Page 235 of Heat of the Everflame

My focus locked on Remis. “I’d like a word.”

“I’m afraid it will have to wait. This meeting is very important.” His eyes flared, his expression trying to convey a silent plea tobehave.

I flopped into a chair and crossed my legs. “Well, then. If it’s such an important meeting, surely the Queen should attend.”

“TheCrownshould attend,” Marthe said smoothly. “And Remis is already here.”

“I think my gryvern would beg to differ.” I shot her a cloying smile. “Would you like to meet her?”

Her face soured and turned to Remis. “First you accuse my grandson of a revolting falsehood, now you bring her here to threaten us? If this is how you intend to make amends, Remis—”

“You should be making amends,” I snapped. “What you did at the Challenging was a shot at me and at House Corbois. A shot youmissed.”

“A mistake we won’t make twice,” Jean said under his breath.

Marthe hunched forward on her cane, her forehead creasing as her peppery eyebrows rose. “We’re not the only ones who took a shot, were we? Even House Corbois didn’t deem you worthy.” She clicked her tongue. “Challenged by your own House. A first in Lumnos history.”

“I knew Luther would eventually see what you were,” Iléana said. She leapt to her feet. “I heard he’s back. Where is he? I want to see him.”

I rolled my eyes. “I assure you, the feelingisn’tmutual.”

She stalked toward me with a poisonous glare. Alixe moved to block her, but I waved her off, giving Iléana a tired, unbothered stare.

“You think because you forced him to kiss you at the Challenging that you’ve won him?” she said archly. “He and I have something deeper than you could ever understand.”

“Don’t let me stand in the way of true love.” I swept my arm toward the door. “You’ll find him in my bed. I should warn you though, he’s exhausted.” I bit my lip. “He and I had a long,busynight.”

I could almost see the steam shooting from her ears.

“How dare you?” she shrieked. “Does he know you’re secretly engaged to a mortal?”

I shot a glare at Aemonn. His guilty look confirmed he’d been the one to leak my secret.

“I’ve been loyal to him for years,” Iléana moaned. “You half-breeds know nothing of loyalty. You’re just like the mortal whores, spreading your legs for any Descended man you see.”

My fists clenched.

Alixe jumped forward to nudge her friend away.

“Marthe,” Remis said with a sigh, “I can only control her so much. Step in, or this is not going to end well for your granddaughter.”

“He only wants you for the Crown,” Iléana shouted over Alixe’s shoulder. “Once you’re gone, he’ll lose interest and come right back to me.”

I cocked my head. “It must be difficult to watch him choose someone else. I might pity you, if I didn’t know how you treated him all those years. How you told him his scars made him unworthy to be King.” I thumbed a dagger I’d strapped to my hip. “Perhaps I should give you some scars of your own. Then you can see firsthand just how powerful they can be.”

“Marthe,” Remis warned.

Marthe pushed to her feet, bones creaking, then shuffled forward to take Iléana’s hand. “Come, child. Let’s not waste our time on a half-breed who consorts with rebel scum.”

The breath punched from my lungs as a gruesome memory flashed into my head of my father’s blood scrawled across the walls of our home.

Mortal lover.

Half-breed.

Rebel scum.

The grief of his loss came tumbling down on my head. Suddenly I was right back in that kitchen, kneeling at his body, his warm blood soaking into my clothes. I smelled the death in the air, felt his too-stiff body beneath my hands.

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