The queen extended her hand and Lorenzo kissed her ring with a loud smacking sound.
“And Princess Cleiona, I’m very pleased to see you again.” Lorenzo squeezed her hands. Despite the joviality in his tone, his searching gaze held a momentary glimpse of both grief and sympathy.
She swallowed hard. “And I you, Lorenzo.”
“It’s my true privilege to create your wedding gown.”
“As it will be my true privilege to wear it.”
He nodded once, shallowly, then tore his gaze from hers to look at the queen, flashing her a big smile. “Let us go inside, your majesty. I have something very special to show you.”
The queen raised an eyebrow, intrigued. “To show me? Really?”
“Yes. Please, follow me.”
Inside the store waited a dozen attendants and seamstresses, lined up six on each side, their heads lowered obediently. The expansive store was lined with bolts of silk, satin, jacquard, and lace for as far as the eye could see.
“I have been working very hard on a dress befitting a queen of your high esteem.” Lorenzo moved toward a mannequin that had been draped in a magnificent indigo gown. It was embroidered with gold thread and beaded with sparkling stones. “I believe I’ve succeeded. What do you think of this, your majesty?”
“It’s divine,” the queen said, her normally expressionless face tinged with the tiniest pink, her words hushed. “Beautiful. This is my absolute favorite color. Did you know that?”
Lorenzo smiled. “Perhaps.”
This vibrant shade was the queen’s favorite? Cleo had never seen her in anything that wasn’t black, gray, or a muted shade of steely green. Since Magnus and his father also wore nothing but black, she’d assumed it was a strange Limerian custom at odds with the red-as-blood uniforms.
The queen’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “Who have you been speaking to about me that would give you such personal information?”
Caution shone now in Lorenzo’s gaze. “It was in my previous correspondence with the king. I asked. He responded.”
“How strange,” she murmured. “I had no idea Gaius even knew my favorite color.” She turned her attention to the gown again. “I would like to try it on.”
“Of course, your majesty. I will attend to you myself.” There was a fine sheen of perspiration on Lorenzo’s brow now at having come very close to offending such a powerful woman. “Princess, if you please, you can go with my seamstress into the fitting room. I will be with you as soon as I can.”
A pretty young girl approached, curtseying before her.
“I am Nerissa,” she said. “Please, your grace, follow me.”
Cleo glanced toward the queen, but the woman’s attention was fully fixed on the beautiful gown and nothing but. Nic stayed by her side as Cleo began to follow the attendant.
“I’m coming with you,” he said when she looked at him curiously. “You did want me to be your bodyguard today, remember?”
“This is a dress fitting,” Cleo said. “Therefore, I will be undressing.”
“A hardship for me to endure, I agree.” Again, that welcome grin of his flickered on his lips. “But I will try to keep my focus.”
She stifled a laugh. “You will wait outside this door for me to finish.”
“But, princess—”
“Nic, please. Do as I ask. Don’t make a fuss.”
He stopped walking and bowed his head. “As you command, your highness.”
Cleo needed as few people in this room as possible. When Lorenzo entered, she would send the attendant away so she could speak with him privately about secretly helping her.
Nerissa led the way into the large fitting room, closing the door between them and Nic. Inside there were messy swaths of cloth and half-made gowns. On one mannequin in the center of the room was Cleo’s wedding gown. It was made of silk and lace with shades of gold and ivory. It had tiny pearls, sapphires, and diamonds stitched into patterns of swirling flowers on the bodice. The translucent, flowing sleeves appeared to be as light as air.
The gown was so beautiful that it took her breath away. “Nerissa . . . Lorenzo completely outdid himself.”
There was no reply.
She turned. “Nerissa?”
The girl was gone. Only then did Cleo notice how dark it was. Sunlight from the window shone upon the area of the dress, but not into the corners of the cavernous room.
“Swayed by pretty frocks, your highness?” a voice said from the shadows. “Why am I not surprised?”
Her heart began to pound hard. “You.”
“I did say you’d be seeing me again soon.”
Jonas Agallon stood in the shadows at the edge of the room, where he must have been since she entered. She hadn’t noticed him. Which surprised her, since now she couldn’t see anything else but him. He wore tan leather trousers, black leather boots, and a simple brown tunic that bore a slight rip in the sleeve. As he drew alarmingly close to her, he smelled not of dirt and sweat, which she might have expected, but the clean scent of the forest, just as he had when he’d snuck into her chambers.
Her gaze scanned the room again as quickly as she could. “What did you do to Nerissa?”
“Nerissa is a help to me and my rebels. One of those girls you mentioned before who says yes to what I ask of them instead of giving me a difficult time. You might learn much from her.”
“I’m surprised at you for endangering her. There are more than a dozen guards in the very next room who are on alert for any rebel activity.”
It was an exaggeration, but there was no reason he had to know this. The king did not take the threat of outside attack lightly, yet he’d sent so very few guards along on this trip.
Jonas didn’t seem alarmed at the threat of guards. He touched the sleeve of the wedding gown, sliding the sheer material between his fingers. “Have you given any more thought to my proposition?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Is that what this is about? Another attempt to woo me to the rebel cause?”
“Believe me, princess, I would never attempt to woo you. Far too much work for very little reward.” A smile tugged at his lips. “So here you are, ready to be fitted in the gown you will wear to wed Prince Magnus. Very soon you’ll truly be one of them.”
“A gown does not make a bride, just as a few empty threats do not make a rebel.”
His grin fell away. “The tongue of a snake. Yes, I think you’ll fit in well with the Damoras.”
“What do you want, once and for all? Speak quickly and leave. I have no patience for useless games.”
“I’m asking you again. Will you help me destroy the king?”
Without realizing it, she’d drawn closer to the rebel—far closer than was comfortable. She couldn’t shout, couldn’t raise her voice louder than a harsh whisper. They were now very nearly touching. She forced herself not to take a shaky step back and show him that his proximity disturbed her.
She’d given this much thought since she’d last seen him. Perhaps this was an opportunity that could serve her well. She had put far too much hope into the idea of her ring leading her to answers that might never come.
Her stomach fluttered nervously. “If I help you, how do I know it will benefit me?”
Jonas’s brows drew together. “If you help me, I believe we’ll have a better chance of defeating the king currently seated upon your throne. Sounds beneficial to me.”
She wrung her hands. “I don’t know.”
“This is not an answer helpful to either of us.”
“What are the rebels’ plans to overthrow King Gaius?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
There was a knock on the door, then a rattle of the handle. The door was locked.
“Princess?” It was Nic. “Is everything all right in there?”
Jonas swore under h
is breath. “I suppose I can tell you part of my plan—my immediate plan. Had you been more agreeable the last time we spoke, it might not have come to this.”
She tore her gaze from the wooden door. “What? Speak quickly. They’ll be coming in here in moments.”
“Concerned for my safety?”
“No, for mine. If I’m found alone in a room with a rebel—”
“It would put a damper on your betrothal to the prince, wouldn’t it?”
“And cost both of us our lives. You must leave while there’s time.”
“You’re coming with me.”
He must be mad. “I’m doing no such thing.”
Jonas shook his head. “Apologies, your highness, but you really should have said yes the last time we spoke. It might have helped avoid the necessity of this.”
Alarm grew in her chest at the dark look that had come over his expression. She turned to the door and opened her mouth to yell for help. Nic now banged on the door, attempting to break it open.
Jonas was behind her, crushing her back against his chest. His hand covered her mouth—it held a cloth that smelled strange. Of strong herbs.
“You won’t believe me,” he said into her ear, “but I mean you no harm.”
She’d smelled the same thing once—a healer had used it to induce sleep when she’d broken her ankle as a child. To avoid further pain, and for him to have the opportunity to reset the broken bone, he’d administered this powerful medicine.
She tried to scream but found she had no voice. Darkness fell all around her.
CHAPTER 11
MAGNUS
AURANOS
The palace had been in an uproar for hours, ever since the carriage returned from Hawk’s Brow without Princess Cleiona. She’d been taken from a private room in the dressmaker’s shop and a note had been left behind, addressed to the king himself, tucked into the folds of the wedding gown she’d been there to see.
I have the princess. If you wish her returned unharmed, you will immediately cease construction on your road and free all those you’ve enslaved to work on it.
“Will you do as the rebel demands?” Magnus now asked the king. He and his father were in Lucia’s chambers, standing on either side of her bed, the sleeping princess between them.
“No. I need my road finished, and soon. It will stop for nothing, especially not the demands of a rebel.”
Magnus’s gaze snapped to the king. “Then he’ll kill her.”
A nod. “Most likely.”
Even for the king, this utter lack of emotion was surprising, at least until Magnus realized that this played well into his father’s plans. Such an end for Cleo would gain him great sympathy from the Auranian citizens. And it would paint the rebels as abhorrent villains who would harm an innocent young girl loved by thousands of her subjects.
Still, it troubled him.
“There was no need for her to travel to another location for such a trivial thing,” he said. “The fitting could have happened here.”
“Yes, it could have.”
Magnus frowned. “Did you know this would happen?”
The king’s expression grew thoughtful. “I thought it a possibility that the rebels might act.”
“So you put her in danger with the knowledge that there might be an attack?” Rage, still controlled, boiled beneath his skin at the very thought of it. “Mother was also on that journey!”
“And your mother is fine, only shaken. Magnus, you think me so cold that I would put my wife and the princess in harm’s way without a single care about their safety?”
Magnus managed to hold his tongue. “So now what? We wait for the next letter to arrive listing further demands you won’t meet?”
“No. I’ve already sent out a search team. There are rumors a Paelsian rebel group has set up camp in the Wildlands not many hours’ journey from here. If they find her, your upcoming marriage can be a grand event to continue to distract the masses. But if they don’t . . .” He leaned over to absently stroke a lock of dark hair off Lucia’s pale forehead. “Then it’s fate. The rebels will be seen as the murderers of Auranos’s golden princess. They will be outcasts, hated by every person in this kingdom and beyond. Either way, we win. They lose.”
Magnus flicked a glance at the attendant, Mira, on the far side of the room. She cleaned the balcony railing, running a rag along it. Her plain gray dress, the innocuous outfit of a servant, allowed her to move about dim rooms without notice, hiding in the shadows, available when needed but otherwise unnoticeable.
But Magnus couldn’t help but notice that the girl’s face held both worry and outrage. She knew of Cleo’s kidnapping. Her brother, Magnus remembered, had gone along with the carriage as additional protection.
Some protection. Magnus personally would have taken the opportunity to have Nic punished for such a failure if the boy hadn’t looked absolutely destroyed when he’d returned with the rest of the guards.
“Kill me now,” Nic had spat at him, his voice breaking. “I deserve it for letting this happen.”
“And interrupt your misery?” Magnus had studied his tortured expression for a moment before turning away. “Not today.”
Magnus would not admit it to anyone, but the idea of the rebels capturing the princess disturbed him greatly. He didn’t want to care what horrors she might be experiencing at this very moment. Besides, the princess’s death would put an end to this ridiculous betrothal his father had insisted upon. It would be for the best.
But, still . . . it bothered him.
Irrelevant.
There was only one beautiful girl he gave a damn about and she was the one that lay in this bed.
“Do you know someone named Alexius?” the king asked after silence fell between them for a time.
“No. Who is that?”
“I visited Lucia yesterday for a few moments after your mother left her side. She murmured the name in her sleep.”
Magnus’s shoulders stiffened. Lucia had spoken in her sleep? “Did she say anything else?”
“No, only the name.”
He wracked his mind but came up blank. “I don’t know anyone named Alexius.”
“Perhaps it’s a boy she was enamored of back in Limeros.”
“Perhaps.” His mouth was suddenly dry. He reached for the nearly empty pitcher of water on the bedside table and poured himself what was left. He’d never heard of an Alexius before. And now this boy resided in Lucia’s dreams? A ribbon of jealousy twisted within him.
“She’ll wake soon,” said the king.
“How can you sound so certain?”
“Because it’s her destiny to help me reach my destiny.”
There was something in the way the king said this, an absolute confidence that resonated like an echo in a canyon. “Who told you this?”
The king’s dark gaze flicked to Magnus, sweeping the length of him as if assessing his son’s worth. “Her name is Melenia.”
“Let me guess. Your mysterious new advisor.”
“That’s right.”
“Tell me, Father, will I ever meet this Melenia?”
“Perhaps one day. For now, it’s impossible.”
“Why?”
The king again hesitated before replying. “Because I see her only in my dreams.”
Magnus blinked. Surely he had misheard. “I don’t understand.”
“Melenia is a Watcher, one with great knowledge about the Kindred and how to go about finding them. She is over four thousand years old but blessed with eternal youth and incredible beauty.”
“Your new advisor is a beautiful four-thousand-year-old Watcher who visits you in your dreams.” The words were heavy in his mouth.
“Yes.” The king smiled at this, as if recognizing the absurdity of what he claimed. “Melenia has confirmed for me that Lucia is
the key to finding the Kindred and harnessing its power. That before this, before she existed, it was simply not possible to find it. That’s why no one has ever succeeded in such a quest.”
This was one of those moments that Magnus had come to recognize. A test. The king was giving him a test. How he responded to something so fantastical would set the tone for the immediate future.
Would he assume his father mad for making such statements? Believing such things? Would he be unable to hold himself back from laughing?
Once he would have, earning the king’s wrath and perhaps another scar.
No more.
His entire life, he’d denied the existence of such a thing as magic, but Lucia had proved to him it was true. It was real. Elementia, according the books he’d recently read here in the Auranian palace library, tied back to the immortal Watchers. And Watchers, so legend told, could sometimes visit mortals in their dreams.
Magnus knew his father was dangerous, vengeful, and remorseless. However, there was one thing the king was not.
He was not stupid enough to believe in imaginary things that served no true purpose.
If his father said this, if he admitted such a thing aloud, then it had to be true. And Magnus needed to know more.
“How is Lucia the key?” he asked evenly.
“This I don’t yet know.” The king’s brows drew together slightly. “All I know for certain is she will wake.”
“Then I believe you.”
The king’s eyes lit with approval and he reached across the bed to pat Magnus’s scarred cheek. “Very good, my son. Very good. Together we will find the Kindred.”
“With Lucia.”
“Yes.” He nodded. “With Lucia.”
Four crystals holding the essence of elementia. Magnus saw their worth, just as his father did. Such incredible and endless power and strength. If he possessed them, even one of them, he would feel equal to Lucia in more ways than he did now. He would be more than just a prince, more than just a brother. They would have magic in common and she would see and appreciate this. Appreciate him. And such strength would show the king that Magnus was not a boy any longer; he was a man who went after what he desired most, no matter the cost.