Page 71 of Given to the Black King

By afternoon, I hear Callas call her leverage.

He is in the far gallery with Perr. The door is shut. My stone carries every syllable.

“The situation has developed better than expected,” Callas dictates. “The envoy has achieved significant personal influence. Advise the council that I may exercise the personal-guarantee discretion granted before our departure and attach a marriage annex to the treaty.”

Perr’s pen stops. “Minister.”

“Continue.”

“What does permanently mean?”

“You have copied marriage contracts before.”

Silence.

Then Perr says, “Not with the bride absent.”

“Iona is not the bride until the offer is accepted.”

The growl rises in my chest.

I stand outside the door with one hand against the stone. Five claws emerge.

I could enter. Tear the parchment. Break Callas’s writing hand. Send him south tied across a horse.

I leave my hand against the stone until every claw retracts. Then I walk away.

Perr starts writing again, slowly.

I leave before the minister hears me breathe.

That night, Iona sleeps against my chest.

The ache wakes me before midnight.

Her pulse beats beneath my jaw. The root pain climbs into my skull. Venom gathers until my mouth floods.

I ease out from beneath her without touching her throat and take the leather strap from the bedside table.

I set the fang points outside the strap and close my back teeth until the urge passes enough for me to breathe.

The leather holds. I do not bleed.

When I return to bed, Iona is awake. She has pulled on my shirt against the cooling room.

Her gaze moves from my face to the damp strap in my hand.

“How often?” she asks.

“Enough.”

“That is not a number.”

“No.”

I put the strap aside and lie down without touching her.

She watches me for a moment, tired and unhappy.