Page 63 of The Ice Prince's Fated Mate
And with me out of the spotlight, it was less likely that the truth of my past could come back to hurt Caz, if anyone ever learned of it.
There was no way to avoid it for now, much as I wished I could. The kingdom had to be there for Caz to come back to, and Iwouldsee that done. No matter what. Which meant everyone would have to be aware of all situations.
“There might be a problem there,” I said in response. “With Mirko.”
“Explain,” Caz barked, sitting on the couch in response to a whine from Anna, who slid across into his lap with a pleasant smile and sigh, working her hips against his. She was oblivious to the rest of us.
“We crossed paths,” I said unhappily. “It did not go well.”
“How not well?” Caz asked, wrapping his arms around Anna and pinning her in place to stop her movements. She only whimpered happily and melted against him, nuzzling his neck. “Be quick about your answer.”
“About as well as it could go with that traitor I’m ashamed to call an uncle,” I snarled, clenching a fist as I explained what had happened. “Apparently, he was unaware of Ella’s and my … status.”
Beside me, Ella stiffened in her chair, but she did not look my way.
“Dirk,” Caz growled.
“I know, okay? I know. I lost my temper, and I screwed up. I am aware of this and nothing you can say will make it better, so let’s acknowledge it and move on. He knows we’re onto him, though I’m sure he already knew we suspected it.”
“Do we?” Caz asked, stroking Anna’s arm as she tried to move. The skin-on-skin contact seemed to settle her once more, but I knew time was running short. Caz was already pushing this far more than he should have to.
“Mirko is a traitor to the kingdom,” I said bluntly. “That’s how the Reds knew we were at the chalet. It’s the only thing that makes sense. His mate has worked with the Reds before, and now he is. He wants us gone, so he can have the throne, a point he’s making clear with this swapped-at-birth fabrication nonsense. And when I can prove it, Iamgoing to kill him for putting Ella in danger!”
The room was silent, all eyes on me now.
“And, uh, for being a traitor,” I added, well aware how lame it sounded.
“How are you going to prove it?” Florian asked, speaking up from the other side of Milly. “We’ve never had any sense before now that Mirko is working with the Reds.”
“Sure we have. We know he lied about this estrangement with Bryna. That’s obvious. His mate had six wolves wearing heart scales waiting for Caz. Only because he’s the strongest tyrant in generations did he survive that.”
Caz’s lip pulled back at the mention of the ambush Bryna had created for him. The wolf shifters, wearing the heart scales of fire dragons on their chest, would have access to all the powers of a true dragon, but without the dragon half that made using such things a second nature to us.
“Is that it?” Durion put in. “We have no proof.”
“We have that. We have the fact Bryna was running the slave markets here in Kylma. We know about the chalet attack, as I said. But I realized something else when we were out helping the victims of the most recent incursion from the Reds.”
Caz cocked his head sideway in question. I hadn’t told anyone this, not yet.
“When Florian came to the throne room to tell us of the attack, I was doing my job when we’re in session,” I said to everyone. “I watch everyone but the person speaking. I see who is surprised, who knows what’s coming, and who is happy or upset. And when that happened, there was no shock on Mirko’s face. He wasn’t surprised. I thought at the time that’s what it was, but it wasn’t. It was confusion and anger.”
“Why would he be those but not surprised?” Kolar mused out loud.
“Because he knew the attack was coming,” Florian hissed. “We’ve been getting reports of all kinds of movement on the border, but we didn’t know this was coming.”
“He did. But the timing of it was wrong,” I added, glad the warlord was on the same page as me.
Caz grunted, listening but focusing most of his efforts on keeping his mate calm as she twisted and moved against him in his lap.
“Why would he want the attack?” Milly asked, looking around. “I feel like the only one who doesn’t get it.”
“I don’t either,” Ella said from next to me. “Can you explain?”
“Think about it,” I told her, staring at my mate but speaking to the room. “Let’s say this wet nurse fabrication worked. Mirko’s claim is proven right somehow, and he sits as tyrant, and then the Reds attack two days later. What does he do? He rides out of the citadel at the head of a force to the valiant defense of the kingdom from our longest enemies.”
“Oh,” Milly said. “That would certainly make him look good.”
“The masses would eat it up because they wouldn’t know better,” I confirmed.
