Page 52 of A Chill in the Flame
If she stayed in the castle, she could get married off to the northern king and live a perfectly safe life, safely dressed in dresses and jewels, safely guarded by armies, safely kept behind shut doors and high walls and moats and borders. Harland was right in one other thing as well: she would have to cut him out. If she was going to succeed, he could not come.
“Let’s go.” Ophir pushed against the mirror just as Tyr stepped out of the space between things. In addition to his dry expression of disapproval, she noted the clean male clothes he wore that had probably belonged to one of her guards. Shespied the tattoo that crawled from his arm to the space over his shoulder and licked the base of his neck, then cast a quick glance to the lines of black ink that peeked through the slit in Dwyn’s dress. She wondered if such markings were common among all Sulgrave people but decided it was neither the time nor the place.
Dwyn glared. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
He leaned against the stone wall and ignored Ophir to address Dwyn directly. “I told you to stay away from the princess. You’re as bad at listening to instructions as she is.”
Ophir wanted to be angry over Tyr’s constant invasion of privacy, but she’d have to find time for her emotions later. “Fine. Let’s all be bad at listening to instructions together. Are you in, phantom, or are you out?”
Tyr looked between the women as if considering his options. She knew he could yell for her guard, though then he’d have to explain why he was in the room. She dared him to make a move.
The threat lingered between them until at last, he said, “I guess I’m in.”
Ophir eased open the mirror without waiting for an answer. She’d had one foot on the staircase beyond the hidden space before the words had left his mouth.
***
Ophir knew that in a few hours, Harland would check on her only to find her door barricaded by the chair. He’d undoubtedly bust the door down, crumbling the chair beneath it, causing enough noise for other guards in the castle to be alerted to the disturbance and call for aid. They’d search her rooms, but they’d find nothing. Rumors had spread over the years that Ophir might possess the ability to step through walls, though she’d never admitted to any such power. She’d also never dispelled this gossip, preferring to wink anytime someone mentioned that she was a being with multidimensional abilities. Her parents would be informed of her escape,and the entire kingdom would be on high alert. Guards and constables and citizens would be rallied to search for the missing princess. Everyone in the kingdom would be desperate to find the last hope of Farehold.
But their efforts would come too late.
She was gone.
Part II
A Death and Rebirth
Twenty-four
Murder is both art and science.
Of course, one must consider the technicalities of homicide—the who, what, when, where, and how required diligence, patience, and intelligence. The “why” was a given, at least for Ophir. The men at Lord Berinth’s had worn masks that night, but she’d seen the angles of their jaws, the colors of their irises, the wicked curves of their mouths, the bodies and clothes of the men who had stood in the room while Caris was bound, stripped, humiliated, and gutted like a pig.
Killing is easy.
Vengeance is hard.
To properly avenge someone, the killer would let the target know why they no longer deserved the air they breathed. A certain understanding by the dying was required for justice to be satisfied. Poison is too slow, too impersonal. She thought of beheadings as a royal cliché but liked the stage and audience that a guillotine demanded. The same could be said of many popular modes of execution. She found herself with an abundance of choices on the matter of murder.
Retribution required fear, knowledge, and poetry.
Every man needed to understand why he was hunted. The comprehension in their eyes would be an essentialcomponent. She wanted to witness the twinkle of justice before their life was extinguished with the slow smothering of a cap over flame. The artistry of the act…well, that was where true brilliance was required.
Ophir would be an artist.
Twenty-five
Hate was a funny thing in how often it blurred lines withlove.
It had been just under a month since Tyr had stormed after his watery nemesis and the princess he’d been roped into keeping alive. And goddess, was she difficult to keep alive. From the moment he met her, she’d been at a party where she didn’t belong surrounded by people who quite literally wanted to slice her open and scoop out the very parts that kept her alive. Since his hunt for Dwyn had forced him back into Ophir’s path, she’d nearly burned the castle down, she’d tried to die at the ocean’s hand on more than one occasion, she’d created numerous terrifying serpents, and she’d aligned herself with the most dangerous murderer of all.
His resentment for the princess should have mirrored his loathing for Dwyn.
If anything, he should have been angrier with Ophir for dragging Dwyn—and him by extension—south, to a kingdom so ignorant that it seemed criminal to allow them to maintain their seats on a throne.
And yet…
He stared ahead at the women who walked arm in arm, sidestepping the trunks and dodging the branches that dangledin their path. Dwyn swatted a rust-colored leaf as if it were an attacking hornet. They’d been locked in what felt like ceaseless conversation for weeks on end. The two never ran out of things to talk about, and fuck did he hate it.
