Page 42 of Dragons' Mate
“All you need to do is follow.” Ettienne replies. “Though I understand that’s a challenge for you.” He steps into the music. To my annoyance, Ettienne is a smooth dancer with a lead even I can follow. “How are you holding up?”
“Alive. Sorry to disappoint.”
Ettienne steps closer, his lips nearly at my ear. “I’m not your enemy Kitterny. Hard as you may find it to believe.”
“My mistake. I must have misinterpreted things when you sent Quinton to kill me.”
“A miscalculation on my part.” Ettienne shrugs a shoulder. “I made a decision based on what I knew at the time.”
“Does that mean you regret ordering me killed or sending Quinton to do it?”
“Do all my sons find your fiery insolence attractive?”
“I believe Cyril would prefer I chose my words with greater care. Tavias might as well. I’ve never asked.”
Ettienne looks like he is holding back a laugh, the tips of his scales flashing a shade of silver. “Indeed. But we all must play the cards we were dealt now.”
“I take it I’m one of those cards for you. How do you intend to play me?”
“I’ve not yet decided,” Ettienne says with an honesty I didn’t expect. “But at the moment your staying alive appears to suit both our interests.”
“I’m pleased we agree on that at least.” For however long it lasts.
Ettienne lifts his arm, guiding me to turn under it. When he reclaims me again, his gaze watches my face intently. It’s disconcerting. This whole game is.
“What do you want from me, your majesty?” I just ask it.
Ettienne nods. “Keep my sons alive, please.”
I give a small snort. “I believe it is them who are keeping me alive in this particular set up.”
Ettienne’s voice drops, stripping all humor. “That is where you’re wrong, little human. Anyone with eyes can see as much. It is you who is truly keeping them alive. You are their greatest weakness, and their greatest strength. All rolled into one. There is a responsibility that comes with power such as that.”
“May I cut in?” Despite phrasing it as a question, Quinton shoulders his father out of the way and takes me into his protective arms. Quinton’s eyes keep moving around the ballroom the entire dance, as if scanning for threats lurking behind beverage tables and marble columns. Despite his grace, it’s like dancing with a bodyguard. The moment the song finished, Tavias steps in to fill Quinton’s place, then Cyril. They are all the same. Tense. As if they know something I don’t.
CHAPTER19
Kit
Iam really starting to hate the sound of the gong, more so because it is deceptively beautiful with full rich notes that vibrate through the whole room.
Music stops. The couples currently out on the floor retreat to the sides of the open space, Tavias nudging me along as well. The head priest steps out and draws his amplification signal in the air before launching into another speech on the greatness of Orion and tradition and the trials. It's when I see some suppressed smiles from packs and visitors that my body tenses with foreboding. A moment later, I'm proven right.
"Fertility is our goal and hope and guiding light," the priest intones, raising his staff. The hood covers his head, but the tattooed skin of his face is still visible. Servants come in, shifting tables around to clear many of them. "Now has come the time for our packs to show, before Orion and the dragon kind, that the human brides they selected are indeed capable of fulfilling such a destiny."
"What does he mean exactly?" I ask, my stomach tight as I turn to Tavias.
"I think you know," Tavias answers gently.
I swallow. I do know. It was one of the things that the dragons had made clear from the beginning of this—while no one knows what the trials involve specifically, there is always a constant: the dragon packs and their brides will be expected to couple before the priests to demonstrate their compatibility despite the usual difficulties of the anatomies. Hell, the pack had spent weeks on the Phoenix preparing my body for this moment. And it was one of the things Cordelia had confessed about her training before she died.
"You knew this was going to happen at the feast," I accuse.
Tavias nods. "I strongly suspected."
"And you didn't think to tell me?"
"If you'd thought about it, you'd have strongly suspected as well," he says, not without understanding. "If you chose not to, we didn't see a reason to make you fret more than you did already."
