Troy smiled. “Yeah. Where are the others?”
“They’re still in there. I actually came to invite you to join us.”
“Are you kidding?” Darius wondered. “That thing is tiny.”
I just smiled. Of course they didn’t know any better. They haven’t been around Adele nearly long enough to know what she’s truly capable of. “You should really come. Since we’re not exactly prisoners anymore, you should see how we spend our nights of travel. It’s better than this, I assure you.”
“Is Adele okay with that?” Zayden asked. “Her mood probably hasn’t changed.”
I laughed and picked up our cloaks laying around, holding them in my arms. “You’ll have to excuse her. The world has put her through much pain.”
“Couldn’t you help her?” Troy wondered.
I looked at him and realized he was referring to my healing abilities but this was different. It wasn’t about that at all and my voice became flat with a growing sad expression while speaking the truth. “No. I wish I could but this kind of pain cannot be healed by any amount of enchantments. It’s not a physical pain. It’s purely mental. She has to be the one to decide to end it once she’s gotten what it is she needs.”
“And what is that?” Zayden asked.
I started to smile again. Was it just a coincidence that he’s the one that asked? “Why don’t you come with me and maybe you’ll find out for yourself?”
Troy and Darius looked over at Zayden to let him know they wanted to. It didn’t take much effort. He sighed and started getting back up to his feet, not in the mood to argue it. It was a wise decision. “All right. I’ll take anything better than this right now.”
They immediately got to their feet with him and I was glad he agreed. “You made the right choice. You won’t regret it.”
“I better not.”
They followed me out into the rain and we went right inside the other door.
“Stairs?”
Darius’s curious voice made me laugh and we got closer to the light. “Welcome to our last night outdoors.”
They seemed quite astonished to see the room with hard stone floors and walls. “Whoa.”
It wasn’t much of a big deal to me. I was used to seeing it. There were two beds Adele had created on each side of the room out of a stone platform with a large pillow top that was filled with feathers. She always carried a single feather and a shred of cloth when we traveled so she could cleverly expand them to create our beds but there was also a small doorway all the way down at the other end of the large room that I had guessed was where her bed was kept.
“Hey, what do you think?” Ruby stood up from one of the chairs so Adele would stop brushing her hair. I often forgot how long it really was. She always seemed to wear it up but it was down now and stopped just down the middle of her back, showing off its true rose red shine. It’s been the first time she really messed with it since we’ve been out here and I watched Darius’s impressed reaction.
“It’s perfect.”
Ruby smiled and went over to him for a simple greeting just to stand close while she tied her hair back up so it was off her neck.
The room was quiet and Adele got up, speaking lowly to all of us as she started to turn away. “Well, goodnight.”
“You’re going to bed?” I asked. “But it’s not even dark out.”
“Don’t worry about what I’m doing and don’t bother me.” She held up her hand with her back still turned and created enough chairs for everyone then turned out of sight in the back left corner of the large room. There wasn’t another sound from her.
“What’s wrong with her now?” Zayden asked.
I had a bad feeling like I already knew and immediately forced my eyes to Ruby without an ounce of a smile showing. “What did you do?”
“What?! Nothing!”
“I leave you alone with her for two minutes and you just had to make things worse, didn’t you?!”
“She’s not really good at taking advice. How is that my fault?”
My eyes got wide and I stepped closer with a higher tone of rage on my voice. “You gave her advice?! Ruby! You and speaking rational sense don’t go together! How many times does someone have to say that to you?! The best thing you should do around her at this point is not say a word about any of this! You just made things worse!”
Ruby just stood there with a smile, not reacting to my outburst at all. “Do you even realize how sexy you look when you’re pissed off? No wonder Kole stuck around through all the fighting.”
My eyes rolled with a sigh. How dare she mention him in Troy’s presence? I didn’t want him to think that I was with anyone back home because I wasn’t. “Please don’t. That has nothing to do with our current problem.”
“Well, I’m not the one to fix it.”
That was true and we both turned our eyes to Zayden. “What? And you think I am? If you made it worse, I don’t think she’d give me the light of day to care.”
“Well, actually, there is one way.” My full smile was back and my eyes glanced to Ruby.
“Ah, yes. There is that way.”
“What way?” Zayden asked curiously.
“Well, I’m not too sure about that actually.” It was a nice thought but I was still having some doubts. “She may be able to turn away from it being as proud as she is.”
“But hey, I still say it’s worth a shot.” Ruby said. “Does that come off?”
Zayden looked confused when he saw her looking at him and he looked around. “Does what come off?”
“This.” She knocked on his breastplate.
“Of course it does. What’d you think, that it’s permanently attached to my body?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen it off. You’ve even been sleeping in it.”
“Well, what’s your point?”
“Take it off and whatever is under it.”
Zayden’s eyes became more curious in a worried way and flickered them over towards Darius and Troy. “Why?”
“Just a test. Adele won’t be able to resist if your hip bones look as detailed to your masculine form as I would think. You know, based on the obvious muscle tone in your arms.”
Zayden still had the confused look on his face and he shifted his weight in his stance. “So, you expect me to go in there and actually use my perfect body to get her to lighten her mood?”
“Have you had a preferred preference for men this whole time?”
Darius and Troy quietly laughed when she asked and I tried not to as well but Zayden was making it difficult when he sighed while rolling his eyes. “No.”
“Because, seeing them, I could see why.”
“I said no!”
“Then yes. I do expect you to use it.”
“That’s a little ridiculous, don’t you think? I’m not doing that. I have my own pride.”
“Then can you think of a way? We’ve tried. She’s not going to listen to any of us.”
“And what makes you think she’ll listen to me?”
“She doesn’t need to listen.” I said. “She just needs to look then the listening will follow.”
“I already said I wasn’t going to do it.”
“Well, you’re the one who wanted to know.” Ruby dropped herself down into one of the six chairs to the left of the fire.
The rest of us followed her lead but Zayden remained on his feet with his eyes looking back towards where we lost sight of Adele. “What exactly is back there?”
Ruby smiled and casually sat herself back, crossing one leg over the other. “That’d be the bedchambers of our valiant and gifted leaders. Who were you supposed to be again?”
“She’s not going to let me stay in there.”
“Not if you just stand out here. You have to go to her and if she invites you in then you don’t even have to ask. You’re in. It’s a hidden rule.”
Zayden only stood there for another second then turned his body completely back to where Adele went.
“Be realisti
c, Zayden and look around. You think we could have done any of this? It’s all been premeditated. There’s no bed out here for you.”
Zayden kept his eyes where Adele was and finally gave into the constant encouragement. I was excited and tried waiting it out to see how this would change her.
Chapter 31
Zayden
I followed to where Adele disappeared and saw the entryway to her room just around the small corner. I slowly stepped out of sight from the others and looked inside to an unexpected delight.
The room was lit up by a torch on the back wall but it was small, making the lighting dim and peaceful. The floor was covered in black fur and the bed was placed in the middle of the room on the far back wall, covered with material from her coat and cloak as the blanket. She must have been able to use her gift to expand them. A fine use indeed.
There was also a small stand to the left of the bed and I noticed her boots tucked away on the bottom shelf with her pants folded up on top of it with her corset.
What could she have been wearing?
My eyes instantly moved to the other end of the room.
Adele was there. She was standing back to me, repositioning the metal rods she didn’t call much of a danger in her sleek brown hair. From what I could see, she was wearing a lavender velvet short skirt with a thick band of blue velvet at her waist. Her back was bare except for a blue band of velvet around the center and a tie around the back of her neck. She also had another mark decorated on her body just between her shoulder blades that was of three blue roses ranging from largest to smallest, bottom to top.
I stood almost speechless to see it. It wasn’t that it was just on the better form of a woman but blue roses were a symbol of Seni. Only our most experienced florists knew how to create them. It’s not something found in the wild. They had to be specially made and I only wondered why she had them.
“I thought I said I didn’t want to be bothered.”
I finally blinked to respond. “And I overruled your word.”
She laughed and slowly turned. The front of her shirt was short and tied between the base of her breasts, hardly enough to be called a shirt though I didn’t mind. “Spoken like a true son of Kings.”
My look instantly changed from interested to unimpressed while raising an eyebrow at her words.
“I didn’t exactly say it.”
“Well, how about we leave that part of me out of this, okay?”
“And what exactly is this?” She stepped closer, her hips swaying with every movement and my eyes followed. “I have nothing to offer you.”
“What of your company? I’ll be contempt with that.”
“I don’t give good company. You should just go.”
“But I don’t want to.”
“Why must you be so persistent?”
I leaned myself to one side of the doorway and just smiled. “It’s my nature, I guess.”
Adele returned the smile and sat herself down on the bed with her eyes on mine. I knew I was getting to her. My charm was too much for her and she actually agreed. “Then I guess I have no choice. Changing one’s nature is much harder to do.”
“Then can I come in? Or shall you have me stand here all night?”
She looked me over before pulling her feet up on the bed. “Only if you take off your boots. I have to wear that fur later.”
I started taking off my boots one at a time and placed them just outside of the door before stepping in. “This is nice. I would have much liked to have spent the last six months out here like this, especially during the long cold months of winter.”
“Well, living with just a small state of luxury could have cost you your esteemed victory. Wouldn’t have wanted that, would you?”
I sighed to her need to keep this mood. “Why do you find it necessary to do that?”
“So you don’t forget. You’re trying to and it’s not right.”
“Why is it so wrong to just want to get along?”
“You really think we could? I already thanked you for sending my father back to me but the manner in which you did could have killed him. I can’t trust what kind of decision you choose to make next.”
“You don’t trust me? You seem to so far.”
“It’s not a trust. It’s my job as leader to keep my girls alive and I’ll do that by any means necessary even if that means with your help.”
“Why don’t you trust me?”
She sighed and looked away. “Because we’re at war, Zayden. You shouldn’t even trust me.”
“But I want to.”
She looked back and I was closer to her, my eyes on hers. “You’re a good liar. I’ll give you that.”
“I’m not lying to you.” I stepped even closer and lowered myself down on the bed in front of her. “I would have no reason to.”
“Well, your reasons to me are asinine.”
I laughed and leaned back so I was angled comfortably near the foot of the bed. “A few days ago I probably would have thought the same thing.”
“I don’t want to continue to judge you so don’t make me. I hardly know who I’m talking to.”
“All right. Then what do you want to know? I’ll get you to know me if I have to. Just ask.”
She seemed hesitant at first. “Just ask? Okay. So, who dressed you?”
“You have a sense of humor, I see. A good quality but I was thinking of questions more pertaining to me as a person, not my choice in attire.”
“It was a serious question. It’s very—shiny.”
“I did. It’s a necessity. Have we gotten this out of the way so you can ask me some real questions now?”
“You really want me to know you, don’t you?”
“That was the plan. I don’t want you judging me on false information.”
She laughed. “So, I should judge you based on who you really are?”
“If you can find anything.”
Adele looked away. I’ve seen this behavior in women before. I was making her nervous and she was almost on the brink of blushing, trying to hide it from me. “Okay. Well, let’s start with how old you are then.”
“Doing this the old-fashion way, are we? Well, all right. I asked for that, I guess. Currently, I’m twenty-one but I’ll be twenty-two in—four months.”
“Really? You’ve seemed older to me but I guess I should have already known that from already knowing we started in these lives around the same time.”
“How did you know that?”
“I’ve heard things.”
“Then you’re twenty-one also?”
“Yeah. I turned twenty-one just a couple of months ago when there was a bunch of snow. I like the snow. It’s my favorite time of year because it makes everything―it just feels like time is frozen and I don’t worry about what’s next.”
This was already becoming better than I thought it would. She was playing along, seeming more like she didn’t hate me.
“Interesting.” I said. “The snow is nice. You should see how it makes the city look. It’s beautiful.”
“Except you don’t get nearly as much snow as we do.”
“How would you know that?”
“Heard things.”
“Then I suppose that’s true but I probably wouldn’t have guess your age accurately either.”
“Why?”
“You just seem too serious to be younger than me like you’ve forgotten what fun is like.”
Her mouth dropped with a quiet laugh only because she secretly knew I was right. “I know how to have fun. You’ve only been around me for a few days and what was fun about any of that?”
“Some of it was actually quite fun.” I flickered my eyes down to the cleavage exposed by her top and tried not to stare for too long.
She smiled and covered it with her hand for just the duration of her reply. “We’re not going to talk about that.”
“Well, it was all you. Yeah, you may have used it to try and kill me but it was still worth it.”
“You regret it, don’t you?”
I wanted to know what she was thinking and was glad that she at least felt comfortable enough to explain something. It was a start. “I regret a lot of things. For instance, coming here. I did it for all the wrong reasons, never thinking it would actually end in my death.”
“But it won’t.” I sat up with a more serious tone than all of my previous playful bantering. “My decision won’t change on that.”
She laughed but it was in a sad way and she slowly shook her head. “I didn’t mean from you or anyone in Seni for that matter. It’s because of my mistake. Something I’ve done.”
“Does this have anything to do with keeping us alive?”
She took a breath and I think she was trying to keep herself from crying in front of me. “Yes, as is the way. Rules that have been set down for all of the Assassins before us.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“Mostly for Ruby and Jaylyn, especially Jaylyn. It’s not their responsibility to stress about things like that. It’s mine. I failed them but they’ll even have to pay for my mistake. They don’t need their minds on that right now. That’s why I didn’t say anything. I want them to savor their last chance at happiness and this is it. I don’t really care where it comes from anymore as long as they get it.”
“You should have at least told me.”
“It wouldn’t change anything. Killed by you or our own Queen, it doesn’t matter. The end result remains the same so it shouldn’t matter if we get along. You’ll never see me again after all of this and we’re sent home.”
I didn’t want to believe it and I didn’t want to believe that she would be killed by her own people. Her father surely wouldn’t have allowed that, right? My mind was racing and I came up with one idea. “Have you ever thought about a royal assassination just to get her out of the way?”
“What?!”
“Have you ever thought about killing her?”
“I know what an assassination is. It’s kind of my job. I just didn’t think you’d actually suggest it.”
Aligning Stars (Fate's Intent Book 1) Page 16
