“To give herself an alibi.”
Silence stretched between them as the weight of her words settled on them both, then Aren said, “Why would Alexandra murder Edward?”
Lara considered what she knew about the Harendellian royals. “There was no love lost between them, that is well known. Except Alexandra wouldn’t have killed him over a cold marriage—she’s too pragmatic. I think it’s because of Cardiff. She’s a true believer, so she can’t have taken the news that Edward had formed an alliance with Cardiff well. His choice to marry William to Lestara behind her back must have gone over even worse. Alexandra will not want competition for influence over William, least of all a pagan Cardiffian princess. My guess is that Lestara isn’t long for this world.”
Aren gripped her hips, his hands warm through the thin fabric of her dress. “Getting reports will be challenging, given that the navy is patrolling their coast. The Harendellians will be searching merchant ships and reading messages, and I don’t foresee receiving reports between now and when I have to meet with William.”
“Agreed.” The very same challenges Ahnna faced in trying to return to Ithicana.
As though reading her thoughts, Aren’s fingers tightened. “If Ahnna somehow makes her way back to us, I’m not giving her up to them. I’m not letting them murder her.”
“I don’t think she’s what they are really after.” Lara stroked her fingers through his hair, feeling the silken texture as she considered Harendell’s queen mother. “I think Ahnna is leverage. If Alexandra’s goal is to destroy the alliance with Cardiff and ensure that trade flows south rather than north, she needs to sweeten the terms on the bridge to satisfy the merchant class. Edward dangled the prospects of free trade with Cardiff before them, which also meant better access to the nations in the far north. She has to make them whole, and that means negotiating with us using Ahnna’scrimesas the bargaining chip. Harendell will deem us innocent of involvement in exchange for free use of the bridge.”
Aren sighed, then bent his neck to rest his forehead against her shoulder. “We can’t afford that.”
“We can’t win a war against Harendell, so there is no choice.” She stroked his back, fighting a sudden surge of anger that, after everything, they could not have a moment to just live. To be a family with no threats against them. To be happy and safe.
That’s your lot in life,she silently chided herself.That has always been Ithicana’s lot, so quit wallowing and figure out a way to survive this. Be a fucking cockroach.
“Harendell will be coming to this meeting looking to negotiate,” she said. “Let’s see what they have to say. Let’s get William’s measure.”
“None of this would be happening if I’d made Ahnna leave.” Aren’s breath was shaky. “I should have tied her up and dragged her home. She only stayed because ofhim.”
Lara made a soft humming sound that was neither agreement nor disagreement, because there would have been other consequences if they’d forcibly taken Ahnna back to Ithicana. Ahnna had no goodchoice, which she had surely known. As for what may or may not have been between Ahnna and James, Lara felt only the utmost sympathy for Ahnna, for his betrayal must have cut her to the core.
Aren straightened and met her gaze. “You can’t come to this meeting. You know that, don’t you?”
Her entire body stiffened. “I’m not allowing you to meet with those spiders alone.”
“I won’t be alone.” He lifted a hand to smooth back her hair. “But if it all goes to shit, one of us needs to be alive to rule. To get Ithicana through this. To protect our daughter.”
Lara’s chest tightened at the mention of Delia, who slept in the next room under Nana’s watchful eye. She’d not considered having to choose between protecting her husband and protecting her daughter, and every part of her hated that such a choice was now forced upon her.
Aren gestured to William’s letter. “It’s me he wants to speak with. Which is not to our benefit, because I don’t know how well I’m going to hold my temper through this conversation—you would do it better.”
Lara wasn’t so sure. What the Harendellians had done to Ahnna had lit flames of anger in her chest that she hadn’t felt since her father had invaded Ithicana. The desire for vengeance had her reaching for a weapon, not words.
Her husband lowered his head to kiss her, tongue chasing over hers and igniting heat in her lower belly. She desperately desired to sate it, because fear was growing in her chest that it would be her last chance. That he would get on a ship and sail away and that she’d never see him again, and Lara wanted to hold Aren back, hold him close, using whatever means possible. Her lips parted to tell him to send an envoy, someone else, anyone else, because she could not risk losing him.
But Lara strangled the words and kissed her husband with enough ferocity to bruise.
“I love you,” he murmured, hand skimming over the side of her breast. “In moments like these, I wish to take you and Delia and run as far from this nightmare as we can get. To leave it all behind and live happily. But that isn’t who we are, is it?”
Lara pressed her forehead to his even as her fingers grazed the knife belted at her waist. “No,” she whispered, reaching for the steel inside her heart: the warrior, the defender, the queen. “We are the ones who stand our ground and fight.”
9
Ahnna
Ahnna eyed the towering mountainslooming ahead while using her free hand to first turn up the collar of her coat and then pull her cap farther down over her ears.
Because it was cold. Bitterly cold.
Logically, she’d been aware that the Blackreach Peaks forming much of the border between Amarid and Harendell would force her to endure temperatures she’d never before experienced. The knowledge hadn’t prepared her for the icy wind that bit through her clothes and cut down to the bone. It grew worse with every passing hour that Dippy carried her higher into the mountains, and Ahnna felt the altitude keenly, her breath short and exhaustion preying upon her.
These mountains were dangerous.
Even in Ithicana, there was an awareness that the Blackreaches were usually avoided. Merchants traveled weeks north to go through the Lowlands or used ships to navigate around the peninsula. The coastline of the peninsula itself was prone to heavy flooding from the Tempest Seas and runoff from the mountains, so no one lived on the barren stretch of land but seals and gulls. Even so, Ahnna would have traveled that way to reach Amarid if not for the wall that stretched from the Blackreaches into the sea, where riptides made short work of the strongest swimmers.
