“We do not ask the king for anything anymore.”
He tipped his head, dark eyes gleaming beneath his brow.
“If you want something from him, you must get it fromher.”
He tapped his temple, miming a crown set there.
Her voice fell to a whisper.“Your mother…”
“Yes." His smile curved darkly. “My mother. The woman who gave this back to you.”
His gaze rose to the diadem in her hair.
“She wants the realm, Amerei. Convince her she can have it, and the world is yours.”
The room blurred until this moment—Evander’s steady breath, Jasmine’s shifting weight—all dissolving as if gravity itself bent toward him, pulling her into his orbit.
“I don’t want the world,” she said at last, tears breaking on her lashes.
“I want men with bows who will live through dragonfire. I want horses that won’t break when the sky does. I want—” Viktor’s name swelled in her chest. Her eyes fell shut, hard. “—Sevrak to hold.”
The words tumbled raw, not regal—born of smoke and memory, of villages gone. She did not care if she sounded like a pleading girl, only that he listened.
“It will,” Xavien said softly, his hand brushing her arm.
Her skin crawled with the ghost of his touch, but she held still. He would not see her recoil, not when she needed his help.
“But you ask for soldiers, Elarien. And I am not the hand that signs them.”
Her voice cracked, barely above a whisper.
“Take me to her. Please, Xavien.”
“Elarien… my queen, don’t beg.”
He lifted her hand, lips grazing her fingers.
“I’ll take you.”
His gaze dipped to the torn edge of her bodice.
“…don’t change out of that dress.”
Evander’s voice rasped like stone. “It’s bloody and torn.”
“We’ll mend it,” Xavien said, then smiled. “Jasmine will mend it.”
He rose, stepping to his desk, rifling through a drawer.
Jasmine raised her head.
“Jasminewill see that her queen is dressed for court. Let us out of this room or find her something from your wife’s collection.”
Xavien’s eyes never left Amerei as he pulled the linen shirt over his shoulders. “The princess’s gowns were cut for ceremony. Your figure asks for a jeweler’s hand.”
He swept on a black cloak, soldier-cut.
“I’ll find a master seamster worthy of you, my queen. For now… my mother must see how easily her favorite son was nearly torn from her.”
