Page 96 of The Sundered Realms

“I’m confident they might have had other options, if their own people, who they give everything to protect, weren’t keeping secrets that could save them,” Rhuil said. “I’m confident Serenthuar always takes the long view and plans for centuries, not moments.”

The ambassador shifted his feet and the icy surface flickered silver again, and finally Liris realized the purpose behind his strange movements:

This was a spell.

Not one she knew, but whatever it was was in his shoes as he danced her into certain patterns to move her into position. In fact she recognized the beginning of the pattern her feet had been making, her mind filling in the points she hadn’t yet hit on the star.

This time Liris didn’t simply mimic his movement but danced at a different angle, testing his response.

He matched her fluidly, and she danced out of range, adding a challenge stanza for him.

Minister Belighia hadn’t been isolating Vhannor.

This was a trap for Liris.

But that meant they—Tellianghu and Serenthuar—believed she was worth trapping.

And wasn’t that interesting?

“The problem with believing your own reputation for longsightedness,” Liris said, “is that when someone takes advantage of you, you still believe you’re in control.”

“You think you’re saving Serenthuar from itself?” Rhuil chuckled indulgently. “Oh, you absolute child. If you want to help our people, why don’t you go back?”

“Says a man who has been very careful to never return once he got out,” Liris said. “Whose vaunted ‘accessibility’ is his value as an entertainer, a dancing monkey for his jailers.”

“And are you different?” He smiled knowingly. “Performing for your keepers, doing whatever you think you have to. But you know they’ll drop you the instant you cease to be useful, don’t you? No one supports Serenthuar but our own, Liris.”

Liris spun, her cloak twirling around them and between them, a barrier at a moment in the dance she was supposed to let him get in close.

“Do I know that?“ she asked. “Do you?”

Ambassador Rhuil’s eyes widened as he realized she’d been interfering with him on purpose. His smile managed to be both bitter and admiring at once. “Oh, child, Serenthuar needs you,” he murmured.

“Yes, they do,” Liris said. But she was not going to let them use her again.

Sound rushed in, and only then did Liris realize all around them had been muffled—an obfuscation, probably, so no one could hear what the ambassador was saying to her.

And then on cue, the man responsible for breaking the spell was there. Vhannor strode between them and, rather than starting a fight, he spoke as if nothing of consequence had occurred, keeping up the pretense that naught was amiss and following the lead Liris had set while nevertheless making himself available to her. “If I may cut in?”

Rhuil bowed grandly, a mocking smile on his lips. “Are you sure he’s not the one using you?”

Vhannor stiffened, but Liris confidently took his arm.

There was, in fact, someone she could trust who wasn’t from Serenthuar, not just because over and over again, he’d had her back.

Because even after she’d made mistakes, he trusted her.

Serenthuar never had.

“I am sure,” Liris said coldly, “because he gives me a choice.”

“That’s all we want,” Ambassador Rhuil said. “A choice.”

Serenthuar wasn’t just a pawn in Jadrhun’s plan, then—they were an active participant, and so was Tellianghu, all of them tied up together desperate to prevent the Coalition’s existence if it might mean the slightest imposition on their autonomy. As if that in and of itself wasn’t choosing for others.

“You don’t get more choice by taking others’ choices away,” Liris said, turning her back on him in a blatant snub that had those nearest them gasping.

As Liris danced away with Vhannor, Rhuil’s voice followed her: “Yes, you do.”

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