Page 36 of The Horde King of Shadow

Silence dropped between us. When I glanced over at Zaridan, I saw that her head was raised, peering at the both of us from herplace on the cliff, no longer hiding that she was listening to our conversation.

Stepping forward into Klara, I brushed the tendril of hair away from her scar, remembering the jolt I’d felt in the marketplace in Dothik when I’d first seen it. How it had felt like all the air had been sucked from my body, a strange sense of familiarity and knowing making the city sway. As if I’d been there before. As if I’d beenrememberingher.

Heartstone magic was an unpredictable, dangerous, and powerful thing. Klara of Rath Serok and Rath Drokka was at the root of it all.

She cleared her throat when the silence stretched too long between us, lowering her cheek so that my touch slid away.

“You, um, said that Zaridan has sway here because of Muron. What of the other Elthika? Levanth’s, was it?”

“Levanth is one of my riders,” I corrected. “The navigator wing, I’m sure you remember.”

She stilled. “Ah. The female you went into the forest with tonight. Alone.”

Thatmade me straighten, hearing an odd note in her tone, one I recognized from earlier. “What?” I asked quietly, irritation beginning to burn in my belly. I couldn’t stand cowardice. “Would you like to ask me something?”

Her lips pressed together. Then her mouth opened. “Everyone saw.”

“Nothing happened,” I rasped, stepping closer, lowering my head until our eyes were parallel. “I am not only aKarathof the Sarrothian people, Klara, but also the lead commander of a rider horde. You think I would do something like that when I have givenyoumy vow?”

“I don’t know you, Sarkin,” she whispered. “I have no idea what you would or would not do. I know nothing of the Karag. Nothing of the Elthika. I know what I saw. And I saw your ownrider horde react in a specific way when you went off with her.Alone,” she said again. “Into a dark forest. What would you have me think?”

Bright anger tightened in my chest. The dishonor she thought me capable of…it was maddening!

“I know these forests better than most, Klara,” I snapped. “Levanth needed my help locating the closest stream for our water supply. I showed it to her so she could direct others to it, and then I returned to the camp. Toyou.”

A sharp breath left her. “Oh.”

“Let me ask you this,” I began, trying to keep tight restraints on my temper. “Do you expect your husband to be in your bed alone? To never stray? Even given the circumstances of this marriage?”

Her brow furrowed. A spark of her own irritation shone hot in her eyes, and the mere sight tightened my abdomen. “How could I even begin to answer that? There’s too many factors to?—”

“Your heart’s reaction, then,” I exclaimed, my voice beginning to rise, pressing my hand to the thundering beat of her chest. Her eyes widened. “Don’t think. Give me an answer. Now!”

“Yes,” she breathed, glaring. “Yes, then.”

“Tell me why.”

“Because I’m the child of an affair, of a broken sacred vow, spoken before Kakkari!” she retorted. “It hurt a lot of people,includingme.”

Shock went through me. My lips pressed together, and I leaned back, understanding dawning.

“You…you must have known. You’ve been watching us for a long time.”

“I didn’t,” I confessed. “We were there to observe, not to ask questions that would get us exposed.”

To the Karag, especially the Sarrothian…her birth would certainly cast Klara in a bad light if the truth got out. The Sarrothian were a regimented people, almost to a fault. Rarely did they see the shades of gray in this life. They saw right or they saw wrong. And if you fell onto the wrong side of that divide…it would take you years to be seen as an equal again.

Memories were long, unshakeable things among the Sarrothian.

I would know that better than anyone.

“Then we are in agreement,” I finally grunted.

Her lips parted in disbelief. “What? Agreement aboutwhat?”

“We arrive to the Arsadia soon. We will seal this marriage, and I expect you to uphold your oaths to me, yourhusband,” I said. “Just as I will to you.”

Realization was dawning over her expression.

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