Page 33 of The Shrouded Queen
Ice flooded my veins. “No.”
He leaned even closer, until I could feel his supernatural body heat. “Because there are a few things I’d like to do to a Khada—”
I put my hand to his chest and pushed.
Keir glanced from my face to my hand, laughably small in the center of his barrel chest, and I could practically read his thoughts in his face. My pathetic show of resistance would mean nothing if he decided to do—whatever he was thinking of doing.
A low chuckle rumbled out of him. “Some fight at last. I was beginning to think we took the wrong queen.”
My stomach dipped. Such an innocent sentence, and yet it filled me with dread.
Keir studied me a beat longer, but I couldn’t decipher his look. If he was going to push his way into my cabin anyway or if he’d scented my reaction to his words and I’d already failed my queen—
A shout went up from the longhouse. I jerked my head toward it. “What was that?”
“Not your concern.”
Before I could question him more, Dalla came rushing up to him. “Keir, you should come.”
“Can’t,” he responded, hooking a thumb my way. “Babysitting.”
Dalla’s flinty eyes moved to me for only a second before she said, “It’s Hedin.”
Keir swore. “Bain knows?”
“You could say that.” She looked purposefully toward the longhouse as people started rushing inside, their faces twisted in anger. It looked like a mob was flowing into the large cabin.
“Fine,” Keir said. “You stay with the queen. I’ll try to—”
“Oh, no.” Dalla was already backing away with a grin, the expression unsettling on her severe face. “I’m not missing this.”
“Dalla!”
Her laugh echoed as she turned and ran back to the longhouse.
Keir swore again, much more colorfully. Then he took my arm and pulled me out of my cabin.
I might have been curious about the shouting, but now that Keir was taking me there, it was the last place I wanted to go. Dragging my feet, I asked, “What are you doing?”
“I can’t leave you unguarded,” he answered. “Don’t worry, Majesty, you’ll enjoy this.”
FOURTEENSAMIRA
A large crowd had gathered in the longhouse, roiling and shouting. Keir guided me along the perimeter, heading toward the dais. People parted for Keir like he was a rock in a river, opening a route to the front where I could see Rade and Bain facing off, the king on his antler throne and Bain staring up at him defiantly. A man I hadn’t seen before stood beside Rade, his entire face covered in blue tattoos. It made him look even more frightening than Keir.
Bain was red in the face as he turned to address the crowd. “Alarik’s only been dead a week! If our king can really replace him that easily, what does that mean for the rest of us?”
A shout of agreement went up.
“It has to be seven,” the king yelled above the din. “Alarik isn’t being replaced. A new member is being added—”
“Bullshit!” Bain whirled on the king. “We’d get along just fine with six.”
Rade’s jaw clenched. “This is your final warning, Bain. Stand. Down.”
Bain pointed at the man with the face tattoos. “I do not accept Hedin as my Second.”
“Shit,” Keir murmured beside me as a battle cry went up among the crowd. Those had been official words. A declaration.
