“Practice makes perfect, as Aran says.” Twisting, I turn in his arms to face him, his handsome features still softened from sleep. Thick-lashed tawny eyes peer into mine, a half smile curling his full lips. A lock of inky hair falls onto his brow, and I reach up to sweep it away. “I miss you,” I whisper.
“I know,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry I’ve been gone so often. House Antares is proving to be difficult and unwilling to sign the terms of the latest tax and tithe treaties.” Warm lips brush my brow. “Perhaps you can accompany me to Eloni in the coming days.”
The weight of that crushes me. Most likely, I’ll be joining as his weapon to hold over their heads, not as the woman he can’t bear to be parted from. “I want... I wish...” I trail off and bite the inside of my cheek, but the words tumble out anyway. “I missus,Ro. Sometimes I wish it could be like it was in Nyriell.”
His brown eyes warm with the memory of our time in the hidden city of the Dahaka, when we’d been on the run for our lives. It had been us against the world, or so I’d thought at the time. I hadn’t known then that he’d been the secret leader of the rebellion all along, and while the knowledge of his lies and the depth of his secrecy had gutted me, I’d forgiven him. He’d died to save me, after all, and everyone deserves a chance at redemption.
Roshan’s arms tighten around me. “I do, too,” he says. “This will be over soon, my sweet starling. Can you be patient? For me?”
Heart aching, I nod, because what else can I do? “I’d like to visit my father and Amma again. I miss them, and it’s been hard to be alone when you’re gone.”
His breath gusts against my hair, and I feel his hesitation even before he gives voice to the denial. “It’s too dangerous now,” he says after a careful beat. “Too many people want to get to me and won’t hesitate to hurt you to do so. I don’t trust my enemies in Regulus, and I know they have many spies in the capital. We still haven’t found who was behind everything in Coban. You’re too vulnerable there, and I need you where I can protect you.”
Led by Clem and Hamid, Roshan’s kingsguard had interrogated everyone in the court, using a truth herb called Verac root from the northern lands, and no secret plot was uncovered. Which means either it had been an unlikely coincidence or our palace spy remains at large. Regardless, I don’t want to be a prisoner, locked in my rooms and slowly losing touch with reality. In the king’s absence, I haven’t been allowed to so much as leave our quarters without an armed escort.
“You know I can protect myself, Roshan,” I reply, not wanting to argue and lose the preciousness of the moment, but his refusal grates like sandpaper on my skin. “It won’t be for very long, I promise. I just need... my family.”
“It’s not safe.”
“For whom?” I snap.
Something like a snarl rumbles in his chest as he tips my chin up, and for a second before his lashes dip down, I glimpse whorls of violet darkening his irises, but when they reopen, his brown eyes are clear, if worried.
I blink. Whatwasthat? Had I imagined it?
The combination of my lingering fears about Fero and Vena’s words about war and rising godslayers has me doubting my own senses. But what if Ihadn’timagined it? Suddenly, I recall the same purple flicker in Coban, and fear blooms like acid on my tongue. A seed of darkness can take root anywhere.
I wonder... I’ve been inside his mind before, when I’d brought him back to life with my magic. I was able to sense his whole aura then. Could I do the same now?
Surreptitiously, I push out a sliver of magic toward him and brace for the worst, that somehow the king has been compromised by unnatural forces. It would explain everything: his behavior, the strange fire in his eyes, his anger.
But there’s nothing there... nothing buthim. No darkness. No seeded remnant of Fero. Just love and worry for me, as well as concern for the future of his kingdom.
Appeased, I pull the thread back and find him staring at me as if he’d spoken and I hadn’t responded. I flush, aware that I’d entered his mind without consent, but my relief at confirming that he’s wholly himself washes away any guilt. Ensuring that the king is safe from harm, even unknowingly from himself, is in the interests of the entire realm.
I clear my throat as his finger traces my jaw. “What did you say?”
“It’s not safe for anyone, and I don’t think it’s a good idea. Not right now. Perhaps in a month when things calm down.”
Resentment bleeds through me, but I hide it. “You said that weeks ago.”
He drops his arms and scrubs a hand through his hair. “I didn’t know Regulus was going to make a bid to unseat me with a so-called legitimate nephew.” Roshan bends to rest his chin on my head. “I need you, Suraya. I need you here, or... we’ll lose everything we’ve worked so hard to gain. After all the sacrifices we have made.”
“Is it me you need or the Starkeeper?” I regret the clipped words as soon as they are out of my mouth.
He sucks in a breath, his voice agonized. “How can you even think such a thing? I loveyou,Sura.”
Remorse immediately swamps me for voicing such an awful thought, but my inner voice perks up:He doesn’t hesitate to herd you into being his showpiece, either. Frustration flares anew, but I tamp it down. “I’m sorry. That’s not... what I meant.”
Roshan sweeps an arm behind us. “Haven’t I given you everything you could want? A palace? Your own forge? A life of luxury.” I freeze, surprised at his words. When did those things become conditional? His thumb feathers over my lower lip. “You’re my queen. We’re a team, my precious starling,” he whispers. “Us against the world, remember?”
A starling in a pretty cage...
And it’s us against the world, but only as it suits him, it seems.
The simmering desolation in my heart swells. A few sweet, tender words can’t erase the chasm that has been widening between us. I want to please Roshan because, yes, underneath all the umbrage, I do love him. But love also requires some measure of reciprocity. It’s a give and take, not a one-way path, and I have to stand up for myself or risk being overrun at every turn.
“I love you with everything that I am, Ro, but I have to see my father and Amma,” I say. “Don’t you care that I am lonely and dispirited?”
