Page 24 of To Claim a King

There was no doubt that the king was more powerful than she, Demelza, Vincent, and anyone else she’d ever fought. The way he moved was nothing short of art, a lethal dance. Each of his moves could have killed.

“Wait please,” she begged, holding her hand up, and the man stopped, tilting his head.

Xandrie retraced his steps, trying to make her muscles remember the way he moved, learn his magical steps. It was awkward. He refused to acknowledge that the natural course was to walk forward - instead, he seemed to follow a certain, chaotic pattern.

Then, it hit her. It was a dance, meant to confuse his adversary. She was pretty certain it worked.

“You follow certain steps.”

“Very good. You may be the first to have worked that out. I might have to kill you so you don’t share my secret,” he whispered, standing so close she could feel his warmth.

“Or, mister, you could just show me how to do it, too. Right, left, left, behind, right, forward, forward, left…” she tried, but he stopped her, his hand on her hips as he stood close behind her.

Then, he really danced with her.

“Follow me.”

And she did. All night, she danced. It was dawn when he took her to her room.

“Alexandria?”

“Xandrie,” she corrected automatically.

“You have a real chance at winning this, if you follow Vincent’s tutelage.”

She opened her mouth, and closed it. Her goal until then had been attempting to stay alive while fighting dragonesses, but the King spoke of her winning?

Did that mean he wanted her to?

* * *

Wishing to calm her nerves, she snuck into the eastern wing of the palace the next day, tracking them to their training grounds, only to freak herself out when she saw what they were capable of. She wasn’t just outmuscled, they had moves she’d never even read about, let alone seen in person.

“Chill,” Vincent told her, appearing out of nowhere by her side. “You’re going to be just fine.”

“Vincent, they’re dragons. As in real dragons. The kind that have scales and can breathe fire. What if one of them shifts in the middle of a bout and sneezes on me? I’ll be toast.” She wanted it to sound light, because she didn’t want to offend her friends, but hell, it was seriously scary.

Vincent shook his head in response, putting his hand on her shoulder. “Two things: first up, they’re not going to shift in the middle of battle. It’s bad form and they’d be vulnerable for close to a minute while they were shifting. You can knock that off your worry list. Secondly, you already faced the fiercest amongst them, and won. You ain’t all that puny, you know.”

Xandrie punched him, playfully, on the arm. It was great that he could make her laugh at herself.

“That being said,” he added when she was almost reassured, “Saskia did underestimate you - she didn’t use the extent of her skills because, not unlike Demelza, she isn’t one to want to humiliate her opponents. She won’t do it again. You’ll need more training, more endurance, and more understanding of dragon magic, so that you may use your strengths adequately.”

Xandrie nodded, determined to do whatever it took to keep her head on her shoulders.

“You’re going to trail me for a month. Everywhere I go, you go, and you fight alongside me.”

“But,” Xandrie was frowning, “aren’t you one of the King’s personal guards?”

She knew he’d been allotted two hours a day to train Demelza, but giving her all of his attention would surely call him away from his duties.

Vincent laughed. “Trust me when I say the King won’t be an issue.”

Old Tales

The man had avoidedhim skillfully for close to a week, and Rhey had let him at first, too busy to chase him around the city, but on the sixth day after the claiming, Nathos came to him, armed with a dozen old manuscripts.

“I had to hunt these down,” he informed him in guise of a greeting, dropping the books on his tidy desk.

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