“I’d be delighted,” I say.
He distinctly does not look delighted to hear that, which only deepens the mystery. Something flashes in his eyes—surprise. He expected me to say no.
Torren nods curtly. “Do you need to get settled in your rooms first?”
“No.” I turn my attention to Zel. “Please see that my things make it safely to my chamber and take the room to the side of mine.”
Zel is a good servant; however, at the moment she’s frozen in place by the terrifying beauty of the Praetorian. I doubt she’s seen anyone this handsome in her entire life.
It’s a few seconds of awkward silence before she shakes her head and bobs a curtsy. “Of course. Right away, Excellency.”
“Thank you, Zel.”
The Praetorian’s eyebrows rise, but he clears his expression. I blink, expectant, as if I am excited for this tour.
He extends his arm. I step forward, but he moves to the side. We wind up face-to-face and far too close. I inhale his scent as time seems to slow like the first drip of candlewax. Then he clears his throat and goes around me.
“This way.”
I shake off his nearness, ignoring the feeling of wings fluttering in the center of my chest. It’s fear. Just natural fear of prey facing a predator.
“This, of course, is the grand entrance hall,” he says.
We both look up at the massive, gilded chandelier. It’s larger than any I’ve ever seen, and the white marble floors and towering windows reflect the light. On the ceiling is a fresco of an Elusian fire king lighting the night half a millennium ago.
“The main staircase is ahead of us, but there are also staircases on either end of the palace. Nearly every room faces north, as the building runs west to east.”
That fits with the Elusian belief in the North Star as the guiding light of the kingdom. Under the Elusians, the temple to the skies was first among the faiths.
We walk along the ruby-red-carpeted floors of the eastern hall. Red wallpaper with gold leaf decorates the walls above the wooden panels. All the torchiers and candelabras are gilded. The hallway stretches to a coffered ceiling high above our heads with gilded fleur-de-lis of the Elusians in the center of the ceiling at intervals. It’s a fantastic show of wealth, overwhelming to the eye, and my father said the decoration is only half of what used to be here. Much of the gold was taken during the Crimson Night.
“This floor has the main rooms we’ll use for the conclave,” the Praetorian explains. “Meals will be served in the banquet hall, the former throne room will be used as a Senate Hall, and there are thermal baths on the ground floor. Jubilee was built over a hot spring, at a time before we could pipe in warm water.”
He speaks about the lowest level, but he leads me up the stone staircase at the end of the eastern hall. I walk beside him, although he only looks ahead, his pace brisk.
“The second floor was home to the offices and bedrooms of the priests and advisers to the realm. Those, like the drawing and ballrooms downstairs, will be empty this week. The third and fourth levels are guest bedrooms—ten per floor. And the fifth is where the royal apartments were located—the king’s bedroom and rooms for his three wives and six favorite children. Those are also now used as guest rooms, except for the king’s suite.”
The old king had one hundred children during his three-hundred-year reign. I suppose not all of them could be favored.
I nod, trying not to remember how I am the last of those children.
Due to his self-healing magic, he outlived almost all of his wives and offspring, which sounds more like a curse than a power.
I expect that the Praetorian will stop at one of the bedroom floors, but we continue upward. I’m glad to be in riding clothes and not my robes as we ascend another flight of stairs. My chest begins to burn in the thin mountain air, but the Praetorian doesn’t break stride, his exercise regime evidently far more rigorous than mine.
The staircase narrows as we enter a tower, leaving me no choice but to follow behind him. I try to ignore his sculpted legs under his leather skirt and broad shoulders barely contained by his armor as we take the stairs, but it’s impossible not to notice how his back tapers in, the rise of his blue veins on his muscular arms. I need to focus, though, to figure out why he’s doing this, but as we continue, I’m too busy fighting for breath.
Finally, he comes to a stop and opens a door. We must be ten stories high in this tower, and I am officially winded. Perhaps I should start joining Mirial on her predawn runs as she’s suggested many times.
My pulse pounds, and I want to lean over gasping, but I sip the air because I refuse to let this man see that I’m struggling.
I glance at him, and he’s not even breathing hard.
Jackal. I’ve never despised him more.
“The western tower features an observatory for the skies, but I thought you’d be more interested in this,” he says.
I walk into a room the size of an average bedchamber, but it’s circular with an oculus in the domed roof. In the center of the space is a marble altar, and to the right is a brazier containing the purple eternal flame. There is a window with a large basin to burn offerings to the gods.
