Page 73 of Court of Treachery

She shook her head and folded her arms across her belly. If he tried to unpick her, she would spiral into madness. “I’m sorry.”

Something ticked in his jaw. “No. I’m sorry. I should not have taken advantage of you.”

“You did not. I gave myself freely.” And she did not regret it, which only made the guilt coil around her heart all the tighter for her selfishness. She wanted him—truly—but she could not.

“Hmm. This was a mistake—clearly. I shouldn’t have allowed myself to lose control. It won’t happen again.” Dimitrius stooped to pick his jacket from the back of the nearby chair and draped it over an arm. “I’ll take my leave. Rest now. Soon, he will return, and you will be summoned. You have said you will not obey him, yet I do not think you will have any choice in what happens next. I will protect you when I can, but neither of us can defy him.”

Any hint of desire was quenched with the mention of Saradon. The ever-present trepidation squirmed around her stomach at his words. As Dimitri left, she wondered what would pass when she was next brought before Saradon, but quicklypushed the thought from her mind. The fear of it was as bad as the event itself. It would not do to dwell on it.

No—now she had something more consuming to worry about that seized her body with an entirely different symphony of feelings. She had nearly just given herself to the Spymaster of Pelenor. And what was worse? She still wanted to, despite the fact that it was definitely a mistake, which he had admitted. With a groan she toppled face first into the bed. But even the covers could not silence her angst and the empty room had no answers.

63

HARPER

Harper had slept for goodness knows how long when she awoke with a start. She listened for a long moment, but there was nothing untoward. Dim faelights danced in the alcoves, casting a warm hue over the space. Silence reigned within and without. But now, she was awake, and she could not return to slumber. She was glad for the oblivion, however long it had lasted. It had saved her from agonising over her captivity at Saradon’s hands, the state of her friends, and the calamitously intimate experience with Dimitrius. Calamitous because she had no idea how it would work out, like everything else—and there were no good outcomes she could see for any of it.

She had stopped their kiss—stopped it going any further, much as she wanted it to, too overcome by guilt and shame at her own selfish greed in taking pleasure with Dimitrius when her friends suffered somewhere in the stones under that mountain. Unable to bear the feeling chasing under her skin, Harper slipped from the bed and padded to the bathroom to dip a finger in the bath—flat cold. So, it had been hours at least, then. Her stomach growled. There was no food to be seen. When had she last eaten? What time was it? It was impossible to place timeunder the mountain, free of natural light. When had she last seen daylight?

As she returned to the bedroom, she halted. Something rested draped across the chair where Dimitrius had sat. She crossed swiftly to it. A dress of delicate diaphanous fabric. As she gingerly picked it up, a piece of paper slid to the floor. She bent to retrieve the scrap. A note in looping handwriting awaited.

“Wear me. –D.”

D for Dimitrius. Something low in her belly stirred, a remnant of that desire. A part of her could still feel the ghost of him upon her lips. She glanced back at the dress. It was yards of fabric.

Harper had slept wrapped in the towel. She shed it now, hooking it over the armoire door, and held up the dress by the shoulders. It seemed a simple enough affair, thankfully free of any corsetry or lacing which would have stymied her. She pooled it upon the floor and stepped into it, shimmying the fabric up and over her hips before slipping her arms through.

There were no mirrors in the suite, so she did the best she could of adjusting it on her body—it was slightly loose and slightly long—until it felt as though it hung correctly on her frame. The fabric was so soft every ripple of it moving across her skin was a soft, sighing kiss. It made her want other things—forbidden things—that she definitely ought not to indulge in again with a certain spymaster, she reminded herself sternly.

At first hidden under the dress, Harper had not noticed the box upon the chair. Inside, she found a hairbrush, hair combs and clips, and some bracelets. She wondered who they had belonged to with an uneasy ripple and closed the box abruptly. Some silk slippers hid under the chair. She eyed them dubiously—they looked too insubstantial to protect her feet from the chill or the rough stone. She beat her boots together over the bathto get rid of the mud crusting the soles and shoved them on instead.

A knock at the door made her startle. She called her magic forth in a rush and spun, crouching slightly—thanking her foresight to put on boots and lamenting the fabric of the dress which would open her up to any number of vulnerabilities. She did not have a weapon, save the hairbrush which was next to useless. But, a familiar voice had her releasing her pent up breath in a gush. “Harper. It’s me. Are you awake?”

Her heart fluttered for an entirely different reason. “Yes.” She straightened as Dimitri opened the door and stopped. His nostrils flared as he took her in, his lips parting at the sight of her. It took a moment for him to compose himself. Perhaps her rejection stopped him from making any further advance. “If you don’t mind, I took a little liberty.”

Her attention dropped to his hands, where he held out a silver bangle to her—new, but with a familiar item upon it. Her little silver charm with Saradon’s mark stamped upon it.

“You seemed very attached to it, and so I thought I would give you an upgrade. Fit for a princess now.”

That title made her stomach flip unpleasantly, but she offered her wrist, touched that he had thought of her at all—especially after she had essentially rejected him at his most vulnerable moment. “Thank you,” she said past the lump in her throat, reeling at the warmth radiating through her chest—and other, more dangerously treacherous parts of her body—as those fingers of his, so gentle when they wanted to be, slipped the bangle on her wrist.

“There. Perfection,” he murmured, meeting her glance for the briefest moment before he dropped her hand and stepped back. Before she could think of any way to respond, he added, “It’s time. Saradon has returned and we must attend him.”

Hope guttered and her spirits plummeted. But she gathered herself and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, before fiddling with the rest of it, twisting it around her hand and letting go so it fell as a rippling sheet across her back. She did not open the box to use the jewelled clips—she had no idea how. Her idea of hair was a braid. Practical. She had no idea how to dress in a royal court. That thought threatened to overwhelm her.

She followed him in a daze through the corridors, almost immediately lost in the unfamiliar hallways. When she stumbled over a crack in the paving, Dimitrius took her hand without a word, slipped it through the crook of his arm, and continued to lead the way. She dared to glance up. He looked stern. Worried, even. That concerned her more than anything else.

When they reached the vast space of the jarlshalle, the cool air rose bumps across her skin. It was empty. Dimitri led her quickly across the stone floor, her boots tip-tap-tip-tapping across the surface. He drew her up the steps onto the dais, to the smaller of the two thrones, slightly below and off to the side of the largest one.

“Must I?” she turned a pleading gaze upon him as he gestured for her to sit there.

The hard line of his mouth softened, but he nodded. “I’m afraid so. You are his heir. He will see you recognised as such.” His touch was gentle as he helped her sit in the chair without becoming tangled in the drape of fabric. The armless dress draped across her shoulders, falling down her seated form to the floor, where the fine, thin fabric pooled around her hidden boots. Her hair had fallen across one shoulder in waves, and her silver charm perched on her wrist, now upon the fine metal bangle.

Shivers crawled down her spine. This garment was no protection against the insistent chill of the place. The braziers to the side of the hall were cold and dead, offering no respite.A moment later, they raged to life—and a shadow loomed from the corner of her eye. Dimitrius stepped back to a respectable distance and bowed at the waist.

Harper’s eyes flicked to the dark form gathering just to the side of her. Through a swirl of shadow, Saradon came into focus—and her mouth went dry. Her hands gripped the arms of the stone throne so hard her knuckles whitened. Saradon’s poisonous magic still clung to her, as if it slowed the very life through her veins—but the power of his presence chased that from her with pure, abject terror.

When he spoke, his deep voice rang clear. “I bid thee welcome, daughter, on this most auspicious day.” He sounded malevolently gleeful, adding to the chills wrapping around her. “Eat! We have much to be thankful for.”

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