Page 4 of Obsidian Throne

But I knew it was all a cover for what they were really looking for.

Me.

Iiro might not yet have the power to stop this wedding outright, but I knew-–and Evander had known–-that it would be easy to find an underhanded way to…dispose of me before I could make it to our wedding.

My breath hitched when one of the guards started to go down the line, looking at the faces and hair of each member of our party.

My heartbeat pounded in my ears. I had wrangled my hair back into a knot tight enough to make my head hurt, twisting my curls in a bun at the base of my neck.

Anything to separate myself from the wild locks I was associated with before.

The guard glared at me. For a chilling moment, I wondered if I had seen his face before. Had he been one of the men that traveled with us to the Summit? Was he at Elk Estate when I was a prisoner there?

I was suddenly painfully aware of the dagger on my thigh, as well as all of the hidden weapons on the men and women around me.

“What is your name?” the man asked, his accent as thick as Theo’s.

“Juliette, mi’laird,” I said in the brogue of the villagers, and it wasn’t a lie. Juliette was one of my names…

The soldier’s eyes narrowed as he glanced between me and a woman standing three spots away, the one whose hair was an even brighter shade of red than mine.

My palms were wet and hot, in spite of the freezing temperatures, and I resisted the urge to wipe them on my dress.

The man took a step closer to me before Cray stepped out of line, speaking up so his voice carried through the mountains.

“Do we have tae stand ‘ere fer much longer? I’m freezin’ me bollocks off.”

The Socairan’s attention snapped to him, and my uncle nodded toward the carriages. “Surely I dinna need tae reminded ye again of whose orders brought us here.”

“Aye,” Callum spoke up. “Not to mention, we would much prefer to return to Lochlann before the pass closes.”

The Socairan soldier huffed, calling out to his Captain in their language.

I didn’t understand the dialect, but I did catch some of the words. I tried not to let the relief that washed over me show on my features when the Captain told him to let us pass. Or at least, I hoped that’s what he said.

When the soldier turned back around to face me, the woman he had been comparing me to ran her hands through her curls to fluff them a little more. A few strands clung to her fingers, and she waved them toward the man.

He practically leapt away before they could touch him.

Thank you for your ridiculous superstitions,I thought as the man made the same sign to ward off evil that I had grown so familiar with, continuing to put distance between them.

Sai bit out a hearty laugh, and soon a few of the others followed suit.

“Are you truly afraid of the cherry-haired women?” he asked. “No doubt, their tempers be terrifying, but other than that, they are fairly harmless.”

“But what about that lass from Loch Briste?” Cray asked, and Sai’s brows rose to new heights.

“She was an exception, when she be finding me necking with the barmaiden…” Sai trailed off, pulling the collar of his shirt down to show a smattering of white scars against his deep brown skin. “Well, we will just say I did not know you could be maiming a man with only a spoon.”

A peal of laughter rang out from our line, and even a few of the Socairans found themselves reluctantly amused.

Here was to hoping that their antics would be enough to distract the soldiers from looking at us too closely. The soldier merely shook his head and started to wave us away when another one came to stand next to him, speaking in low, clipped tones.

My heart thundered in my chest as I met his eye. Images of the new man in a blue-and-tan uniform came to mind, followed closely by the memory of his bruising grip around my arms as he dragged me up the stairs of the Elk dungeons.

The other soldier had looked vaguely familiar, but this one undoubtedly knew me.

His brown eyes met mine and I looked away, hoping to appear meek rather than cowardly. Both of which I wasn’t, but if I had kept eye contact, he would have undoubtedly recognized the defiance in my gaze, not to mention their telltale light-green hue.

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