Page 39 of A Monsoon Rising

Alaric stared down at her, disconcerted. He could hardly bellyache about the tailornow. His mind raced until it stumbled on a viable excuse. “I was wondering if Sevraim and I might put the courtyard to use. With your permission.”

“Sparring? You don’t need my permission for that,” Talasyn said. “This is your residence as much as it is mine.”

“Still. I thought I should ask.” He cleared his throat. “Thank you.”

She looked thoroughly mystified, but changed the subject. “Before you go—Daya Vaikar sent word that she and her Enchanters still haven’t finished the new amplifier modifications. So you and I will have to make do by ourselves during tonight’s eclipse.”

“Very well,” said Alaric. “I will give Nenavar no cause to accuse Kesath of reneging on the treaty, despite their recent incompetence.”

“Your generosity is boundless and noted,” Talasyn sniped.

Alaric spun on his heel and left. He found Sevraim in the kitchens and all but dragged him to the courtyard.

“But, Your Majesty, why?” the legionnaire whined. “I was helping shell these lovely little pili nuts and the cooks promised I could sneak a bite here and there. It is alsomuchtoo warm to spar. Where is this coming—”

“Shut up, Sevraim.”

The four nobles had ostensibly come to pay their respects, but Talasyn had lived in the Dominion long enough to know better. News of the Night Emperor finally taking up residence at Iantas had spread, and this courtesy visit was a thinly veiled excuse to gossip. Talasyn’s guests wasted no time in getting back to it once she returned to the pavilion after Alaric’s departure.

“Is black all the rage on the Continent, Your Grace?” inquired Bairung Matono, whose bronze skin was covered in the runic bottle-green tattoos that were the tradition of her island. “Emperor Alaric’s wardrobe is rather … dull.”

“Beyond Nenavarene waters, not all civilizations prioritize aesthetic as we do, Lady Bairung,” Talasyn replied carefully.

“Fashion sense or lack thereof aside,” said Harjanti of Sabtang, her plump frame draped in rich orange stitchwork fabrics with diamond-and-chevron patterns set in metallic silver thread, “His Majesty is not all that bad-looking, for an outsider.”

Jie shrieked with laughter, playfully shoving her cousin, who shoved her back in a moment of girlish camaraderie that completely belied their fine clothes and lofty status.

“You and your consortmustvisit the Silklands, Lachis’ka,” Oryal enthused. She was the only child of Ito Wempuq, the rajanwho had given Alaric such a hard time during the engagement banquet. “The fire trees are currently showing their monsoon colors. It would be my honor to host you.”

Although she had her father’s rich umber hair, chopped to chin length in blunt waves, Oryal was as thin as Wempuq was portly, as soft-spoken as he was boisterous, and apparently as welcoming to the Night Empire as he was not. Talasyn flashed her a tentative smile. “That would be lovely, if time permits.”

“Honestly, Oryal.” Niamha Langsoune rolled her eyes. “Did it ever occur to you that Her Grace and His Majesty might want some time to themselves? Theydidjust get married.” She was being a good ally as always, slyly offering Talasyn an opportunity to wriggle out of any possible commitments, but the implication made Talasyn want to throw herself off a cliff.

Oryal huffed. “It was merely a suggestion, Daya Langsoune. Too much time alone together can be positively disastrous for a husband and wife. We can’tallbe Harjanti and Praset.”

The other noblewomen tittered while Harjanti gasped in mock outrage. The blatant affection that the daya of Sabtang and her spouse showed for each other was a source of amusement among the Dominion court, whose marriages were usually strategic alliances rather than the natural outcome of anything so passé as feelings. Talasyn, however, couldn’t help but remember how happy and in tune Harjanti and Praset were at her engagement banquet, how they’d worked together to help smooth over an awkward situation.

“It is not too difficult a task, making a man fall in love. Husbands included,” Bairung said airily. “Daya Langsoune, show the Lachis’ka your favorite technique.”

Jie, Oryal, and Harjantishrieked. Niamha shook a dainty fist at Bairung, but quickly straightened up in her seat and cleared her throat with aplomb. The merriment reached a fever pitch. Talasyn’s head was starting to hurt.

“It’s quite simple, really, Your Grace,” said Niamha. “First, a vague smile, like you have a secret, then you peer up at him through your lashes instead of directly meeting his gaze”—she demonstrated—“and you blink slowly, a bit exaggeratedly, and he melts at your feet with a flutter of your lashes—”

The others were doubled over, clutching one another in mirth. Talasyn, on the other hand, was at her wit’s end. “Pardon me, my lady, why are you teaching me how to?irt?” she burst out.

“Because men are so much more malleable when they follow their blood,” Niamha smoothly replied. “You don’t have to go around setting anyone afire with lust, but it’s amazing what a sprinkling of pretty manners can achieve.” She smirked. “Who knows, you might convince His Majesty to stop wearing black.”

Her last remark was said as a joke, and the other noblewomen treated it as such, but she held Talasyn’s gaze long enough to make it clear that this was nothing less than a lesson. They needed Alaric Ossinast to be as malleable as they could make him. In light of what was to come.

But Talasyn wasn’t about to go off seducing the Night Emperor anytime soon. “And what haveyoumanaged to convince Lord Surakwel of, Daya Langsoune?” she shot back, turning the tables on the other woman.

At the mention of Surakwel Mantes, Niamha paled while everyone else quite positively perished from laughter.

Oryal was the first to resurrect, wiping tears from her eyes. “Ah, Surakwel. The only man immune to Niamha’s powers.”

Talasyn wasn’t so sure about that. Surakwel had named his yacht after Niamha. And the look on his face when Talasyn asked him about it as they sailed to the Storm God’s Eye had spoken volumes.

Back when Talasyn had been fighting to survive Hornbill’s Head and then fighting to survive a war, there was precious little time to think about romance. But now that life was softer,easier, she was noticing much more often what she had never had. She’d never been the cause of an expression like Surakwel’s, and no one had ever looked at her the way Praset looked at Harjanti. Wistfulness rippled across the surface of her heart.

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