Page 115 of Heir

She cursed loudly, and Quil turned from where he was laying the fire.

“It’s R’z,” she said. “She’s close.”

“No Kegari?”

Sirsha shook her head. “R’z will want to stay here.” Sirsha rubbed her temple, agitated. “It’s the only shelter for miles.”

Quil tilted his head and there was sympathy in his regard. “She will, but not because of the storm. She wants to get to you. I’ll deal with her when she arrives. Take one of the back rooms. Come out if you feel up to it—or not at all.”

“I— We’ll have to share again.” She pulled at their coin, finding a strange comfort in rubbing her fingers against the etchings.

“I’ll take the other room,” Quil said. “You could use some time to yourself, perhaps. They can sleep in this room, and if they have an issue with that, they can take it up with me.”

She wished to weep, to thank him, to hiss at him for knowing herwhen what she wanted was for him to be obtuse, so he’d be easy to leave behind. But he wasn’t obtuse and that made her angry, so all she could do was glare at him and hope he’d flinch.

Instead, he stepped close, the proximity tightening something inside her chest.Closer, she wanted to say. As if he could read her thoughts, he lifted a big hand to her face, tipping it toward his with barely a touch. She channeled all her venom at her sister, at herself, into her gaze. He looked at her level, taking it in, aware of what lay at the core of it.

Until the loathing drained out of her, and she looked down at her hands—her useless hands that did nothing as Loli died.

“I’ve seen terrible things, Quil.” Her voice shook, but she kept speaking, because she needed to expel the words from her mind. “Perhaps beyond what you could imagine. But even after all that, what stays with me is how it—itfedon her. Those sounds. I don’t know how to get them out of my head.”

“The more you try not to think about it, the more it will haunt you,” he said with the surety of someone who lived with a bevy of his own ghosts. “And if you forgot, it would be an injustice to her. I don’t forget what happened in Navium, even when I wish I could. I remember, and I mourn, and I rage at myself and then I vow to have vengeance.”

The words were so unnaturally fierce coming from him that she glanced up, finding to her surprise that his venom matched her own. But she supposed it made sense, for who would hate himself more than a prince who didn’t stop his Empire from falling?

He didn’t look away, and she took it as a challenge, even when she knew this was exactly what she shouldn’t be doing, staring into the eyes of a person she couldn’t afford to care about, burning in his sunrise gaze.

Outside, thunder crashed, breaking the spell between them. Quil shook himself and walked to the back room, laying out her bedroll andlighting a fire for her bath. The rain had plastered his black hair to his head, his clothing to the taut ropes of muscle running along his shoulders and arms. She’d heard Quil joke that Sufiyan had gotten the looks and Quil the royal legacy.

But that’s only because he didn’t see himself clearly. Quil, with that aquiline nose and cut-glass jaw and magnificent body—Quil was addictive. Sirsha didn’t think she’d ever tire of looking at him.

Something that was deeply inconvenient, she realized, as he was staring at her, saying something.

“Ah—what?”

“The fire is going.” He nodded to the bath. “Your water should be warm soon. Are you all ri—”

“Fine!” she said, horrified when it came out more shriek than word. She pushed him out the bedroom door, shoved it closed, and marveled that she could find new and interesting ways to humiliate herself in front of the boy she wanted to kiss amid an emotional crisis. If Loli were here, she’d scoff.Tup him and get it out of your system.Sirsha chuckled, and the ache in her heart faded a touch.

After what seemed like an age, her bathwater warmed, and she stripped and scrubbed herself, her mind moving unbidden to thoughts of the creature she hunted. She shivered as she remembered the fixed, hungry way she had looked at Sirsha. The killer was far away—the earth told her as much. But Sirsha still felt disgusted, like there was a tentacle snaking along the deep reaches of her mind.

Eventually, she heard voices—R’zwana and J’yan had arrived. She rose reluctantly, throwing on clean clothes and braiding her hair. She’d greet her sister, so the hag wouldn’t think Sirsha was afraid of her, then take her leave.

Easy enough.

She strode into the main room, and barreled into J’yan, who waspulling out a seat for her. He tried to steady her, but she slapped him away.

R’zwana, sitting across from Quil, smirked.

For his part, the prince looked almost bored. His legs were stretched out and he was slouched in his seat, like a big predator trying to put his prey at ease. He’d bathed too—out of a bucket, probably—and changed into dry clothing. His dark hair was still wet and pulled back from his face.

What a face.

“Sister,” R’zwana greeted her, and Sirsha snapped her attention away from Quil. “Dawdling away your time in the bath, as usual.”

“R’z,” Sirsha said with a sugary bite. “Letting other people do the hard work because you’re a shit Inashi, as usual. Why are you still following me?”

“Perhaps I don’t trust you,” R’zwana said. “Perhaps I think your engagement is a lie.”

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