It is a small table, chosen for intimacy rather than ceremony, and that makes the betrayal feel closer, more precise.
Beside me, Colsar senses my tension and immediately understands. His body tightens the moment the realization reaches him. His hand remains in mine, but the pressure changes, grounding, ready, his attention fixed entirely on Hurstinal.
I turn to him. He does not look at me. I wait until he does.
I blink once. Twice. Three times.
Just play pretend.We have not used the blinks since that dinner, so many months ago, when Sevrin announced Yvara's pregnancy.
He remembers. His hand loosens slightly in mine. Not much. Enough.
I glare at Aunt Petunis.
Aunt Petunis speaks, her voice carrying easily through the room, reaching every corner without strain. “This is what happens when a queen neglects her duties for three days,” she says, her eyes holding mine as though nothing else in the room matters. “Betrayal. Decisions made without her. Power shifting where she is not present to hold it.”
I do not respond.
Before anything else can be said, I force myself to speak. “Lady Jularin,” I say, my attention catching on the pin at her temple, “I have never seen a stone like that.”
The light moves through it strangely, milky at first glance, then catching in a way that shifts as she turns her head, something beneath the surface that does not sit still.
Jularin’s smile deepens, pleased. “There is only one,” she says. “It was found in the mines of Yorali. A paravin stone.” A small pause. “It was a gift.”
I nudge Colsar lightly. “I would like special jewels mined from Yorali.”
Colsar’s attention lingers on it for a moment, then his mouth brushes my ear. “After what you just did to me in the corridor,” he murmurs, “I would bring you whatever you wanted. Even from Yorali.”
My cheeks burn, and I almost forget the unpleasant aura in the room. But then Hurstinal looks up, and recognition takes hold slowly, his attention focused on me as he takes in what I havebecome. His eyes move downward, drawn to the curve of my belly, to the undeniable presence of what I carry, and I watch the moment it registers, the moment it alters him.
The color leaves his face.
His attention shifts to Colsar, and this time it holds longer, something tightening in his expression as he tries to reconcile what stands before him with what he remembers.
Colsar stands beside me, his presence altering the room simply by existing within it, his robes open across his chest, the strength of him visible, carried without concealment.
I tighten my hand around his as we take our seats.
My eyes find Hurstinal's hand as we sit. The scar tissue where his fingers once were catches the candlelight. I smile at him pleasantly. His expression turns to fury. Then he gathers himself, pulling composure back into place, though it sits unevenly now. “Well,” he says, his tone smoothing into something that attempts ease and lands closer to mockery, “dog —”
The air changes. It presses in without warning, subtle at first, then not. My lungs catch on the next breath, the space in the room thinning as though something unseen has closed around it.
Hurstinal falters mid-word.
Around us, chairs scrape faintly against the floor. No one speaks. No one breathes. My chest constricts, the familiarity of Colsar’s power pressing in. I feel it before I look at him, the control of it, the precision, the way the room itself bends to his will.
Then I cough.
Colsar looks at me, and whatever he was holding in place breaks apart at once. The pressure vanishes instantly.
Hurstinal smirks. “As I was saying, dog prince, it has been nice getting to know your wi?—”
Colsar moves before he can. The distance between them collapses, the shift too fast to follow in any clean sequence, and the sound that follows tears through the room, wet and final. Something strikes the table with force, an eye rolling once before coming to rest near the center.
For a moment, Colsar remains in that form, immense and unrestrained, his body filling the space in a way that forces everything else back. He turns, as though assessing what remains, and then moves again, tearing away Hurstinal’s arm and sending it crashing against the far wall.
Venya’s scream breaks through everything, high and uncontrolled, her body recoiling as she stumbles backward.
Colsar returns to himself, the transition smooth and contained, his hands moving to straighten his robes.
