I told myself that as I swung forward, grabbing Reaver’s arm before he launched himself into the air. I pulled him down,keeping him between me and the chaise. Ector was alive because the embers in my chest only pulsed. They didn’t throb with the intensity of death.
Instead, they hummed with something else.
An awareness of…ofanother.
“Sorry,” a silky voice said from the doorway. “He knew better than to refuse me entrance.”
Heart strangely calm, I turned to the doors and came face-to-face with Veses. Suddenly, and for no reason, something Attes had said when he first was here came to me. He’d referred to the situation of the Primal God of Rites and Prosperity and me as a complication he didn’t envy.
And she was definitely that.
“Hello.” Veses smiled, and…gods, she was so damn beautiful.
So much so, I imagined it wasn’t hard to overlook whatever unsavory or cruel things she was involved in when she looked like some delicate painting come to life.
She glided into the chamber, the hem of her lilac gown fluttering silently around her feet. I was surprised to see that for someone as thin as she was, she was shockingly endowed. And I only knew that because her dress was as transparent as the nightgown I wore beneath my robe.
“I said”—she cocked her head—“hello?”
Alarm swept through me, keeping the anger threatening to lead me to another unwise choice in check. No matter what she’d done with Nyktos or how she was involved with him, she was a Primal, and not someone I wanted to anger. I kept the dagger hidden beneath the sleeve of my robe as I quickly glanced at Ector. He hadn’t moved. Not once. “I heard you.”
Veses’ head tilted as her mouth, wide and the color of lush, red berries, curved up at the corners. The smile would’ve been lovely if not for the cold, calculating edge.
It hit me then, what had nagged at me as I’d returned to my chambers. Ector had said that the Shades finding their way to Lethe had once been infrequent. But when Taric and the other two gods had come to the palace, they had led the Shades into Lethe first as a means to pull Nyktos’s presence away from the palace. As a distraction. I couldn’t remember if I had told Nyktos that or not, but it was mighty convenient that Veseswas creeping around the palace now, throwing gods through doors, while Nyktos was otherwise occupied.
Footsteps pounded down the hall and then came to a halt. Rhain appeared in the open doors. “Fuck.” That one word said everything. “I’m sorry, Your Highness. I was unaware that you were here.” Rhain bowed stiffly, glancing at Ector’s prone body. “These are not Nyktos’s chambers. I will send word to him and let him know of your arrival. Come,” he called to me, his eyes holding mine.
“That’s not necessary.” Veses glanced down at the small draken trying to peek around me. I moved, shielding Reaver. He was far too young to see all that Veses had going on. “I’m not here to see Nyktos.”
Fear. Rhain’s eyes widened, and I thought I saw fear in them. “But—”
Veses flicked a finger.
Rhain went skidding backward, out of the chambers and into the hall. That was all it took—a move of her finger. “You can take him with you,” she said, and Ector’s unconscious body went sliding across the floor and out into the hall, as well. “He should wake up… I think.”
Rhain pushed off—
The doors slammed shut, one of them hanging crookedly from the frame. They’d broken when she threw Ector through them, but I doubted anything but another Primal was getting through them now.
“What do you hear?” Veses asked. “It’s silence, isn’t it?”
Utter silence. No one banged on the doors. There were no more pounding footsteps.
“At least Rhain remembers his place. Perhaps he’ll remind Ector of his when he wakes,” she continued. “And maybe I will forgive him for his grave overstep and for standing between me and…” That smile returned, but it was mocking. “You.” She shook her head.
“Do you know he actually drew his sword on me?” Veses laughed as my eyes widened. “What was he thinking? Striking out against me when you’re not Nyktos’s Consort.”
Shit.
WhatwasEctor thinking?
Feeling that Reaver was still behind me, I swallowed. “Maybe his sword slipped and fell into his hand.”
Veses laughed again, a full-body laugh that shook parts of her I shouldn’t be able to see. “I’m not sure. But perhaps Nyktos will be able to convince me of such.”
I didn’t let myself respond. I didn’t even bat an eyelash.
“You know, I couldn’t believe it when he told me the rumors were true.” Kohl-lined eyes drifted over me in a way that made me painfully aware of how I must appear in the robe with my hair looking like I’d been caught in a windstorm. “What little he did say about you left me confused.” Laughing softly, she began to prowl. And that was exactly how she moved. Like the large, striped tigers that roamed the drylands of Irelone. She sat on the couch, draping her arms along the back as she crossed one leg over the other. “Sera? That’s your name, is it not?”