Yet it was her path to choose. She would do it her own way.
This conniving boy had stolen her Luca away, and she would steal him right back.
CHAPTER
10
AMARANDEpushed out of the red hall, heart pounding but head up—Renard’s guards waited for her; she was sure of it.
And she didn’t put it past this boy, this snake in silk, to order them to stop her. To put hands upon her in her own home. To carry her kicking and screaming to the Royal Council, some forged contract in hand, and dump her at the feet of her future. At Ardenia’s future.
She stepped into that passageway as if she owned it—she did.
As if she could do as deadly things with her fists as with the knife in her boot—she could.
As if she had her mind made up about exactly what she was going to do—she had.
The guards stood at attention. They weren’t lolling around, deep in cups of actual sagardoa, their own cuts of lamb balanced in plates upon their knees, threatening to stain their silken tunics with savory juice. No. They stood, all four of them facing the great doors, hands on the hilts of their swords. Waiting for a command.
Amarande didn’t hesitate when she saw them. She simply turned that proud chin over her shoulder and said loudly, politely, “I shall see you in the morning, Your Highness.”
The guards didn’t spark at that; they only dipped their heads in honorable nods, spying their master standing—alive—throughthe glimpse the doors gave as she made her exit as quickly as possible.
With a single word, these men would be on her.
But they didn’t know the castle—not like she did. And thus, they didn’t happen to notice that the princess did not turn left toward her chambers, but right.
She clasped her fingers together, so that the men wouldn’t see them trembling as she walked away, as briskly as possible without breaking into a dead run. Just a princess strolling away for a night of contemplating a generous offer from a boy who would sacrifice her people to satisfy the greed that slunk under every inch of his useless skin.
The trembling didn’t still as she turned a corner and away from their eyes, the tower stairway she’d been seeking straight ahead of her. Rather, she almost shook harder as she closed in on the stairwell—the one that took her to the arena side of the yard and then in a quick diagonal down the hill to the stable—her body reacting as much to her anger at Renard as to what she was about to do.
She pressed open the door into the courtyard, the crisp night air filling her lungs, stinging at her eyes, whispering at the fear creeping up her spine. This new fear.
She knew the brand of fear she felt whenever her father left for a battle. Though she knew he was the strongest, the most capable, there was always the fear that he might never come home. That fear rumbled low, like an ache in the temples before a thunderstorm—something common yet painful.
Thisfear had come with her father’s death. It hadn’t been there that day, waiting, creeping, auspicious. No, it’d appeared later, once the shock wore off and the consequences settled in. It was this fear that sent her mind to places that had her questioning everything.
What if this isn’t the right thing? What if this isn’t the right choice? What if this makes it worse?
That fear pulsed through her mind as she ran. The moon was weak and unhelpful, but her confidence grew with each step.
Yes, this is right.
Amarande pushed the questions down—locked them away deep.
She was the daughter of the Warrior King and the Runaway Queen, and she had made her choice.
These people were poised to steal her crown, her independence, as they had stolen her father and Luca.
And that was their mistake.
She was going to prove to them that they couldn’t steal from her. Not again. She was strong enough to take what was hers—her love, her throne, her future.
Amarande was going to claim it all, while letting these vipers devour one another in the chaos of her wake.
Renard, his mother, his brother—they could poison one another with their ambitions.
Domingu and Akil could gamble capable men for half-baked attempts at conquest.
