Page 218 of A Queen's Game
Marietta shook her head. “No.” Deities damn Keyain. Of all the guards to escort her, why did it have to be him?
“No, you don’t want to go to the temple?” he asked, giving a mocking pout. “After all of us assembled to bring you safely?”
Marietta followed his hand that gestured to the hall, finding more than a dozen guards lingering. “Where’s Amryth? She’s taking me to the temple.”
“Keyain thought it’d be best to have someone he trusts to take you,” Ryder said, holding out his arm.
“And why would he trust you after the comment about my ass?” she snapped.
“We are males of similar taste. Who better to trust?” He reached around Marietta, pulling the door shut behind her. “Besides, Keyain wanted his best guards to protect his wife and unborn child.”
Marietta lifted her chin, meeting Ryder’s stare. “If you’re his best, then I worry for my safety.”
He laughed, looping his arm through hers. “Gods, you have a sense of humor. Let’s hope you do not need to witness how wonderful of a captain I can truly be.”
She ripped her arm from him, walking ahead of him down the hall. Keyain understood what he did, placing his most vexatious guard in charge of her.
The remaining guards took positions around Marietta with Ryder at her back. “I could get used to walking behind you with a view like this.”
She turned abruptly to him. “You couldn’t be more of the boorish Syllogian man stereotype, ready to hump anything that walks in your direction.”
“Apologies,” he said, grinning. “That wasn’t an attempt to sleep with you.” He leaned in, looping his arm with hers once again, and whispered, “Between King Wyltam and the temple attendant, you have enough males competing for your bed.”
The guards nearest to them bit back a few smirks. So, they all heard rumors that Marietta slept with King Wyltam and Coryn. The sooner she left that gods damned city, the better.
Ryder and the guards led Marietta in the opposite direction of the temple, instead, to the southeastern gate, none of them answering her when she asked where they were heading. Not when Ryder draped a cloak over Marietta, her face obscured by a hood. And not when they exited through that gate, at the opposite end of the palace from the temples.
Ryder ushered her into a waiting carriage, neither she nor him sitting before the driver had it in motion, the guards armed and in position on the outside. “Keyain took precautions. Three carriages left the palace at the same time. Only two will arrive at the temple.”
Marietta rolled her eyes. “This is completely unnecessary.”
“Keyain would do anything to protect those he loves, even if that person doesn’t deserve it,” he said, draping his arm across the back of the seat. He crossed one leg over a knee, smiling out the window at the passing city.
“Apologies, I should love the man who abducted me—”
“I wouldn’t continue that sentence, Marietta.”
She narrowed her gaze at him as he looked back at her.
“I trust Keyain,” he said, “and I’m smart enough to realize I don’t know all of his reasonings, but you know what makes a good leader?”
Marietta refused to reply as she held his stare.
“Though I don’t have all the details, I know, without a doubt, that Keyain took you back for more than just personal reasons.” Ryder looked her up and down. “That’s what makes him a good leader—I trust he knows what he’s doing and tells us only what’s necessary.”
Gods, no wonder Amryth couldn’t stand being around him. “Sounds like blind ignorance to me.”
Ryder laughed again, looking back out the window. “Oh, I like you. I see how you and Keyain could have worked.”
Marietta bit back her irritation, realizing that snapping at Ryder would yield nothing but more frustration.
The carriage wove through different side streets to the south. From Marietta’s sense of direction, they overshot the distance to the temple, and then wove back. They took a lane parallel to the Halia River, weaving through side streets before pulling into an alley.
The temples rose in the distance, and the black stone of Zontykroi pulled her gaze first. It was as ominous from behind, with a stone wall encircling a courtyard at the back. Above the stone rose spikes of cypress, their boughs still in the stagnant air.
As they journeyed further into the alley, the white stone of Therypon’s temple came into view. Bright blue banners waved from the upper floors towering above. Like the temple of Zontykroi, a stone wall guarded the back, filled with trees and other greenery beyond.
“So here’s how your visit will go,” Ryder said, sitting forward with his gaze sweeping the streets. “We enter through the back, you give a very brief goodbye to the attendants, and then I will escort you to a private prayer chamber. You may take as long as you need, but I will be vigilantly waiting outside the door.”
