“Stop what?” I ask.
“Ogling me like I’m a sweetmeat.”
I can’t help the snicker that erupts from me. “I was not.”I totally was.
“Behave, my starling,” he says softly, though his eyes convey the opposite. He loves it when I defy him, and besides, he knows what that directive does to me. I despise being told what to do, even by the man I’ve accepted as my sovereign, but in public, the rules of being the future royal consort apply, which means I must be demure.
Or at leasttryto be. That was the promise I made, anyway.
“As you wish, my king.”
Edging out of reach, I lower my lashes as a tendril of my magic wisps across his shoulders, down his muscular back, and over his tight rear. He gasps, which he covers up with a cough, causing a solicitous attendant to dash up with a cup of water. Impishly, I don’t relent, sending the sinful stroke of magic down his leg and then back up, winding my way around his knee, over a rock-hard flexed thigh... and higher...
“Sura.” His warning is a gravelly rasp as my invisible, playful touch inches upward, nearly to where we both desire it the most. “Your family,” he grits out.
“What about them, Your Majesty?” I ask innocently, and widen my eyes with concern. “They’ve gone ahead. Is everything well?” I fight the urge to bite my lip at the strained look on his face. We’ve toyed with my magic before in the bedchamber, though never in public, and the power I feel over my poor, tortured king in this moment is practically indecent.
With no one else the wiser, I shift to cup his rapidly stiffening length beneath his silk trousers and groan at the feel of him, even via my magic. Holding his gaze, I indulge in a long stroke. Roshan stumbles and hunches over, the back of his neck going crimson and the veins in sharp relief on his forearms.
“Your Majesty!” General Clem Jinn, one of my few friends and Hamid’s second-in-command, shouts. “Guards, formation! To the king!”
As the guards form a defensive circle around us, I crouch down, peering up at him with a sweet, solicitous smile. He sees right through my act, glittering eyes that promise vengeance meeting mine.
“You don’t like it when I behave, Ro,” I whisper, my breath grazing his ear.
He chuckles. “Stars, what compelled me to fall in love with a magical sadist?”
“I don’t know,” I reply cheekily. “Why did you?”
I stand up to shoot a glance at Clem, who has hurried over but still stands a respectable distance away to respect our privacy, her face stern as she scans the surrounding area for threats. I’d met Clem during the games for the competition for the former prince’s hand. Two outsiders, we’d bonded quickly, only for me to discover later on that she’d been one of Roshan’s inner circle and part of the Dahaka. Her deceit had been a hard blow, but I understood the pull of duty and her loyalty to her cause above all else. It didn’t mean our friendship wasn’t real, and I’d chosen to forgive her just as I had Roshan.
I pat her shoulder. “It’s nothing, don’t worry. He has a cramp from an injury. Give him a minute.”
She frowns. “When was he injured?”
“Er, yesterday?” My brain whirls. “During training.”
“He didn’t have training yesterday,” she says. “He was in the forge, if I recall, with you. Did something happen there?”
I blink and inhale a suddenly shallow breath. Oh, something did happen. The king and I had thoroughly defiled almost every available surface in the castle forge to the point where I’d sustained temporary minor burns on my backside that had healed immediately.
Worth it.
It’s my turn to blush when a smug Roshan stands and lifts his brows, finally able to rise without an embarrassing tent in his trousers. “Yes, Sura, did something happen?”
Clem’s gaze dances between the two of us before she lets out an aggravated sound and rolls her eyes. “By the gods, can the two of you keep it in your pants for once?” she mutters, keeping her voice low so that no one else can hear.
“What can I say?” Roshan teases, winking at me. “She can’t resist me.”
“You’re an arrogant pain in the ass.” I must say it much too loudly, because someone gasps on the periphery as we resume our progress to the village hall.
We are separated once we enter, Roshan striding to the front to make his address to the townspeople. I choose to stay near the back, ducking into a quiet corner. I’ve heard his speech multiple times since his coronation in Kaldari: an acceptance of the transfer of power, the condemnation of the coup that had nearly decimated the Imperial House, and reassurance that the dark forces have been eradicated from Oryndhr.
For good.
It feels like a step in the right direction to rebuild and to restore the confidence of all the people in the realm. Coban was targeted specifically by the former king because ofme, so Roshan’s reassurances mean more than he knows. I wave hello to a few Cobanites, mostly old neighbors, some of whom stare at me openly. The notoriety I’ve gained for my part in the rebellion still makes my skin itch, but I’m used to the attention by now.
Who in Coban would have guessed that the Starkeeper would have been Suraya Saab?
