Page 26 of The Stolen Throne
I look back to find him dismounting, handing his reins to Achlys, who looks as surprised as me. Especially when he comes over to me.
“Your stirrup needs adjusting,” he says, not looking me in the eyes.
No, it doesn’t, but I let him slip my foot out of it and fiddle with the buckled straps anyway.
“You can do this.” His low voice skates over me in a hushed murmur.
Possibly the most words strung together that he’s aimed in my direction in days. He says it with his head bent over his task, and I almost ask him to repeat it, except I realize before I open my mouth that he’s trying to make sure no one else can hear this conversation. No one…as in any Wanderer sentries hidden among the dunes around us.
“You don’t need help,” he tacks on.
I want to make a face at him, but I don’t.
“This isn’t going to work.” I also keep my voice low. “There’s too much history here.”
He shakes his head, the black tangle of his hair falling into his eyes. I tighten my grip on the pommel of my saddle just so I don’t reach out to brush it back. He needs a haircut. “Doesn’t matter. You are Arydian royalty. They are your subjects. Period.”
Right. He’s right. I know he’s right. “It doesn’t make me feel any better.” That comes out more as a grumble.
“There you go, domina,” he says overly loudly.
With a hand around my ankle, he slips my foot back in the stirrup. Under my skirt where no one could possibly see, his thumb brushes against my skin, sending delicious, ill-timed shivers through me. Days without his touch, and I’m craving him in an instant. That can’t be normal.
The way he stills, then drops his hand quickly to his side, sucks all that craving right out of me as fast as it came on. “Can I do anything else for—” He lifts his head, and whatever he sees in my gaze has him biting the words off with a grunt.
Then I see it. I see the flash of wanting in his eyes, and suddenly my scars shift inside me like a physical touch, a caress, and I almost laugh on a swell of relief. Because the distance between us isn’t there anymore.
That craving spirals. Sharper. Hotter. Thrumming.
But just as quickly, he schools his features, and the sensation inside me disappears, going cold, and those shivers change—and not in a good way.
Seven hells in a handbasket.
I feel like I’m a horse on a lead rope being jerked around. Now I’m sure I wasn’t wrong. He is shutting me out. On purpose.
Frustration builds like a geyser in the Crystalline Desert, ready to spew scalding words all over the man.
“What are you doing?” I manage to keep the question soft even though the words are out of my mouth before I can stop myself, but I don’t take them back. I’m calling him out. Even while I’m aware that we’re being observed and listened to.
He takes a deliberate step back. “Can I do anything else for you?” he finishes his earlier thought. From before that scorching look. Pulling back into the role of servant that he’s supposed to be posturing.
How convenient for him.
Heat now crawls up my throat and into my cheeks. What I want to say is, “This isn’t over.” But I can’t. Now is not the time or the place, so what I actually say is, “No.” Through clenched teeth.
He nods and walks away.
I don’t wait for him to mount before I prod my horse forward. He can damn well catch up.
Even before we round the last dune, the orange glows of hundreds of campfires reflect off the pale sands. The zariphate is currently set up near where the Singing Dunes meet the Salt Flats. The minerals glitter at me from everywhere, white but also iridescent. I’ve heard of the salt glacier that sits at the southern edge of the flats—not white at all, but striped and all the colors of the rainbow.
The natural beauty all around me mocks my staged pageantry.
I take a deep breath as the camp comes into view and try hard not to turn my horse around and run. The entire zariphate has gathered together to greet me. Rows and rows of faces, people all lined up to see the false queen.
I was wrong. This is a million times worse than the palace, not a hundred. There, the expressions aimed my way were interested or happy or at least polite, maybe even a little fearful after my grandmother’s style of rule. But the Wanderers… Right now, I’m looking at a sea of hostility, suspicion, or, at best, indifference.
Terrific.
