“I see I am to preserve you from the consequences of your own folly.”
“You could attempt it.” She tipped, arched her back and brushed a fleeting kiss against his chin. Such a risk with this public display of affections, for neither, had declared to their king they had feelings for each other.
Those gray eyes searched her features as if he wanted to examine her soul. Xian could not speak, enthralled with the need flashing in his eyes. Soon they became shuttered, and something dangerous glowed back at her.
"Who did this?" he murmured, touching the slight swelling at the corner of her lips. "This was caused by a fist."
Her pulse tripped alarmingly. “It is nothing.”
“I will not ask again, Xian.”
She lifted her chin. “It is from a training exercise.” And that was all she would say on the matter.
He placed her hand on his arm and escorted her from the ballroom to one of the smaller balconies. Once there, a welcoming breeze danced over her skin, the smell of burning pinecones redolent on the air. Frenzied shrieks echoed from above where massive insubstantial winged creatures, the wraith of their kingdoms, patrolled the skies.
“The law is death for anyone who hurts a royal princess. Even in training.”
“A ridiculous law,” she said with a wry smile. “How am I to know how to battle effectively if I am cossetted.”
He advanced on her, the scowl on his face menacing, the silver in his eyes darkening to black. The scar stretched taut over his cheekbones, and she lifted a finger and traced along the puckered ridge. His many wounds and his indomitable will had been earned on bloody battlefields as he walked with loyalty beside her Kalija. A place she had never been. Xian had never fought in a war or a battle and had been protected from much by her brothers. But she would not stand by while her kingdom suffered. No more.
“Why are you displeased?”
“You have Queen’s blades: A team of ten, some of Ajali’s most merciless warriors and their sole job is to protect you. There is no need to risk—”
She slapped a hand on his chest, and he halted, certainly not by her strength. His chest felt like an immovable mountain. And at times like these, she hated their disparity in size and strength. Without the six-inch heels diamond slipper encasing her feet tonight, the top of her head would barely touch his chest.
&nbs
p; Everyone in the royal court and the kingdom insisted on treating her like spun glass. She was a master swordswoman, even if she did not practice wielding her shenkiri of fire like most citizens with serious chakra control. She was too afraid of tempting the flames buried inside of her, but that did not mean she was not a capable warrior.
“These last weeks have proven that a war hover. War, Gavyn. Not a skirmish that will be settled in a few days or weeks. We are talking about thousands of dead. Lives displaced. Homes and families destroyed. All because of a madman who only cares to amass power. The emperor of Mevia must be stopped. He came for Ajali, here in our very own realm with such ruthless boldness he steals my sleep. The empire will come again, and we must be prepared. I must be ready to fight and defend our king and people.”
Eyes without mercy set in a hard, ruthless face peered down at her. “Is that why you have been sneaking out daily to the edges of Taryllion to train?”
She sucked in a sharp breath. "You’ve set spies on me?”
“No,” he said. “I followed you myself.”
“Why?”
A hiss slipped from him. “You are mine to protect, Xian. Taryllion is the deadlands of the seven kingdoms, only the lawless lives there, the thieves, the cutthroats, the assassins and murderers. It is no place for a princess.”
She laughed and tossed her head, the thick, heavy tresses of her hair tumbling from its chignon and down to her hips. “I do not need you hovering as if I will stumble and break my delicate toe. I am a princess of this realm, and I must be ready to give my life for its protection and its people. If I must steal away and train for this, then that is what I shall do. And if you tell my brother, I will never forgive you."
“You are asking me to betray Ajali,” he growled.
“I am not. I am asking for your loyalty. I do nothing that will harm our king and our nation, so there is no fucking betrayal.”
“What is it that you fear?”
She searched his eyes. “Have you forgotten so soon? ‘I see lands ravaged by war and death. Without access to the mountains of Boreas and their elixir, your kingdom will fall under the might of Mevia and Avindar’. Those are the chilling words of the Serangite, Ruxia. We were all there when she gave them to Ajali.”
Xian paused, pushing down the fear which had lived for a long time in her since that prophecy. “It is Nuria which is to fall under the might of Mevia and Avindar. I close my eyes each night, and I see the unveiling of the prophecy, and all I feel is fear. Our kingdom must not fall, Gavyn. Our people…our people must be saved at all cost. How do you dare suggest I must not do everything in my power, as Nuria’s princess to save our people?”
He brushed his thumb tenderly over her trembling lips. “We know that prophecy is not set in stone. Did the foreseer not predict Ajali would die at the hand of a woman? And that has not come to pass.”
“Tehdra did rip out his throat!” Xian snapped.