I looked up to meet his hard and unyielding stare. The question was abrupt, yet it was the most obvious thing suspended between us. I rubbed more yarrow into his open skin. “Because it was wrong.”
“As if you know the difference between right and wrong.”
I gaped at his boldness. “I didn’t have a choice.”
“I’m guessing you want something. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”
I huffed a reluctant breath. So much for gratitude and getting on his good side. “I wanted to make sure you were alright, but yes. I do have a proposition for you. Clearly, you don’t trust Maryn with the truth about what’s happened to Gregorios’s Sight. I have to wonder, whatwouldhappen if I revealed all of that to your queen regent?”
His ungloved hand flexed against the bedding. “If you tryanythingto get Gregorios in trouble, I’ll?—”
“What, kill me? Tell Maryn about my apostate brand and have her do that for you? You’ve threatened me plenty already.” I placed my fists on my hips to indicate I meant business. “I’m offering a deal. I won’t reveal whatIknow to Maryn if you promise to keep my grandparents safe. Help me convince Gregorios to lie and say I have no living family members to sacrifice. The Treaty requires allknownblood relatives to be sacrificed during a trial, right? So, we lie and say I have none. Then take my grandparents somewhere no one will discover and…” I inhaled shakily. “Forget about my brother. For now.”
If finding Basil meant he, too, would be sacrificed, I could only hope he was able to get out of the apostai’s clutches on his own.
Raithe’s eyes roamed my face. “You must be joking.”
“I’m completely serious.”
“I don’t understand why Scorpio Chose you.” Despite his bored expression, his eyes simmered with contempt. “You have no regard for everything we Chosens stand for.”
I couldn’t argue his words—much as they stung—because he was right. “What’s it going to be, Raithe?”
“What you are suggesting is treason, as is blackmailing a guardian. You’re not very good at this leverage concept you seem so proud of.”
I tapped my foot this time. I was desperate and had nothing else to offer. “Please.”
“The Treaty is the law and the law is the Treaty.”
“I don’t care about the Treaty. My family?—”
“You are not the first, nor will you be the last, to sacrifice family for the good of the realm,” he said. “I can’t believe I am having to explain this to a princess. It’s like talking to a child.”
I reared back. “I’m not a child.”
“Then stop acting like one.”
His harsh words resembled my grandmother’s. Humiliation kept me from speaking, and an uncomfortable silence followed. I didn’t know what else to do except continue with the paste still smeared over my hands.
They’re wrong.For some reason I needed to stay and prove that to him.
Raithe tensed, either from pain or surprise that I chose to continue after his cruel tongue. Even if he wasn’t going to help me, my character deserved defending.
“Regardless of what you think of me, you should know,” I said, “that I would have intervened for anyone. And notjustto get something in return from you. That’s not who I am.”
It wasn’t who I wanted to be, anyway.
“For someone you know, maybe,” he said. “Not to a stranger you detest.”
He didn’t understand why I did what I did, and I didn’t understand why he put himself in such a position to begin with. “Is it so hard to believe that someone could put aside personal animosities to help another?”
He cocked his head up at me. From this proximity, I could make out the definitions of his face, sharp and unyielding, with light freckles smattering over a noticeable crook in his nose, broken at the bridge. Strangely, it suited him.
“Well?” I pressed a bit breathlessly. “Is it?”
His eyes held mine unflinchingly. “Yes.”
We were at an impasse of misunderstanding. I had an urge to uncover why so muchloathingburned through his otherwise stoic mask. “Alright. Then let me ask you this: why were you so determined not to let me go under that whip with you? Given our shared dislike of one another and your wanting to kill me and all.”
