Page 53 of The Prince's Captive

Even if it meant his brother would hate him. Even if it meant he would lose his oldest friend.

Even if it meant his wife would never return the affection he had begun to have for her.

Chapter18

MARCELLA

When Marcella woke up, it was to the sound of Gavril’s low voice and a small bit of sunlight filtering in through the tent flap he was holding open just enough to speak to whoever was on the other side. She blinked her eyes open until they focused.

The last thing she remembered was the cloak’s warmth settling over her shoulders and back and Gavril pulling her closer as she was silently cursing herself up and down for the tears welling up in her eyes. She was mostly cursing herself for wanting to believe him. But with the pain in her wrist and throat gone, herself almost out of tears, and so terrified she was willing to be the fool again, she had drifted off. She hadn’t felt anything but the fabric, and her limbs were too heavy and her soul too beaten down for her to be able to shove it away.

Sometime after that, Gavril must had laid her down, and he hadn’t taken his cloak back. Now that she was awake—and the cloak was more suffocating than comforting and the heat wrapped around her was from her burning humiliation—she wanted nothing to do with it anymore.

“—little longer—exhausted—make it before night,” Gavril was saying in his language.

She sat up slightly and saw it was the other commander outside the tent. The cloak shifted with her as she moved. The commander looked past Gavril and narrowed his eyes at her, well, at Gavril’s cloak wrapped around her shoulders. Gavril followed his gaze to see she’d woken up as the commander said, “—awake to me—sordidus lupadisgracing—on—her talk of you—expected better—put it off—your mess to explain—”

Gavril just sighed and waved him off. “—coming—know I didn’t—tradition—a minute—”

The other commander shook his head and disappeared out of sight. Gavril turned to her, and she could see the bags under his eyes. He looked like he hadn’t slept at all. Good.

His eyes traced over her, and he muttered something, “—pulchra sponsa—who despises me—”

She immediately grabbed the cloak, flinging it off and back at him.

He easily caught it and rolled his eyes. “Back to this again?”

She held up her left wrist and showed him the lines branding her arm. She raised an eyebrow.

“Expected. Will see, then you will believe.” He moved to climb out of the tent. “We go.”

When she stayed where she was, rubbing her healed right hand over her left wrist, he peered back down into the tent and held a hand out to her. “Don’t make me come back in there.”

She shot him a huffy look, but considering how her heart was still racing and they had a whole day ahead of them for her to find other ways to cause him problems, she moved to exit the tent. She did swat his hand away from her and pushed herself to her feet.

As she straightened up and her eyes adjusted to the sunlight, something settled around her shoulders again. She jerked to the side right as Gavril finished clasping his cloak around her shoulders.

What was he doing?

She reached up and undid the clasp, letting the cloak fall to the ground.

Someone nearby laughed. Marcella refused to look to see who it was as she just lifted her chin and stared Gavril down. His pale cheeks immediately turned red as he narrowed his eyes right back before he bent down and picked up the cloak from where it lay her feet.

He shook it out and knocked any dirt and dust off it and said, “My cloak.”

“I don’t want it.”

“Too bad.” He wrapped it around her shoulders again and clasped it. “Took last night. Will take today.”

She reached up again and unclasped it, letting it fall to the ground again. Behind her, several men roared with laughter. Gavril’s jaw clenched and his eyes darkened, but he was still flushed red. She wasn’t entirely sure why he was so insistent or why he was getting so frustrated and insulted by her actions, but that only encouraged her.

He snatched the cloak off the ground again. He wrapped it around her shoulders a third time, muttering as he did so, “—contumax puella—decide—wants—live or die—if I—anything to say—will live—curse me—rest of—”

She started to reach up for the cloak before he’d finished clasping it, but instead of letting go like the last two times, he put both hands on the clasp where it rested at her left shoulder and his fingers flew over it. She gasped as a small rune lit up the air. In a second he finished, drawing his hands back and looking down at her with a smirk and a light in his still tired eyes.

She tried to undo the clasp, but when her fingers touched the metal, they slid right off. She tried again, but she couldn’t get her fingers around it to work it. Her head snapped up to his and his grin grew even bigger. “—pulchra mea chlamys.”

One day, she was going to figure out what that word meant. Although she probably wasn’t going to have long since they were going to arrive in Areator that day.

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