Page 28 of The Stolen Throne
Zariph Cainis helps me to my feet but doesn’t let me go, placing his other hand over mine and tugging me closer. “Perhaps we should combine our strengths through your marriage to my son.”
12
Priorities
Abruptly, an unnatural darkness sweeps over the gathering, dimming the light of the fires. With it, a second gasp sweeps through those gathered around us. The zariph snaps his gaze over my head and stills, his hands clamping down on mine hard, face a study of a warrior staring down a threat.
I don’t have to look. I know what’s happening.
Reven.
I barely have time to brace to fight the Shadows if they took control of him, because as quickly as the darkness rose, it fades away again. As I search him out, my Shadowraith visibly appears to diminish, like stopping that darkness took too much out of him, or like defeat is weighing him down. Or is he still fighting the evil inside him?
I don’t relax, studying him, waiting. Until he subtly taps the scars on his wrist and relief leaves me in a whoosh of a breath.
He’s still Reven.
The erratic thumping of my heart tells me that was close, though. I haven’t seen him struggle like that before. Trying to be subtle about it, I slide the knife strapped to my arm under my robes back into its sheath. Beside me, I hear a soft snick as Cain does the same with his. After a beat, so does the zariph, followed by several similar sounds from all around us.
Which is when it finally sinks in that no one is standing near him, like there’s a moat of space keeping everyone else away. His doing? Or are they all too wary to get close?
How often has Reven lost control around them? Across the way, his mask is back in place. An emotionless expression that makes me want to shrivel with him. It’s like he’s determined to feel nothing. To separate himself.
The need to go to him is a living thing, but he gives me a tiny shake of his head, gaze flicking to the zariph still holding my hand. And I get the message. My only job right now is to secure Zariph Cainis as an ally. I understand. I really do.
His rejection feels like a slap anyway.
Feeling more alone than I have since before I was kidnapped, including when I was with Eidolon, I release the zariph’s hand only to tuck mine into the crook of his elbow, drawing his attention back to me.
I have no intention of commenting on his proposal. Yet.
I doubt he’ll let me keep my answer to myself for long.
Cain told me that the zariph was informed about exactly what happened. Cainis knows Tabra married the king, not me, and that I am merely the second-born princess.
Which means everyone in the zariphate knows, too. After all, they’ve been carting around a woman who looks like Cain’s city waif friend for months, along with a whole bunch of other people. At a risk to their lives. Explanations would have been demanded. Besides, as many things as he is, I will say the zariph is transparent with his people. He doesn’t hide anything if it affects them.
“Before we discuss anything,” I say, “I need to see my sister.”
The zariph hesitates. “Tomorrow morning is perhaps a better—”
“Tabra is firstborn, technically queen. I rule in her place, but I need to know what I’m dealing with,” I tell him firmly.
Under my fingertips, he tenses, no doubt at the interruption. I’m sure no one except maybe his zaripha dares to interrupt this man.
Too bad.
“As you wish,” he eventually murmurs.
I allow the zariph to lead me through the crowds and into what amounts to a city of tents and structures that make up the camp. As we pass through the people standing at the very edges of the gathering, a familiar face looks back at me, and I have to tamp down on the immediate urge to stop and hug her.
Tziah.
The last time I saw her, she’d taken a spear to the stomach during the attack on the Shadowood. Thank the goddesses she survived. I wasn’t sure. Younger than I am by a year or two at most, she’s striking, with the most unusual coloring that, every time I see her, reminds me of the sky before dawn when it turns from black to a deep, mysterious navy blue. Add to that shoulder-length white hair and narrow-set entirely black eyes that appear to frost around the edges, and she puts me in mind of starlight nymphs.
Cain used to tell me stories of them. Pella would then make fun of me for believing him, but sand nymphs are real, so why not starlight nymphs? Given what I’ve learned and seen in a few short months, maybe Pella’s the one who should be more open-minded.
More familiar faces stand out in the crowd around Tziah—Vos, Horus, Vida.
