Nothing’s okay. Kazia can’t grasp the version of himself who was happy moments ago. The hollow memory crumbles between his fingers. “Get up,” Kazia orders, shoving to his feet. “Follow me.”
Lucien rises with a watchful calm that makes Kazia’s skin crawl. Kazia pulls his keyring from his jacket as they leave the parlor and has to stop himself from fiddling with it.
The back hall is empty, dimly lit. “Stop,” Kazia says, and Lucien stops precisely five feet away. The keys clatter too much in the quiet before Kazia shoves the door open. “Go in.”
Lucien obeys, hands in his pockets. “I’d rather have finished the game.”
“Don’t escape.” Kazia layers the orders like a ritual. “Don’t remove your bindings. Don’t harm me, my people, or my property.”
“Anything else, Your Highness?” Lucien asks.
No command can restore Kazia’s sense of balance. This was so much easier before Lucien asked the names of his rats. But Kazia can’t change course, and he can’t forget how dangerous Lucien is.
Heart pounding, he slams the door shut and fumbles for the lock. He slumps against the barrier, back burning with shame, fear, and pain, woven from memories old and new. Forget three months. Kazia hadn’t expected how weak this war would leave him.
He thought he was used to pain.
?
CHAPTER TEN
Lucien
The following morning, Lucien is folding linens when Tezurit speaks to him.I’m going to be gone for a few days. Or a few of a few. I don’t know how long the adventure will be.
Lucien can’t respond. He’s in Kazia’s parlor, and Kazia is right across the room. All he can do is fold the next fucking pillowcase.
Fuck, I picked a silent time to say farewell.Tezurit has been picking up some of Lucien’s swearing habits.Please weep and wail in my absence. I will return, though.
The reassurance is welcome. Lucien doesn’t know about wailing, but if he was alone, he’d be tempted to weep. Tezurit’s stories have been a bright spot in his imprisonment.
Don’t talk to other dragons while I’m gone,Tezurit instructs.I don’t want you bonding to them.Her mental grasp quivers with the equivalent of a stutter.Not that I want you bonding to me or anything! Ugh! Goodbye!
Lucien has to bite the inside of his cheek to hide his grin. Then he grabs the next pillowcase, as his torture continues.
There are four lilac-scented pillowcases, three sheets, and two quilts. Lucien shakes them out one by one, folds them into perfect squares, and piles them on the same table he played aerie at the night before.
Then Kazia pushes the linens to the floor and tells Lucien to fold them again.
The obedience collar isn’t the worst part now. Lucien hates the null-ring holding his magic back. If hatred alone could burn, these linens would be a bonfire.
Lucien wises up on the fifth round. He slows down, as slow as he can without the collar spurring him onward, because the slower he works, the less he has to start over. The more time he has to think, his annoyance settling to a simmer.
It’s like they’re right back where they started—but Kazia doesn’t even seem to enjoy the torment. He doesn’t taunt Lucien during the folding. Doesn’t say anything besides ordering him to start over. Lucien would think this was a performance, except he and Kazia are the only two in the parlor. Which means if there’s a message, either Lucien isn’t understanding the lesson he’s supposed to learn—or it’s meant for Kazia himself.
Lucien had worried last night that Kazia might catch him searching the room. Playing with the rats was entertaining. They’re charming creatures. But Lucien first brought them out to cover the fact that he’d been poking around in their cage. Especially because, to Lucien’s surprise, he actually found something.
The letter from Marek would have been innocuous had it not been hidden in the rat cage. It wasn’t even sealed, and it held no military or political information. Marek wrote that Sei wanted to invite Kazia on their next picnic to Rainbow River. Then he wished Kazia well. If there was a code in those few lines, Lucien couldn’t decipher it. Just an ordinary message betweenbrothers—so ordinary and brief, Lucien can’t imagine spending the resources to send it all the way from Talorna.
But there must be a secret if Kazia hid it after reading. Which means Lucien can’t let Kazia know he found it.
At first, Lucien was just glad his ruse worked. Maybe Kazia was just so panicked over Lucien hurting the rats that he didn’t think about what else was in the cage. Except even besides that…
Lucien likes to think he’s learning his captor’s temperament. Kazia’s a paranoid, suspicious little brat, and upon seeing the cage disturbed, his first thought should have been his secrets.
Which means Kazia wasn’t thinking clearly.
Kazia returnedfragilelast night. So deeply needing companionship that Lucien almost felt bad offering it to him, when all Lucien wants are vulnerabilities to exploit.
