuckles to himself while inspecting the slips of parchment bearing each of their names on the plates.
What the shit, Thrain? Why is Avina on your left?
Thrain sat their mother to his right, but instead of his Second, he sat Avina at his side. He glances across from his plate to find Helga’s name.
He grabs Avina’s card, places it opposite him, and moves Helga’s next to Thrain, feeling only slightly guilty for sticking her with his brother.
Briny God willing, it will not be for much longer.
“Are you angry already?” Avina stands by her seat with a goblet of wine clutched in her hand. “You have that furrowed look when you’re angry.” She settles into her chair while the rest of the party continues their conversation at the door.
Her observant remark draws a crooked smile. “Of course I am angry. I am at a party with my brother. But you make it better, my little Queen.”
A cute pink blush brushes over the apples of her cheeks. “Why do you say things like that to me?”
“What things?” He lights his pipe, clenching it tight in his teeth.
She suddenly hesitates, looking away from him and twirling a curl. “That you may enjoy my presence. I thought I was nothing more than your plaything through the Winter Solstice?”
He exhales deeply, casting a cloud of sweet-scented smoke over the set table.
“I told you once you will always get the pleasure and the pain from me, and I mean that. No one else will ever lay a hand on you as long as you are mine.”
And she will always be mine, even if it means locking her away in Blackwood for the rest of her days.
“I meant every damn word I said before we left my home, my little Queen. Never question my actions or my words.”
He leans closer, feeling his chest clench at the sight of that damned doe-eyed expression. His hand curls around her wrist while his thumb brushes her sleeve back, revealing his name carved into her flesh.
“Any other man would have ceased pursuing you last night, with the understanding their life would be forfeit to me had they not.”
