Page 7 of Nightingale

He followed her intrusive gaze, jaw clenching firmly as he tucked his left arm behind his back. Anger flashed in a cold fury across his long features. Vrea watched him cautiously as he edged closer, gaining foot by foot as the distance between them shortened.

“The revel is coming up in a couple of days.” Castil flipped the subject of conversation around, ignoring the topic of war and death completely. “I’m sure it will be just as unpleasant as the previous year.”

“I won’t be dragged to that unnecessary celebration again.” She flat-out refused, crossing one arm over the other and stepping down from the balcony. “I was forced to go to the last one, I won’t go to another.”

He circled her in a half-crescent shape, halting just a couple of inches in front like a leaf floating on the night-kissed breeze. “I’m afraid you won’t have much of a choice in regards to your attendance. I suggest that you take it in stride and get through it without any issues.”

“Withoutany issues?” She bit out with a flash of fury and the heat of humiliation. “I take great offence to the fact that you and your brothers are allowed to dress me up like some sort of doll and walk me around the palace in your arms like some sort of prized cattle!”

Castil, as usual, didn’t react to her temper. “It’s only a week of festivities. Besides, I’ll make sure that you have plenty of things to do afterwards if you succeed in behaving properly.”

It was no longer a bubbling dribble of determination to keep cool like rushing water, but a hissing stream that shoved and slammed against stubborn stones.

“Behave properly?” Vrea marched closer to him. “I amnotyour slave, I amnotsome dog to be led around on a leash. I amnota pretty wife who has been ordered to keep quiet or a toy to take out whenever you all are bored. I amPrincessVrea Greenvass, heir to Niroula and a skilled fighter.”

Castil’s sterling eyes bore into her mouth, only to dart up a second later. There was approximately seven inches of height between them and he used most of it as he slowly bent down towards her. “Let me remind you of something,Vre.”

She didn’t like how much her core flitted about in return for the shortened version of her name. But it did unreasonable things whenever he used that ridiculous bird title.

“What?” Vrea pushed out through clenched teeth.

“You may beoneof the heirs of Niroula, perhaps Casta’s favourite because you’re the only one that looks exactly like her. You may be a seasoned sentry with skills to match my own even, but youarea prisoner at the moment. Titles don’t matter, and nor does your will when it comes to the matter of your life. So you can either be a good little Princess and come to the revel that my father willinsistthat you attend, or you can wallow away in the darkness until he inevitably decides to kill you.”

There was a delicious temptation to punch him in his gorgeous face. She almost gave in to it.

Almost.

Her next sentence felt as sweet as raw, recently harvested sugar as she spoke. “Kill me, then. I don’t know why your father insists on keeping me alive when it’s clear that he has no use for me.”

Castil looked taken aback, his pale skin turning towards a sickly tint of ivory. But within the next second, he shook it offand returned to his normal sneering expression. “If I do that, then my neck is next on the chopping block. I don’t dare go against the King’s orders, even if I’m tempted.”

“Coward.” She slung the insult his way.

He didn’t miss a beat. “Survivor.”

Her heart toppled a hundred feet, falling to a cold plunge near her toes at his single word, his one title that he said proudly.

“Looks like I’ve rendered you speechless. Good.” He ambled away, his back rotating as he headed for the door. “Don’t try to fight it when Brioc comes for you in two days. It’s happening, whether you want it to or not. You should heed my advice and go alongside it, lest you want my father to make it extremely painful for you. One way or another, youwillbe sitting by my siblings and I’s sides, for all evenings of the event.”

Castil dipped out of the room and left her to ponder over his word.

Survivor.

It struck a familiar cord inside of her, one that she didn’t realise she had. Then horror was a wet blanket that draped across her entire system as she understood that she held something in common with Castil Moordian.

Three

“A

bsolutely not.” She denied as she took in the sheer fabric that would leave nothing to the imagination. It was a single bolt of fabric that fell off one shoulder of the mannequin and trailed down the hips, which would leave her sides utterly exposed. The front hem was slanted, with two golden belts that crossed at the waist and a low slit in between the chest section that would make it impossible to hide anything.

“No?” Brioc propped his foot up against the wall and folded his arm into the other. “I’m afraid I must insist.”

It was demeaning, offensive and downright gaudy that the Moordians wanted to drag her out of the room for four nights of dancing, drinking and dining and show her off like she was a mere trinket of value and not a prisoner of war. One night for each Prince, one night to be led around on their arm and placed beside them at dinner. The King allowed his sons to control everything from the food to her outfit, to the way the event was styled for their night of glamour and glitz.

Vrea glared incredulously at him. “There is no way that you’d be able to force me outside in that thing. I’d rather stay here and rot in my chambers than be paraded around like a common whore.”

Because there was a doubt in her mind that the dress would even fit her either. She was small, that much was true, but the bolts of cranberry fabric were even smaller. And with her darkercomplexion, things were easier to see. Things that she wasn’t too fond of any of the Moordians being able to see.

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