Page 31 of Somber Prince

“Time rights all wrongs, Your Highness. She just needs time to heal.”

Wise words. Only they failed to put my concerns to rest. How much time did Dawn need to adapt to her new life in Alveari Kingdom? I hoped it wasn’t forever because every second of her unhappiness scratched inside my chest with unease I couldn’t quiet.

“What if she never recovers?”

Oskura rubbed her chest through her beaded armor. “She is not the only Joy Vessel you have, Your Highness. There are plenty of others in your sarai that are far more agreeable than her. I’d say, give them all a chance before choosing a favorite. You may develop a preference for someone else’s joy.”

That was the most puzzling thing—I hadn’t even tasted Dawn’s joy yet. I longed to feel it. But more than that, I wished for her to have some in the first place.

Following the curve of the city, we slowly circled back to the main gate. The moment it came into view, I knew something was wrong. A tight group of guards gathered a few paces away from the gate. More of my warriors blocked the access to the city in a defensive formation, their weapons drawn and ready.

“Something is happening there,” Oskura muttered, drawing one of her swords. She made her camel move faster, hurrying toward the gate.

As fast as Starlight could be if needed, it wasn’t fast enough for me. I had to be at the gate now.

With a long breath in, I willed my body to dissolve into wisps of shadows. By the time I breathed out, I was at the gate—my body, my clothes, and my weapons solidifying into their shapes once again.

A bout of nausea hit my stomach. The distance was too great to travel as a shadow to leave me unaffected. The transformation left me disoriented and weak. My head was spinning, blending the faces of the city guards into a blur.

I blinked, rooting my feet into the desert floor. I’d trained all my life to transform and recover quickly. By now, I was able to successfully do it everywhere, even in battle. I just needed a moment to ground myself for the world to turn upright again.

“What’s going on?” I asked the leader of the guards on duty.

“Your Highness.” He bowed his head. “A desert dweller tried to enter the city with a merchant caravan. But we apprehended him.”

“Just one man?”

Desert dwellers were a nuisance. Before Teneris became mine, they had grown to think of the city as their own. Many refused to bend to my rules and left, but they never abandoned organizing raids on the city to steal supplies and terrorize my people.

One man wasn’t much of a concern, however. Unless he was a spy or an assassin on a mission, a part of a bigger plan.

“He’s dead!” someone yelled from the crowd of guards.

“Dead?”

The guards stepped aside, allowing me to see the man on the ground. His throat was slit wide open. A black dagger of Nerifir iron lay next to his hand. Dark blood gushed from his wound, the edges of the cut flesh already fraying with shadows of decomposition.

The man was certainly dead. The question was why.

“Who did this?” I cast a glance around the circle of somber faces of the guards.

“He did it himself, Your Highness,” one of them replied.

“Grabbed the knife and slit his own throat before we could stop him,” another one added.

“Why would he do that?” I asked.

The first guard rubbed his neck, looking uneasy. “I told him we’ll have to question him.”

“And I said that Your Highness would want to speak to him too,” the other guard said. “That’s when he pulled out the knife.”

I saw confusion on their faces, not guilt. They must be telling the truth, puzzled by it the way I was.

Oskura climbed down from her camel. Starlight had come with her.

“Looks like he chose death over the chance of meeting you, my prince,” my general pointed out.

I knew I wasn’t favored by desert dwellers, but none of them had killed themselves before just to avoid seeing me.

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