Page 118 of Enchanted Crown
Still,she insisted.
Kian flopped on the shore, breathing heavily, my board beside him in the sand.I don’t remember the last time I laughed like this. Thank you, Princey Poo.
I grinned and immediately dried any part of myself which was still damp. “We need to do this more often.”
A pause and then,Will you teach me to do this in my human form?
“Of course,” I responded immediately. “Malachi was wanting to learn as well. We may have to contact Wylan about getting a few more boards.”
Esta laughed. “What is Dra Skor if not a bunch of adrenaline junkies?”
Someone whooped their agreement.
As I reached for my shirt and jacket, I felt more than saw Esta’s appreciative look over. Not just at my bare chest, but my wings also.You’re staring again.
Yes, well, some things never change.
Like your affinity for pretty things.
“No,” Avril said, pointing at me playfully. “Nope. We need to get some food and head for the castle.”
I gave my head a shake. “Did you just see a rather inappropriate vision, Avril?”
Her head went back. “What? No. I don’t typically see visions of that variety.” The sun was setting but not so much that I missed her blush. “I mean, unless I am personally in them. But I know lusty looks when I see them.”
“You might as well get used to them,” I told her.
Laughing, we headed into Keld for some food. To the same tavern where I waited all those months ago.
As we finally took off for the castle, Esta sent me,You are good to our people, Keir. From the server that you knew, to the farmers you met, to Kian. You are good to them, and it is not forced.
I stilled. She hadn’t saidherpeople. She’d saidour. And it made all the difference. They weren’t just her people anymore, they were mine too. Not only because I had married her, inheriting a small chunk of the crown of Dra Skor, but also because I had seen their faces, helped to heal them. I cared about these people just as I cared for the people of Wylan. It took me a moment to answer, finally able to state,Only because they are good to you.
CHAPTER 40
“Ithink we should do the bait and switch again,” Zaire suggested in the war room. “It didn’t work the first time, but maybe Morana wasn’t close to either Rael or Arava.”
“Not a terrible idea,” Zaccai agreed. “The teams are restless.”
“We cannot plan one for at least another few days,” Amory told them both. “The team in Arava is planning to stay one more day.” She let out a long sigh. “There was no sight of Morana during either the bait or the switch, we have no leads, but there is a person missing in Arava who still has not been found.”
“A missing person?” Jagen asked.“What?”
It was his first meeting back with the advisors since he’d been taken to the holding cell by Nana Mallick. Nana Mallick was not present today, feeling a touch under the weather, and she had demanded that Reyald stay away. His issues with his brother were part of why we were in this mess to begin with.
When Jagen had asked Esta yesterday if he could come back to these daily meetings, she hadn’t hesitated to say yes. He was motivated to find Moranaas much as we were.
Amory explained, “We do not know the cause. Could simply be travel.”
I already knew all of this. Amory had come to our room the night before to let us know. We hadn’t rushed to panic, thinking the person would show up. Yet still they hadn’t. And the longer the person stayed missing, the more suspicious it felt.
I figured it was time to voice what I had suspected when she first told us. “Could it have been someone who is not okay with a Wylan prince being bonded to their queen and left the town quickly to avoid our trip? Avoid us? Before it was explained to the Arava people that our trip was merely to smoke Morana out?” The people of Arava were a little disappointed, so eventually we were going to have to plan a visit. A real one.
I felt Esta’s anger come chasing down the bond.
“It is an option,” I told her gently.
“An awful one,” she bit out.
