She reminded him of Talasyn. Her stature, the color of her swept-back hair, even the way she moved. It was a cruel joke that he would now have to wed someone so similar to the girl who plagued his thoughts.
“Lachis’ka.” Alaric bowed his head, retreating into prescribed formalities the same way that he fell into combat forms by rote. “May this signal the beginning of an amicable relationship between our two realms and . . .”
He trailed off mid-sentence as he lifted his gaze back to her features. His brain was starting to catch up, starting to realize that—
—underneath the opulent silk and the lavish jewels—
—underneath the cosmetics that hid her freckles and sharpened her cheekbones and softened the strong line of her jaw—
—underneath all of that—she was—
“Amicable relationship?” Talasyn hissed, with narrowed eyes and a feral flash of teeth, and Alaric’s heart all but stopped beating in his chest. “Not fucking likely.”
Chapter Sixteen
Talasyn did not hold much truck with the finery of her father’s people. That wasn’t to say that she detested looking at the Nenavarene lords and ladies in their resplendent attire, but actually wearing these things herself was a different story. Perhaps concluding that her granddaughter would be a more amicable hostage if provided some measure of freedom, Queen Urduja usually allowed Talasyn to scurry around in simple tunics and breeches when her presence was not required at a meeting. Talasyn was little used to the scratch of embroidered silk and the constraints of heavy jewelry and layered skirts.
As such, while she was aware that she currently looked very glamorous indeed, she was also, not to put too fine a point on it, dying inside. Jie had laced up the bodice a bit too securely in an effort to imbue curves where there were none, and the pins holding Talasyn’s crown in place dug into her scalp like talons. Her face was pancaked with layers of powder and metallic pigments, her lips sticky with the peach lacquer that had been brushed over them to offset her bold eyes. She felt too stiff and too warm, and also rather like a fraud, but she gladly acquiesced to these discomforts because the look on Alaric Ossinast’s face made it all worthwhile.
Her hackles had started rising practically from the moment he walked into the throne hall with his companions, one of whom she recognized as the staff-wielding legionnaire from the battle of Lasthaven. Sevraim, one of the twins had called him. Talasyn had been expecting Alaric to arrive in his usual armor or perhaps the grand robes of his new office, but instead he wore a starkly tailored, belted black tunic over black trousers, and in place of the clawed gauntlets of his battle regalia were plain leather ones. The only nod to embellishment was the silver brooch in the shape of his house’s chimera crest, affixing a cape that flowed with his every step like a raven’s wing. She would never admit it out loud, even with a knife to her throat, but the simple attire flattered his lean figure, emphasizing his broad shoulders and his formidable height. With his mane of thick dark hair framing his pale face as he’d purposefully stridden toward the platform, seemingly oblivious to the court’s stares and whispers, he’d looked every inch a prince. And not a charming, gallant one like Elagbi, but a sinister prince who brought blood and battle and ill omens.
Therefore, it was all the more satisfying when his jaw dropped once he realized that she was Alunsina Ivralis.
Talasyn was standing right in front of him. She had the privilege of watching all trace of urbane courtesy vanish from his features as it morphed into complete and utter shock. His gray eyes went wide and his complexion drained of color so that he was now as white as a sheet. Even after her hostile declaration, which she had pitched low so the courtiers would not overhear, he remained silent for several more seconds, gaping at her like a fish plucked from water.
It was a petty sort of triumph that swelled in Talasyn’s chest, but it quickly faded into bewilderment when something like relief spasmed across Alaric’s features. The expression lasted only for a second, just long enough for her to register its similarity to the look on many a soldier’s face when the all clear was sounded—we live to fight another day—and then it was gone.
“A fine trap you’ve set,” he said coldly, glancing around the hall as though expecting Sardovian soldiers to pop out from the shadows at any moment. There was a stir below the platform as Sevraim recognized Talasyn and tried to rush up the steps, but was blocked by the Lachis-dalo closing ranks around him, the scrape of blades being drawn piercing the silence.
“It is no trap, Your Majesty,” Urduja declared. “The kaptan of the Belian garrison noticed Alunsina’s resemblance to her late mother and summoned the prince. After Kesath won your Hurricane Wars, Alunsina returned to us to seek sanctuary and to claim her birthright.”
“If the patrol hadn’t apprehended us at the shrine, I would never have been reunited with my family,” Talasyn told Alaric with venomous sweetness. “So, really, I have you to thank for that.”
“And who else sought sanctuary with you?” he retorted. “Am I to find Ideth Vela among your retinue? Is Bieshimma long-lost royalty as well?”
“I have no idea where the others are.” The lie rolled off her tongue with ease, as it should; she’d rehearsed it frequently enough. “I was separated from them during the retreat. If you think that this is some sort of ruse, you can search the Dominion yourself.”
But demanding to search the archipelago would be an unforgivable breach of jurisdiction, as well as tantamount to calling the Nenavarene head of state a liar—which would hardly endear the Night Empire to an already wary populace. Alaric was in a difficult position and he knew it, and he obviously knew that Talasyn knew it, judging from the way that he was glowering at her. She arched a brow at him in challenge as he continued to frown down at her and she could almost see the vein throbbing in his forehead and, oh, she was enjoying this far too much.
“Are the two of you quite done making a scene?”
The question dripped like icicles from Urduja’s lips, shattering the world that was Alaric and Talasyn alone. Talasyn wanted to argue that it wasn’t as though they’d been shouting at each other but, on second thought, their tense standoff was already eliciting speculative murmurs from the gathered nobles. Not to mention the minor chaos that was erupting below the platform.
I’m always so shortsighted when it comes to you. Talasyn seethed at the sullen emperor looming over her. Alaric had the habit of eclipsing everything else, making her throw caution to the wind for the sake of crossing blades and wits with him on the battlefields they’d fought over. This magnificent hall was a kind of battlefield as well. She had to be smarter, had to start using the same weapons that Queen Urduja wielded with such skill.
“I believe His Majesty and I have finished being reacquainted.” Talasyn tried to say this with an air of sophisticated loftiness, but it only sounded bitingly sarcastic. Oh, well. Practice would make perfect—she hoped. “Shall we proceed with the negotiations?”
“What the hell is going on?” Sevraim demanded as Alaric stalked down the platform. The legionnaire’s usual nonchalance was conspicuously absent. “Why is the Lightweaver dressed up as the Nenavarene Lachis’ka? Is the Dominion in cahoots with the Sardovian Allfold? Is—”