Page 66 of His Realm

He nodded and grinned. “I see that protocol has flown completely out the window with my absence.”

“You have no idea,” I assured him, grinning back.

“This will not stand, my consort, and we will be reinstituting a dress code at once.”

“Of course, because that’s the important takeaway here.”

“My prince!” Cirillo yelled, clearly dumbfounded by the banter.

Varic turned and draped an arm around my shoulders so that we were both facing the enraged, overwrought lord. “Where were you?” Varic asked casually.

Cirillo could only stare at him.

“The question confuses you?”

“It’s not what I expected.”

Varic grunted.

“I thought you would be⁠—”

“You’re very tan,” Varic commented, “so I’m guessing you were somewhere in the South Pacific? You hate the desert, so I’m thinking…Australia maybe?”

He huffed out a breath. “I made an extended trip through all of Oceania and then to every coast in the world south of the equator.”

Varic nodded. “Did you want to stay for the wedding?”

He only stared at Varic, who glanced over at his mother. She got up from the couch where she was sitting with Dae-Jung and joined us.

“I think you’ve overwhelmed him,” she offered.

“Why?”

“I think he thought,” I began, and Varic turned back to me, “that you might be pissed off at him that he ran away all those years ago.”

Varic looked at the clearly distraught Cirillo. “Is that it? Did you think I’d be mad?”

He nodded quickly.

Varic shook his head. “Absolutely not. I figured you were done with me and ready to begin your next adventure. That’s why I never had Hadrian and Zev look for you. It’s not as if you were a courtier or a courtesan. You’re from a noble house. You were free to do what you wanted, and still are, of course.”

He couldn’t stop staring at Varic.

“Have you been in touch with your parents or your sister?”

“I—yes.”

“That’s good,” he said with a forced smile. “Well, again, if you want to stay for the wedding, consider yourself invited.”

He appeared flummoxed. “Your father’s men found me in the Maldives and brought me here to speak to him. He then explained that I was the only man who could replace your consort.”

Varic breathed in through his nose, and his arm tucked me in tighter against him. “I have corrected my father’s mistaken notion and explained to him, in detail, that I am of the same mind as my grandfather on the subject of my consort.”

Cirillo’s mouth fell open.

“My consort is, and will always be, irreplaceable.”

Ever since I’d learned that Gideon had killed Varic’s grandmother, Livia, and I’d uncovered the truth, I had asked both Varic and Isabella all about her as well as anyone who had been at the palace during that time. Livia was not the great beauty Isabella was, but she had a way of enchanting everyone she met with her compassion, her sense of humor, and her ability to laugh at herself. Apparently, she’d been a bit clumsy, and everyone at the palace was in the habit of reaching for her to keep her upright. She was, Isabella told me, the most charming woman she’d ever met, before or since, and the only person who could constantly make her laugh even at inopportune times like formal events and, worse, funerals. The entire Noreia had grieved when she died, and no one was surprised that Magnus never took another to his heart or his bed. She was his consort and irreplaceable. No one ever judged him for being harder, colder, and hyperfocused on ruling after she died. They had felt like that was the only way for him to be.