Page 32 of Lady Dragon
He was more than capable of protecting himself, she found, when she began to slide herself over the sill, and he, standing silently alongside with his back pressed to the wall, seized her by the collar, dragged her inside, and slammed her shoulders down onto a desk while holding a dagger against her neck.
For a moment, they both stared at one another in silence, breathing, taking each other’s measure. His red hair was beginning to thin, but his dark eyes were sharp and his body hard. He wasn’t holding back now, as he had in the tourney, and his blade was as sharp as it had been then. An inkpot rolled off the edge of the desk and shattered on marble, no doubt staining the blue stone black.
Kirek grinned without taking her eyes from his. “I appear to have made a mess.”
The knife pressed closer to her throat.Oh, she hoped he would try to kill her. Then she could killhim.
“A dragon attacked the princess,” Branon murmured. “But you defended her, and now you’re here, ostensibly to kill me, and yet…” He abruptly straightened and withdrew the dagger.
Skies curse him.The man might be smart.
“And yet?” Kirek asked coldly, straightening herself and tugging her leathers back into place. She didn’t offer him anything, refusing to hand him everything on a platter. If he was truly smart, he could figure it out himself.
“And yet you never betrayed that my blade was sharp for our match, and adragontried to kill the princess, whatever your response. So I’m left with questions.” He re-sheathed his dagger, but he didn’t turn his back on her.
“You think I had something to do with the ambush?” Kirek’s tone was dangerous. Any suggestion she might have wanted to harm the princess still made her blood boil—despite any intentions she had now.
“Or someone you know, perhaps, and you were covering their tracks. Someone who might not mind the princess’s death. Who might not mindmeon the throne. But it couldn’t appear so obvious.”
Interesting.He thought her so devious as to be in on a plan that required killing one of her own, just to mask the dragons’ involvement.
And then Kirek realized: Her motherwasso devious. Maybe she intended for Kirek to fight the other dragon to the death all along, unbeknownst to either combatant, in order to make the show of Kirek’s protection all the more convincing. If the princess died in the process, so much the better; the wheels of their plot were in motion, succeeding where Branon had failed, andKirek would appear innocent. If the princess didn’t die, it would still open the door for Branon to trust the dragons’ word.
And now Kirek’s killing the princess would ensure his trust, and the human queen would still be none the wiser, if all went to plan.
“Doyoumind the princess’s death?” Branon asked, his gaze shrewd.
“You’ll see.” Kirek spoke through gritted teeth, but for once, Branon wasn’t the one she wanted to bite. “You’ll know the moment.Yourmoment to rise. And none of us will stop you.”
He scoffed. “That is no guarantee of anything. How do I know I can trust that you’re not setting me up to fail?”
“Do you wish me to hold your hand through it all, as if you were a child?” She heaped her words with enough scorn to sink a dragon in flight.
His jaw clenched, color flushing his cheeks. It wasn’t nearly as charming on him as it was on Samansa.
Kirek sneered at him. “Never fear. You will have your guarantee. And it will be written in blood.”
She didn’t saywhoseblood, but he could guess. She didn’t want to make this too easy for him, after all. She wanted him to sweat.
She would prefer to makehimbleed.
But it would be Samansa who would bleed, instead. The thought felt like a dagger in Kirek’s own chest, right where she kept the princess’s floral silk kerchief folded and tucked under her armor, over her heart. And yet there was no other path. Her mother had made that painfully clear for her.
As she stared at Branon, watching him mull over her words, she realized she utterly despised him. He’d tried to kill his sister,who had done nothing to harm anyone. Who was only ever kind and filled with laughter. But that was ahumanthought. Dragons believed that the weak got what they deserved.
In him, Kirek saw herself. And she hated herself for it as well. She had let a soft, precious creature put trust in her that Kirek didn’t deserve.
Precious?Yes, Samansa was precious to her, like a sweet-smelling blossom carried on a warm spring wind. Rare. Lovely. Fleeting.
And now Kirek was going to betray her.
No one would suspect you now, not even if you did it in your own quarters.
With that thought, she knew just how she was going to do it.
Softly. As sweetly as possible. But as sure as autumn’s frost, Kirek would end her.
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