“It’s lovely,” Ciana finally murmured. The stress of the elevator ride wasn’t gone, but she had calmed her heartrate, pushing back her fear to the far reaches of her mind.
She was in, but she knew how easily her access to this place could be taken away. The role was simpler now but not done yet.
“It is.” Nik pushed her forward, a hand still on the small of her back, guiding her farther into the central room. He halted, standing close to her, and drew in a deep breath. His eyes fluttered closed, and the hint of a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
“I’m not like the others in my family who wish to spend every waking minute in the archives if they could,” he said. “But I do love it here. In these quiet rooms. Besides my study, this is where I come when I just want a moment of peace. A moment to be myself. A moment to do whatever I want.”
Ciana’s skin prickled, but she met the king’s waiting smile. “I can only imagine the demands of being a king. Thank you for sharing this with me.”
“Of course.” Something flashed across Nik’s earthen eyes, too fleeting for Ciana to read, before his stare dropped down.
To her mouth.
A warning panged through Ciana’s chest, but she forced herself to stay still.
The king tentatively lifted one of her golden curls. That warning grew louder, more urgent, as Nik brushed his fingers across her collarbones, skimming up her neck.
He swallowed, throat bobbing. “It’s also where I wanted to come to finally do this.”
Ciana wasn’t quite sure what happened next.
She was aware of him leaning forward. Of his grip tightening on the back of her neck.
Of his lips meeting hers.
She was aware of how she froze.
Memories—dark, twisted, terrible memories—flooded her mind. She was swept far away from this warm room amongst the boughs of the archive trees. In a flash, she was back in a regal manor in Kasia, eyes clenching shut as a boy who’d never been told no took things from her that could never be replaced.
It was all too raw. Fresh wounds were reopened in Kreah that might never truly heal.
The king’s warm, woody scent hit her, his tongue trying to push past the barricade of her lips, and all she could think was that this waswrong.
Wrong.
Wrong.
She wasn’t safe. Not with this man. There was only one who could make her settle, and this wasn’t him.
“No.” The word left Ciana in a gasp as her hands landed on the king’s chest, pushing him away. He released her, stumbling back, cheeks flushed and eyes wide.
“Ciana?”
“No,” she repeated, still barely above a whisper. A tear slipped down her cheek, landing on the wood beneath her feet. “No.”
She couldn’t do this. Even if it meant failing her queen.
She just…couldn’t.
She wasn’t strong enough.
There was one person she needed, and it wasn’t the king standing in front her, expression shifting from shock to embarrassment.
“Ciana, I’m so sorry, I thought?—”
Ciana didn’t stay to hear what Nik thought.
Her feet carried to the top of the winding staircase, rushing her down their spiraling steps. They were so high, but she didn’t stop. Her calves and thighs were burning by the time she reached the bottom, but she didn’t stop.
