Sullo turned back to him. “Why are you still in bed?”
“I’m, uh, not dressed, Your Radiance.”
Sullo raised his eyebrows. He eyed the bed.
Eithan looked at the Nicce-lump, panic rising into his throat. Oh, Sullo was going to know. There was no way—
He got out of bed, stark naked, standing up straight.
Sullo was distracted. “What’s wrong with you?” He demanded, striding across the room and out of the door. “Get dressed,” he said, without looking at Eithan. “I’m hunting nightmares. You can come along.”
The door shut.
Eithan let out a breath, hanging his head.
That had been far too close.
He went to his wardrobe and pulled on a pair of breeches. When he turned back to the bed, Nicce was peaking out.
“Sorry,” she whispered. “I should have left.”
He crossed the room to her, sitting down on the bed. “It’s both our faults.” He kissed her quickly.
“Eithan?” called Sullo.
Eithan threw covers over her head.
But the door stayed closed.
“Your Radiance?” called Eithan.
“What’s taking you so long?”
“I’ll be right there.” He snatched a tunic out of the wardrobe and shrugged into it. He was buckling his belt and swords over his clothes as he shut the door to the room tightly behind him. He hadn’t thought it prudent to even say goodbye to her. What if the god heard?
Sullo looked him over. “Finally.”
“My apologies,” said Eithan.
Sullo strode down the hallway.
Eithan hurried to keep up, still buckling his belt. “Hunting nightmares, hmm?”
“Yes,” said Sullo. “When I was involved with Ciaska, it was one of my favorite pastimes. I assume you’ve indulged?”
“Well, not for sport,” said Eithan. He’d been too busy trying to survive and take care of everyone else to have pastimes.
“Should we take spears or bows and arrows?”
“Whatever Your Radiance prefers,” said Eithan.
“No, don’t be that way,” said Sullo, shaking his head in disapproval. “If I’d had a strong preference, I would have told you. I want your preference. I prefer to do what you say, so make a decision.”
Eithan’s experience with killing nightmares was that finishing the job typically meant getting up close and personal, dismembering the creatures with swords. He wasn’t sure that either spears or bows and arrows would be very efficient. On the other hand, if they took spears, Eithan imagined he’d be sent off to retrieve the weapons from the creatures, who would still be alive. Sullo might want arrows retrieved as well, but maybe that could be done after the creature had a quiverful already in it, which might make it a bit more subdued. “Arrows,” he said.
“Excellent choice,” said Sullo. “I trust you slept well.”
“Yes, quite,” said Eithan, and panic rose in him again. Sullo had noticed Nicce in the bed, and the god was going to kill him now. Sullo was toying with him. He waited.
Sullo kept walking.
Eithan kept pace with him.
“I wonder if my daughter had a restful night.” Sullo turned to look at him.
Eithan’s heart stopped, but somehow he continued to keep pace with the god. “I wonder,” he said. His voice was a little strangled. He braced himself for the strike from Sullo.
“Should we go to her room and wake her?”
Eithan couldn’t speak.
“Well?” said Sullo. “I have just finished explaining that I don’t ask your opinion out of courtesy, have I not?”
“No,” said Eithan.
Sullo gave him an odd look. “Don’t you wish to see her?”
Eithan shook his head. “No, it’s only torture for me, since I am no longer allowed to, uh, to…” Gods take it, there was no way to end that sentence.
Sullo only chuckled. “Very well. I suppose, first thing in the morning, she’d be concerned mostly with eating, anyway, and I know you don’t need to eat. That’s why I didn’t offer you breakfast.”
“Exactly,” said Eithan. “Exactly so.” What had that all been about? Did Sullo know or was he clueless? If he’d known, he would have insisted they find Nicce’s empty bedchamber, wouldn’t he? Eithan couldn’t be sure.
But it was a risk being with a god at all, he supposed. After all, he could never be sure that Ciaska wouldn’t kill him anytime she wished. She sometimes killed on a whim. Sullo might be exactly the same way. Eithan had yet to see him kill anyone, but he had attempted to kill Eithan, so…
They stopped in the weapons room on the bottom floor of the palace. It had half-collapsed when the palace had crumbled, but it was still accessible, and there were bows and arrows in the room for both of them.
Armed, they set off into the mists surrounding the palace.
The landscape in the Nightmare Realm was bleak and empty, nothing but darkness and mists and the nightmares. There was only one plant that Eithan knew of that grew in the realm and it produced a fruit of dark orbs. Otherwise the place was barren and strange.
He found himself curious about Sullo. Where did Sullo live? Was the place he lived all sunlight and brightness? Was it another realm, or was it also part of the same realm as the Nightmare Realm? He thought about asking and then decided the god might take offense at it. Sullo was not there to satisfy Eithan’s curiosity.
Sullo turned in a circle, arrow stretched taut in his bow. “Where are they? Come out, little nightmares, come out.”
Eithan wasn’t looking forward to the nightmares’ appearance, truthfully.
Abruptly, Sullo let his bow string go slack. He sighed, setting his bow on the ground and leaning against it like a walking staff. “I forgot how boring this place is. Ciaska was always complaining about how bored she was when I wasn’t around, and I can see why.”
“I suppose Your Radiance’s own home is much more entertaining,” said Eithan, even though he had decided not to ask questions.
Sullo shrugged. “Well, perhaps not. I suppose it is boring everywhere.” He turned to look at Eithan. “Let’s talk about Nicce.”
All right, then. He did know, and Eithan was going to die. He squared his shoulders, waiting.
“You can’t imagine how much it pains me to know she’s been with so many men.”
Eithan hadn’t been expecting that. He didn’t respond.
“I suppose you think of her as some sort of floozy, one of those women who will lie with anyone.”
“I don’t, as a matter of fact,” said Eithan. He cleared his throat. This conversation had taken a strange turn, and he was uncomfortable about it. “You know, I don’t see why you think that she’s been, um… I don’t think there have been a great many men.”
“She told me there were,” said Sullo. “She wasn’t a virgin with you. Did you know that?”
“I… did,” said Eithan, stifling the desire to indicate that he didn’t find this at all troubling.
Sullo shook his head. “I typically only bed virgins myself. Occasionally, I’ll make an exception, but I do like to, well, train them.”
Eithan needed to steer this conversation elsewhere.
“What would make a sweet girl like my daughter behave like that?” said Sullo. “Do you think that she was badly used by someone? Maybe she assumed that since she had been ruined, nothing mattered, and she would spread her favors around.”
“King Timon,” Eithan blurted. Gods take it, he should have thought this through before speaking. But maybe it could work. Maybe if he played it right.
Sullo turned to look at Eithan slowly. “What? What’s that you say?”
“I can’t be sure what exactly happened,” said Eithan. “But I know she indicated that he had a, er, prurient interest in her.”
Sullo’s eyes flashed orange. “Oh, human kings think so highly of themselves. You think that man hurt my little girl?”
“I do,” said Eithan. “
Someone should teach him a lesson.”
“Yes, if you’d cared about her, you would have.”
“I couldn’t care about her in the same way a father could,” said Eithan. “Besides, your punishment against the king would be so much more thorough than anything I could manage.”
“Yes,” said Sullo. “Yes, if it’s true, I shall—”
A nightmare swooped down on them, shrieking from its gaping mouth. It was one of the flying kinds, with feathery black wings and a mouth with three rows of sharp, gleaming fangs.
Sullo yelled, hurling a bright bolt of light out of his palm.
The light hit the thing and it sizzled, burning from the inside. It went up, curling like burning paper, screaming in pain. In seconds, it was nothing more than a small pile of ash.
Well, Eithan supposed it didn’t actually matter what weapon he’d picked, then, did it?
“Let’s go and find Nicce,” said Sullo, heading back toward the palace.
Eithan hurried to catch up with him.
Sullo moved quickly, and Eithan found it nearly impossible to match his pace, so he stopped trying, figuring it was better if he trailed along behind the god, anyway. That would help to cement his place as less than the god.
Eithan only hoped that Nicce would have been able to get out of Eithan’s room. Eithan and Sullo hadn’t really been gone that long, and he knew she would have been careful of moving out into the hallway, lest one of the acolytes saw.
Luckily, Nicce was in the throne room, eating what was left of another breakfast spread Sullo’d had set out, presumably for himself.
When she saw them both, she stood up from the table. She was still chewing and she hurriedly swallowed.
Eithan caught up to Sullo, who thrust his bow and arrows at Eithan without looking at him. Eithan juggled them, giving Nicce a look, trying to wordlessly communicate her to go along with whatever the god said.
Sullo folded his arms over his chest. “King Timon of Rabia.”
“Yes?” said Nicce.
“Did he violate you?”
Nicce’s eyes widened.
Eithan was behind Sullo, where the god couldn’t see, and he nodded vigorously at Nicce.
Nicce gaped at him, a look of betrayal spreading across her face.
Eithan felt it like a dart to his heart. Wait, the king hadn’t hurt Nicce, had he? Why did she seem so devastated? If something like that had happened, she would have told him.
Then he wondered, because it wasn’t as if he had spent hours detailing his experiences with Ciaska. Eithan felt sick to his stomach.
Nicce looked down at her feet. “Yes,” she said in a low voice.
At first, Eithan thought her tone was full of pain, but then he realized it was rage. She was angry.
“That tiny, self-important peon,” said Sullo, shaking his head. “He’s ruined you. And think of how it reflects on me. You’re my daughter, after all.”
Eithan stepped closer, his voice low and musical. “How dare he disrespect you like that?”
“How dare he?” repeated Sullo. He clenched his hands into fists.
“He thinks he is powerful,” said Eithan. “But a puny human king pales in comparison to a god.”
“Indeed he does,” said Sullo.
“I’d hate to see him when you’re through with him.”
Sullo smirked. He turned to look at Eithan. “Well, you won’t. You’re not coming. You could have avenged the honor of Nicce, but you were never worthy of her, were you? I shall go alone and deal with King Timon.”
This really couldn’t have gone better. Eithan had to fight from letting a grin of satisfaction crawl across his face. Honestly, Sullo was more easily led than he could have hoped.
Eithan bowed. “I would not think to say otherwise. You are right. I am unworthy.”
Sullo was already leaving the throne room. “I think I shall go right away and find him. I think I might toy with him before I kill him. I think he will suffer. For your sake, my daughter.”
Nicce let out a sound that might have been a sob, but that Eithan could tell was a harsh laugh. “How have I lived my whole life without your protection, Father?”
“You will never know that loneliness again,” said Sullo, and swept out of the doorway.
Eithan watched him go, and then he turned back to Nicce.
For several moments, she was quiet, only glowering at him. Then, she picked up a wine bottle and dashed it against the floor.
Glass and liquid exploded everywhere.
Eithan winced.
CHAPTER FIVE
Nicce wasn’t wearing a sword, but Eithan had one on his belt, and she went to him and yanked it out of its scabbard, much like the first time they’d met, when she’d fought her way to escape from him.
He took a step backward, holding up both of his hands, palms out. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think the king had ever touched you—”
“He didn’t.” She advanced on him, pointing the tip of the sword at his neck.
He reached up and clapped both hands around the flat of the sword, holding it in place. “Then what’s the problem? It’s a ruse to get Sullo to leave. I think it went very well.”
“Oh, of course,” she said, and her hands were shaking now. The blade would have been shaking too if Eithan hadn’t been holding it. “Well, it didn’t make you look weak, did it?”
“What?” He gazed at her with such confusion that her anger surged again.
She could have stabbed him, but she knew she didn’t want that, so she dropped the sword. It swung around and the pommel collided with him between his legs. He grunted. “What in the name of the pit is wrong with you?”
She stalked away from him, going to the side of the room where there were racks filled with towels. There were no servants in the Nightmare Court. They had to see to their own messes. She came back with an armful of towels and tossed them down on the spilled wine.
“Leave that,” said Eithan quietly. “As soon as Sullo is gone, we need to go too.”
She needed something to do. She got down on her hands and knees and began mopping up the liquid.
“There’s broken glass. You’re going to hurt yourself.”
“I’m going to be fine.”
“Nicce, calm down.”
“I’m always fine,” she said fiercely. “No man has ever done anything to me against my will, and no man ever will.”
“All right,” he said. “I know that. You know that. What do you care what Sullo thinks?”
“I wouldn’t let that happen to myself,” she said. “I would kill anyone who tried, or I would die in the attempt. That will never happen to me.”
He didn’t say anything at all.
She looked up from the sopping towels and had a stray thought that she shouldn’t say that to him, not after everything he’d been through with Ciaska. She scrambled to her feet. “Oh, Eithan, I didn’t mean…”
He furrowed his brow. “I’m very confused right now. Why are you so angry?”
She reached for him. “I didn’t mean you should have killed yourself instead of letting Ciaska do what she did to you.”
He evaded her touch, and his voice came out harsh. “How many times do I have to explain to you that I never fucked her?”
She swallowed. “Never mind.”
“The other knights. She forced them, but nothing happened to me.”
She shook her head at him. “Of course. Nothing.”
“Why are you bringing this up? It’s not the same.”
“I was here, Eithan,” she whispered. “I saw the ‘nothing’ she put you through.”
“I’m fine,” he said. Then he seemed to realize that he’d echoed her, and he rubbed his forehead, looking stricken.
She put her back to him, taking several deep breaths, trying to find her equilibrium. “We don’t have time for this, do we?”
“We don’t,” he said in a gravelly voice.
She turned back around. “What should we be doing now?�
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He licked his lips. “Go, find your weapons, and wait for me in your quarters. When Sullo is gone, I’ll come for you.”
She nodded briskly. “I’ll be waiting.”
Then she walked out of the throne room.
* * *
Eithan and Nicce easily left the palace, because Sullo hadn’t left guards at the gates of the palace, not like Ciaska had. So, they strode out of the front doors and past the gates with no one to stop them.
But when they reached the portal, there was a contingent of his acolytes there, at least a dozen of them, hiding behind their huge, circular shields.
There wasn’t much in the way of cover between the palace and the portal, so when Nicce and Eithan could see the acolytes, the acolytes could see them too. The acolytes raised their spears in warning.
“Well, so much for talking our way out of this,” said Eithan.
“Six each?” said Nicce. “Can we do that?”
“You’re a half-god. I’m incredibly strong. Yeah, I think we’re going to be fine.” Eithan drew his sword.
Nicce sucked in a breath. Maybe she’d missed fighting, at that. Sure, it had only been a few days since they’d had to expel the nightmares from the palace, but that hadn’t been the same.
This would be a real fight.
Weapons against weapons, with men who wielded them. The nightmares were formidable but mostly because of their numbers, not because of their fighting prowess.
She smiled a fierce smile, really just baring her teeth, and she yanked out her sword for one hand and her dagger for the other. “Let’s do this.”
He glanced at her sidelong. “Have I mentioned you’re incredibly sexy with a sword?”
She blushed suddenly, letting out something she could only term a giggle. “You’re distracting me.”
And there was no time for distraction, because they were coming.
It was a whir of movement from all sides, and Nicce could do nothing but move in response. She thrust and swung and kicked, and she could see nothing but spears and shields. The mist pressed in on them from all sides. The world was clanging metal and the pulse of her heart and the smell of sweat.
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