by Maisey Yates
She imagined that Anton wouldn’t disown her completely. But there was no place for her there. No purpose. She would have nothing more to do than rattle around the large palace, nothing more than a useless limb that could easily be amputated. Until she said something. Until she spoke up and lost the good favor of the last person on earth who cared about her even a little...
It was too close to what she’d experienced growing up. The forgotten child. Because everyone had had to give Emily every last shred of attention. Watching Emily required constant vigilance. The state of her health needing to be monitored at all times.
What does resenting that make you?
She pushed the thought to the side. It didn’t matter. None of it mattered. Her parents had done what good parents had to do. And she had done what a good sister should. Still, she had an aversion to idleness. To invisibility.
“I wish you would reconsider,” she said, the words exiting her lips before she had a chance to think them through.
Did she wish he would reconsider? She wasn’t sure. Part of her wanted to run away, to go back to the private plane that had brought her here—the same sort of plane her husband had perished in two years ago—climb into the bed and cover herself with a blanket and spend the flight back to Alansund curled into the fetal position.
That was the other problem. Returning would require getting on a plane again. Three antianxiety pills had not been enough to make that bearable.
She’d never liked to fly. Losing Marcus hadn’t helped that particular phobia.
“Do you know what my function has long been here in my country?” His tone was mild. Deceptive, she had a feeling.
“Enlighten me,” she said, schooling her tone into smooth unbreakable glass.
“I am the dagger. The one a man might keep hidden in the folds of his robe. Concealed, and all the more dangerous for that reason. I did not command the army. Rather, my place was in the desert. My focus on the tribes there, on ensuring stability. Loyalty to the crown. Commanding small battalions when need be. Crushing insurgency before it ever had the chance to take root. The enemy to my brother’s enemies. The one they barely knew existed. They say if you live by the sword, you will also die by it. If that is the case, I suppose I am simply awaiting the final blow. However, as I previously stated, I am quite difficult to kill.”
Unease crept down her spine like icy fingers. If he had been intending to scare her, he had very nearly succeeded. But he had also piqued her curiosity. And for the moment that overrode the fear.
“Do you have any training in being royalty?” she asked.
“Do I know how to converse with foreign dignitaries, give speeches and eat with rudimentary table manners? No.”
“I see,” she said, taking a step closer to him. She felt as if she was approaching a caged tiger. There was no real danger, not in this setting. But the strength, the lethal potential in his body was evident. “With that taken into account, perhaps I could be of use to you in other ways?”
“What other ways? If you mean to entice me with your body—” he looked her up and down as he said the word, his gaze dismissive “—you will find that I am not so easily moved.”
Heat rushed over her in a flood. She wasn’t sure if it was embarrassment or anger. And she wasn’t sure why she would feel either. She didn’t know the man. His assessment of her body didn’t mean anything to her. She was confident enough in her appeal. Marcus had certainly never had any complaints.
She did her best to keep from flinching. To keep from faltering. Her emotions, her concerns, had no place here. Truly, she had no right to feel upset, or concerned. She owed this to Anton. He wasn’t asking too much, not when it came to serving the country.
“Any woman can share her body with you,” she said, her tone dismissive. “Very few have the benefit of royal training. As I said, I’m American. An heiress, and certainly from a wealthy family, but not royal. There was much I had to learn before I was ready to become queen. I could teach you.”
His expression barely changed, a flicker in his eyes that was nearly imperceptible. “You think I might find value in that?”
“Unless you want the country you’ve spent so much of your life protecting to burn, I think you will. There is an entirely different manner of strength that is coveted in politics. And like your physical strength, you will be required to work at it. You must build up your muscles, so to speak.”
“I don’t have to marry you to receive the benefit of your training.”
“It’s true. You don’t. And perhaps that’s a good place for us to start.”
“What are you proposing?”
“Give me some time to prove my value to you. Marriage is a rather serious step for two strangers to take.”
He tilted his head to the side. “Have you married one before?”
“Marcus wasn’t a stranger when we married. We met at university.”
“A love match?” he asked, one dark brow raised.
Her stomach twisted uncomfortably, a bit of numbness starting at the tips of her fingers and slowly spreading upward. “Yes.” She swallowed hard. “Just another reason I find it so easy to entertain the idea of a mutually beneficial alliance. I am not searching for, nor do I anticipate having, another marriage like my first. I don’t want one.”
“I can promise you a marriage between the two of us would be nothing like the one you shared with your first husband.”
She didn’t doubt it.
“Fine. Don’t send me back. Give me one month. I will help you with the finer points, and we can engage in a kind of courtship. A bit of something for the media, something for your people. If it doesn’t work out, there is no harm. But if it does... Well, it solves several problems.”
He stood abruptly, his movements fluid. It reminded her of the strike of a viper. So still in the moment just before the fatal hit was administered. Over before you ever knew it had occurred.
“Dowager Queen Olivia of Alansund, we have an accord. You have thirty days to convince me that you are indispensable. If you are successful, I will make you my wife.”
CHAPTER TWO
“A MEMBER OF staff will show you to a room.”
“Perhaps you might trouble yourself just long enough to show me?” Olivia didn’t know why she was pressing for any more time spent in Tarek’s presence. Perhaps it was simply her attempt at reclaiming control of the situation.
She didn’t like feeling out of control, and the past two years of her life had given rise to the feeling that she was nothing more than a rock hurtling through space, at the mercy of gravity’s pull. She hated that feeling. It was too close to what she’d experienced growing up with the specter of terrible illness hanging over the household.
Nothing highlighted your true lack of influence on anything important like death, or the threat of death. Olivia was far too familiar with both.
So you can wallow in it, or you can make a difference. It isn’t like Anton wants to send you on an unpleasant mission. But he has a country to consider.
And so did she.
This wasn’t the time to break down. This wasn’t the time to start making things all about her, and her comfort. There was a broader scope to consider.
“You assume I might know where a prepared guest room is. I assure you I do not.”
“You don’t know the layout of the rooms in your own palace?”
He stepped down from the raised platform the throne sat on, making his way toward her. “This is not my palace. It is my brother’s palace. That is my brother’s throne. I wear my brother’s crown. Metaphorically, of course.” Olivia found it impossible to breathe with Tarek advancing on her as he was. He was nothing like the men she was accustomed to. Nothing like her gentle, sophisticated father. Nothing like her cultured, amusing husband. Or indeed her quiet and stea
dy brother-in-law. If she was focusing on space metaphors, Tarek was a black hole. Sucking the air, the sound, the energy from the room around him, internalizing it. Creating a void that he alone commanded. “None of this is mine. I was not meant for this. If you intend to make me your project, then you should be aware of that fact.”
“What is the solution, then? Because you seem to be here, whether or not you feel destined for it,” she said, not certain where the strength to speak came from. Apparently, though he had sucked the air from her lungs, he had not stolen her ability to speak.
“I suppose you are the solution. My brother’s advisers despair of me. Fair enough, as I despair of them. I feel they are weak-minded sycophants, trained to be so by a ruler who required mindless servitude. I do not. Nor do I want it.”
“Come now, most rulers enjoy a bit of bowing and scraping.”
Black eyes clashed with hers. “Only a man craves praise. A weapon wants nothing more than to be used. And that, my queen, is all that I am.”
She swallowed hard, trying to appear self-possessed. Trying to feel self-possessed. “Then, I will train you to fight. The way a king must fight.”
He began to pace, making a circle around her. A shiver ran through her, chilling her down to her bones. “I worry. I worry about the things I have left behind, untended.”
“Then, use what you have seen. I’m sure you know more about many things than your brother ever did.” She had no idea if that was true; she was simply trying to prove her worth. “Use that. And let me assist you with the rest. Interacting with diplomats is simply politics as usual. My husband excelled at that. As do I.”
“Well, then, I expect for you to prove that within the allotted time. Follow me.” He strode past her, his movements decisive, abrupt.
She snapped to attention, doing her best to keep pace with him. It was nearly impossible. The top of her head came to his shoulder, and that was with the aid of her high heels. She had to take three strides to his every one, sounding like a panicked baby deer as she clicked along the marble. “Where exactly are you taking me? Because you just said you didn’t know where you were going.”
“Give me a skin of water, place me in the middle of the desert and I could find my way back. And yet, I find this palace difficult to navigate. It is too dark. I depend on the sun for my direction.”
“Interesting,” she said, “except, are you leading me to my room or the middle of the desert? Inquiring minds want to know.”
Just then a servant girl turned the corner and began walking toward them down the long corridor, her eyes averted. “You there,” Tarek said, his tone commanding. “Are there guest quarters in which I might install the queen?”
The girl stopped, her eyes widening. “Sheikh Tarek, we did not know to expect a guest.”
“Yes, because I did not tell you we were expecting one. Though I assumed my impotent advisors might have done. It is extremely difficult to accomplish simple tasks here. In the desert each man asks for himself. We have none of this foolish bureaucracy.”
The girl looked at him, her expression blank.
“I’m fine with whatever is available,” Olivia said, attempting to inject some diplomacy into the exchange. “I’m certain it will be fine. So I will need my bags brought from the car.”
The girl nodded. “I can do that. The room nearest the sheikh’s quarters has a made-up bed. It will be the simplest room to prepare.”
Tarek went very still, and Olivia had the feeling he didn’t want her staying near him. “That will be fine,” Olivia said before he could protest. Her aim was to be in proximity with him after all.
“See that it is done,” Tarek said.
The girl nodded and scurried off.
“I imagine you know how to find the room,” Olivia said.
He nodded once. “Indeed. Follow me.”
They wandered down a maze of domed corridors, with silver walls inlaid with stone reflecting off the polished floor. The palace at Alansund housed the crown jewels of the royal family. This palace seemed to be made of them. It was ostentatious, a show of riches that awed even her.
“This is beautiful.”
He stopped, turning to face her. “Is it? I find it oppressive.”
He turned away again, continuing to lead them in their journey. He was such a strange man. Impenetrable as rock, and yet, at the same time, honest in his speech. Still, for all that honesty, she found she could not understand him.
“I suppose when you are used to open spaces, it might be difficult to become used to living behind stone walls.”
“I’m used to stone walls. I’ve spent much of my time inhabiting caves, and an abandoned village out in the middle of the desert. But I have no good memories here.” He let his words die there, and she sensed there would be no reviving them now, no matter how persistent she was.
She didn’t need him to go on. She didn’t need to know his story, didn’t need to understand him.
She simply needed him to marry her.
A wave of fear, of uncertainty, washed over her. She wondered what she was doing here. Why she was agreeing to marry this stranger.
For Alansund. Because you were asked to. Because you are a queen who has no throne, no power. Because you have no husband. Because you have nowhere else, and nothing else.
Her internal voice had ample reason, and she found it difficult to argue. But fear was not looking for rationality. Fear was simply looking for a foothold, and it had found one.
Not so difficult to do in this situation.
Still, she followed on. He paused at one of the ornate doors that led to what she assumed would be her quarters for the duration of her stay. He pushed the door open without saying anything.
“You’re a scintillating conversationalist, has anyone ever told you that?” she asked.
“No,” he said, the sarcasm skating right over his head.
“I’m not that surprised.”
“Conversation was never required of me.”
In that statement, she felt all of the helplessness he would never otherwise express. And somehow, in that moment, with those words, she felt a connection with him. They were both in a situation they were ill equipped to handle. Olivia, having lost her status, having lost the man that was so much a part of her identity. And Tarek, pulled from the desert to become something he had never been trained to be.
“We will find a way,” she said. She wasn’t sure who the assurance was really meant for. Him, or her.
“And if we do not, you can return home.”
“It isn’t my home,” she said, speaking the words that terrified her more than any others. “I don’t have one. Not now.”
“I see. I have one. I simply cannot return to it.”
“Perhaps we will make one here?”
She tried to imagine finding a bond with this man, tried to imagine being his wife, and she found it impossible. Though not more impossible than returning to Alansund. Watching her brother-in-law sit on the throne, where Marcus had been before. Watching his fiancée take her place.
That was perhaps an even bigger impossibility.
“If not that, perhaps we can simply prevent the palace from falling into ruin? And the entire country with it?”
“That’s a lot of faith you’re placing in a stranger,” she said.
“I would more readily put my faith in you than anyone who worked under my brother.”
“Was he so bad?”
“Yes,” Tarek said, offering no further explanation. And she could tell, by the finality in that one-word answer, that he would not.
“Then, perhaps you don’t have as far to go as you might think. You may look good simply by comparison.”
“Perhaps.”
Olivia didn’t say anything; rather, she continued to stand n
ext to him, feeling intensely uncomfortable. Socially at sea. That almost never happened to her.
“I thought you wanted to be shown to your room,” he said.
“I do,” she said, walking past him and into the vast space. Different than her quarters in Alansund, but no less grand. It glittered like the rest of the castle, full of gold and jewels, the bed wrought from precious metal, twisted together like gilt tree branches. “I suppose I just feel a bit—” She turned as she spoke the sentence, and saw that she was talking to nothing.
Tarek had excused himself without a word. Obviously finished with her for the moment.
She was alone. Something that had become far too common in recent months.
How she hated the emptiness.
She crossed the room, taking a seat on the edge of the bed, trying to squash the feeling of terror, of sadness climbing up inside her, mixing together to create a potent cocktail that made her head swim, made it difficult to breathe.
“You can’t break now,” she said. “You must never break.”
* * *
He wasn’t sure if it was a memory or a dream. Both.
Right now, though, it was agony, reality. As it had been ever since he had come back to the palace. Ghosts of the past long banished rising back up to haunt him.
He had spent a great many years out in the middle of the desert with nothing but a sword to act as protection. There, he had known no fear. Because the worst that had awaited him was death. Not so here in the palace. Here, there was torture.
He sat up, his breath burning like fire, sweat rolling down his face, his chest. He was disoriented, unsure of his positioning in the room. Certain, in that moment, that he wasn’t alone.
He was on the floor, a blanket tangled around his naked body. He stood, disengaging himself from the fabric, searching the dark space around him, his every sense on high alert. He felt as if he was dying. His brain lost in a cloud of fog that made it impossible to sort through what raged inside him, and what he had to fear outside.
