by James Tate
All three of them scowled at me in confusion as I folded my arms under my breasts and lifted my chin defensively.
“What do you mean Sagen did something?” Zan demanded, matching my glare with equal intensity. “What the fuck does she have to do with this?” He tapped the mark on his chest, drawing my attention back to his mostly naked body, and I swallowed.
“I don’t know,” I snapped back, getting angry at myself for constantly being distracted by their bodies. What was wrong with me? “But your heart stopped beating, and I’d been screaming for ages and you weren’t responding. You just kept bleeding from your eyes and nose, and no one was coming to help. Then all of a sudden I was free and she was here like you were expecting her or something...” I trailed off with a frown, remembering how Sagen had let herself into Zan’s room like she belonged there. “Were you expecting her? She must have had a key... unless you left the door unlocked. But why would you do that?”
Zan’s mouth tightened, and his gaze shifted suspiciously.
“Zan?” Lee prompted, standing up and folding his arms in a mirror of my own defensive pose. “Why was Sage letting herself into your room before dawn?”
“Sage?” I blurted in a shocked squeak. “Since when were you all on pet name terms with that psychopath?”
Zan flicked a pissed-off look at his brother and let out an irritated sigh. “That’s irrelevant right now. She doesn’t have magic, so there’s no way she could have brought me back, if I really did die. So either this is some result of the broken oath”—he tapped the mark on his chest again—“or you did something, Luna.”
“Me?” I spluttered. “I didn’t...” But I couldn’t finish that sentence. Because I had done something, hadn’t I? Otherwise, how had I escaped my restraints? And fuck Zan for tying me up in the first damn place.
“Okay, this is getting us nowhere,” Lee interjected before Zan and I could argue back and forth any more. “Our time is limited. The second trial begins today, and Calla will be expected to show up with the other girls in less than an hour.” He’d just consulted the clock over the fireplace, and I was shocked to see it was almost dawn.
Ty flopped down in one of the chairs and extended his legs out in front of him. “Shit, I forgot we’re supposed to leave today.”
“How could you forget?” Zan glowered, leaning against the fireplace mantle and making zero effort to put clothes on. The towel around his hips looked dangerously close to falling, too...
“Did you, uh, want to get dressed or something?” I suggested. The words left my mouth before my mental filter could reel them back in.
Zan grinned a shark-like grin at me. “Why? Is this too distracting for you, lovely Luna?”
“Fucking Zryn’s dick, you’re as bad as Ty,” I muttered, rubbing at my forehead to fight off the building headache. “Okay, fuck. Where do we even start? Other than the fact that you’re all dirty liars?”
Zan snorted a laugh. “Oh, we are, are we?” He narrowed his eyes at me. “Lady Callaluna.”
I froze.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I responded in a shaking voice.
Pull it together, Rybet. You’re a better liar than this.
Something about being called out on my false identity had made me revert to my real name inside my own head, but it felt right. Comfortable.
“He means we’ve been to Riverdell, Lo,” Ty informed me. “And it’s pretty obvious that you haven’t.”
Shit.
Lee reached up and snagged my hand from where it had balled in the fabric of my robe, then tugged me back down into his lap again and locked his arms around me like he was scared I was about to run.
Maybe I was.
“We’re not going to tell anyone,” he assured me. “But perhaps you might understand our own deception, seeing as none of us are quite what we say we are.”
It took a couple of tries before I could make words form, and none of the royal fuckers cut me any slack. “That would be treason,” I finally said, my voice quiet and cautious. Yes, they said they weren’t going to run screaming to the guards, but fear still coursed through me like poison.
Zan’s glare darkened like a heavy storm cloud rolling in. “Seriously, Luna? I almost died to share our dirty little secret with you, yet you’re sitting there practically trembling with tension. You’re all of three seconds away from making a run for it, aren’t you?” I didn’t deny it. “What more do we need to do to earn your trust? To prove we’re not all the things you’ve accused us of being in this past week?”
Guilt formed a lump in my throat, and I needed to swallow several times. He was right. I was a huge hypocrite. But that didn’t stop me from thinking about the quickest way out of the palace in case I needed to run.
“Lo, hey.” Ty snapped his fingers to break the staredown Zan and I were engaged in. “We’re not asking you to tell us anything. We just need you to listen. Can you do that?”
I wasn’t totally convinced this day wouldn’t end up with me in the dungeons, but Zan had a pretty good point. Biting my lip, I gave Ty a short nod, and Lee’s grip on my waist relaxed the slightest bit.
Ty nodded back to me, leaning forward with his arms on his knees. “Okay. Good start.”
“Calla,” Lee said, brushing a damp strand of hair over my shoulder, then he paused. “Can I still call you that? It sort of suits you.”
I couldn’t fight the smile that his words brought to my lips, so I shrugged. “I’m not giving you any other name to call me, so you don’t have much choice.”
“Fair enough.” He smiled back at me, then turned serious. “What we’re about to tell you... it’ll change things. You’ll be as deep in this shit as we are, and that means you’ll be in danger.”
I snorted a laugh. “More danger than drinking poison at dinner? Or how about falling through a trapdoor into a bottomless pit during that last trial? Or getting killed by a stupid, magically binding oath that I never should have taken in the first damn place?”
There was a pause as my bitter words sat between us, and Ty nodded. “You have a point.”
“Okay, so here it is,” Lee said, sucking a deep breath. “Our father is plotting to kill us so that he doesn’t have to give up the throne, and we’re pretty sure he was responsible for Queen Ophelia’s murder.”
A tense silence fell between the four of us.
“And... how do you feel about that?” I asked. If there was one thing I’d learned growing up in the Pond, it was to never make assumptions. Just because I found the king’s scheming deplorable didn’t necessarily mean his sons did.
Zan looked at me like I was clinically insane. “Seriously? We just said our father is trying to kill us. How do you think we feel about that?”
“What he means,” Lee interjected before I could snap back at Zan, “is that we are obviously going to stop him. He’s let power corrupt him, and the rapid decline in magic is proof of how badly he’s pissed nature off.”
Another tense silence fell, and I pursed my lips. Carefully, I scrutinized each of them, debating whether they could be trusted. Finally, my gaze fell on Zan. Zan, who’d just risked permanent death to reveal their secret to me.
Gusting out my breath, I shook my head. “You’re wrong.”
Ty made a grunt of surprise, his brow furrowing at me. Zan just threw his hands up and scoffed a bitter laugh.
“Calla—” Lee started, looking at me in shock, but I shook my head at him again.
“I mean, you’re wrong about him trying to kill you,” I tried to clarify, but Zan was in a particular mood. I supposed a brain anyurism would do that to a person.
He glared at me and tucked his towel a little tighter. Damn.
“Oh, you would know better than us, would you?”
My returning glare heated, and I decided he was definitely playing the Prince Alexander part now. “Actually, Highness, I would. They’re not planning on killing you; they’re planning on poisoning you until you—and your new queen—are nothin
g but human puppets. That way they can keep pulling strings but the people will think one of their beloved princes has ascended to the throne. Come to think of it, he’s probably found some way to use your magic too. Which one of you has the most?” Lee and Ty shot a look at Zan, and that fairly much answered my question. “Guess you know who his target will be, then.”
“Wait, how do you know this, Lo?” Ty asked me with a frown. “And who is ‘they’?”
“I overheard the king and Taipanus talking outside the sanctuary the night they poisoned me. At first I thought I’d imagined it, but you guys sort of confirmed it by thinking they were out to kill you.”
“Huh,” Lee muttered. “Taipanus. Makes sense.”
Zan nodded. “I always hated that slippery bastard. It makes sense that he’s in on this.”
“So... what do we do?” I asked them, wrapping my arms around myself as the gravity of everything suddenly weighed down on me. How the fuck had I ended up here? A week ago, my worst concern had been meeting my quota for Master Bloodeye, and now here I was discussing with the royal princes of Tiech how to take down the king.
“We?” Lee repeated, tightening his grip around my waist and tucking his face into the crook of my neck.
“Well yeah, pretty sure I’m neck deep in this shit storm now. Besides, surely even Prince Alexander would make a better ruler than your father.” I rolled my eyes and gave Zan a rueful grin to show I was teasing. Sort of.
Ty huffed and pushed to his feet, stretching his muscular arms over his head and drawing my lusty attention to his fighter’s frame. “Well, that’s not up to him. The winner of the Royal Trials will get to pick her consort, remember?”
“Hasn’t she already?” Zan taunted his brother, and Lee’s fingers tensed, biting into my flesh with a bruising grip.
Ty growled an angry sort of sound and glared at his older brother, who just smirked back at him. For my part, I cleared my throat and shifted off Lee’s lap to grab my dress. Suddenly I was starting to feel a bit like a chunk of meat between hungry wolves... but was Zan implying that I would be the winner of the Trials?
“I should probably get back to my room,” I murmured, ducking into the bathroom to quickly exchange the robe for my beautiful, blue ball gown. If anyone saw me heading back to my room, it would be pretty obvious I had spent the night in the royal wing, but it was surely better than doing a walk of shame in Zan’s robe.
I could only do the laces at the back of my dress loosely by myself, but it was good enough to keep me decent. Returning to the main room, I found the three brothers in the middle of a tense, whispered argument. It cut off abruptly when I rejoined them, so it wasn’t hard to guess who they were talking about. Fuckers.
“Any hints on what’s to come today?” I asked them with a brow raised. Better to change the subject, if I could.
Lee nodded, his gaze sweeping over my gown quickly before returning to my face. “I’ll give you a quick summary on the way back to your room. Now that we know what our father is up to, I suddenly don’t feel safe leaving you alone.”
“I need to get dressed,” Zan muttered, brushing past his brothers and stalking straight toward where I stood in the doorway to his bathroom. When he reached me, his hand snaked up and clasped the back of my head, pulling me close and crushing my lips to his in a wild, passionate kiss that left me shaking and panting.
“Let’s not forget who you chose last night, lovely Luna,” he murmured in my ear, his voice hot with desire and only loud enough for me to hear. “I promised I would ruin you, and I intend to keep that promise.”
Fucking. Gods.
Zan shifted past me into the bathroom, leaving me to burn under the intensity of his brothers’ glares. The determined set to each of their jaws told me one thing beyond the shadow of a doubt.
I was totally screwed.
4
Just as Lady Hazel had told me, the second trial was a quest.
After returning to my rooms, I barely had enough time to shower and dress before Jules was rushing around and packing clothes into travel bags for me. Her reappearance in my rooms had been less than welcome, but I had no time to argue with her. Her betrayal, and Bloodeye’s misguided view that he could use me, would have to wait for another day.
Yesterday I’d had one primary goal—keep myself alive.
Now, suddenly the idea of saving the very princes I’d viewed with such scorn for my whole life consumed me. One thing was for damn sure—we would be having words about their shitty treatment of their people.
If I was being honest with myself, though, it was becoming more and more evident that they’d really had no say in things. Until now. They had an opportunity now, while the kingdom’s eyes were on the Trials. They could do some good and make a difference.
I’d make sure of it. Even if it killed me...
“Where do you think we’re going?” Jules chattered as she buckled my travel bags closed. “They didn’t give us any indication of what to pack, so I included a little of everything. Just in case, you know? Like, what if we’re visiting a foreign court? Oh, maybe Asintisch? Or Isenmeden?”
To my frustration, we were all permitted to bring one maidservant on our quest, so it looked like I was stuck with my snake-in-the-grass ex–best friend for the next full week.
“Jules,” I snapped, spinning to glare at her. “Shut. The. Fuck. Up. We are not okay, so stop pretending we are.”
She sucked in a sharp gasp, her eyes filling with water. “Ry, I’m sor—”
“Don’t,” I hissed at her. “Don’t you dare apologize to me. You weren’t thinking about me or our friendship when you took Bloodeye’s money or when you spied on me for him. So don’t pretend to feel bad now, just because I found out. Own your choices, Jules, because there’s no changing them now.”
She swallowed visibly, and one fat crocodile tear rolled down her cheek, but she was smart enough to keep her mouth shut. I’d seen enough of her acting skill to know those tears weren’t true remorse, so they had no effect on my anger toward her.
Turning my back on her once more, I continued weaving my long hair into a tight braid, then tied it off with a simple black ribbon. What little Lee had known of this trial told me that my smartest choice of clothes was not an elegant gown. Instead, I’d dressed in soft, black leather pants, a loose-sleeved, cream blouse, and a flexible black corset over the top.
I’d spent so many years dressing as a boy that the pants and shirt felt familiar, but the loosely laced corset highlighted the fact that I was unmistakably female. I sort of loved it.
“I guess I will take these bags to the stables then,” Jules murmured in a more subdued voice. I gave her a sharp nod, then ignored her as I sat on a chair to pull on my thigh-high riding boots. Lee had known we would be riding, so I’d dressed appropriately.
Thank Aana I’d learned to ride as a kid. It wasn’t a skill many of us Pond-dwellers possessed, but Bloodeye had seen it as useful in case speedy getaways were needed. Not that I had ever needed to steal a horse, but it was reassuring to know I could stay in the saddle if the situation arose.
Once my boots were laced, I closed up my room and made my way down to the courtyard where we’d been told to gather.
I heard Sagen before I saw her. As she argued at the top of her lungs with one of the grooms holding her horse’s reins, her entitled bullshit practically suffocated the open space.
“I am a royal princess,” she was informing the poor man, as though he wasn’t already painfully aware of this fact. “You can’t possibly expect me to ride a horse for seven hours straight!”
She looked over at me as I entered the courtyard, but her haughty expression didn’t waver for even a second. It was the same bitchy, self-involved, scornful look she’d been giving me since we’d met, like this morning had never even happened.
Like she hadn’t found me naked and covered in Prince Alexander’s blood.
I made a mental note to dig deeper into why she’d been there in the first
place, then turned my back on her tantrum and made my way to where Jules waited beside a beautiful, silver-gray horse.
“I take it this is my horse then?” I asked her, a bit unnecessarily. It was the logical reason why my fake-maid was standing there. She gave me a short nod, her lips tight. Clearly she was still pissed off at my harsh words upstairs.
Too damn bad.
“The servants are all riding in a carriage with the luggage,” she told me, “except for a few whose mistresses brought horses for their servants when they arrived.”
Her phrasing made me pause. Of course all the other ladies had arrived with their own mounts; they were noble-born women. “Where did this horse come from?” I murmured low enough that only she could hear. Our cover story was that bandits had attacked us on the way to the palace before the first trial. It had explained why Lady Callaluna had no luggage, but was it believable that they’d taken my horses and we’d arrived on foot?
“No idea,” she replied with a shrug. “When I got to the stables, she was in a stall with your name on it.” I gave her a puzzled frown. “Lady Callaluna’s,” she corrected. “I assumed you’d sorted something out with one of those tutors you’ve been cozying up to.”
I bit my cheek. Those tutors. What would Jules do if she knew that I’d been making out with all three princes of Teich? Of course, she would immediately run to Bloodeye.
My heavy sigh had her looking at me with suspicion, and I realized I hadn’t responded. “Uh, nope. Maybe Madam Mallard sorted it out.”
Jules frowned and gave me a hard side eye, but had no chance to push any further as Lady Savannah arrived in a swirl of heavy skirts and clapped her delicate hands for attention. Her graying hair was swept up into an elaborate updo, and her dress looked like a throwback to less progressive times. Then again, since King Titus had taken the throne, it did seem like we’d taken a backslide in women’s rights and freedoms.
“Ladies,” the elegant woman announced. “Congratulations on making it through the first trial. As you can already see, this second trial will require you to leave the palace.”
