Page 81 of Warrior's Reign
Lohail laughed. “I have no doubt you serve. And I have no doubt you love her just as you would your own sister. But above all others? Come, Vykhan. These attempts at obfuscation are beneath you.Sheis not the female whose safety concerns you above all others.”
Vykhan’s attention sharpened to the fineness of a blade’s edge.
“This is not a competition for my. . .attention, Lohail. I have made no move against you. Yet.” Which made him a traitor in ways he didn’t care to reflect on. “But if you touch Reign, I will come for you. And not in the way you wish.”
“Finally, a real threat.” White teeth flashed as Lohail’s voice deepened into a purr. “I was beginning to think you didn’t care for me any longer.Iwon’t harm Reign, Vykhan.”
“Tell me everything you know.”
Lohail’s mouth tightened. “You know I cannot.”
Until then, he hadn’t. Vykhan considered the male, one finger tapping on his desk. Lohail enjoyed his games, but he had not usually played them with Vykhan. Well, not political games. For him to do so now. . .
“You’re under an inviolable oath.” He was Aeddannar, despite his human-Yadeshi mother’s blood. An inviolable oath would bind him.
Lohail said nothing. But the dust of crumbs the Anthhori lord kept tossing at him made sense. If he knew something, but could not speak, then he would be forced to subterfuge.
Still. Lohail might not desire Reign and Ibukay’s deaths, but if he was contracted to bring them about, there was little he could do to aid Vykhan other than these cryptic warnings and games.
“It’s an odd thing,” Lohail said, spinning idly in his chair, “how these human females have become the key to so much. And yet by elevating them, we have placed their lives in danger.”
“They chose their paths.”
“They’re children, most of them.” Lohail stopped the spinning and leaned back in his chair, hair waving over his shoulders as he stared up at his ceiling. What he saw, Vykhan only suspected. “But if you set them loose, let them be free to be themselves, they lead us to our own salvation.”
Vykhan pursed his lips. It was a clumsy message, but clear enough. Reign was in danger, and Reign was the key. Use Reign to flush out the traitor.
“I forgot what a philosopher you are.”
Lohail glanced at him. The question in his gaze pained Vykhan. He could offer his old friend forgiveness, but not an answer to that question. Not the answer Lohail wanted, in any case.
“You’re right, Lohail. Reign is important to me.” The words cost him. It cost him to speak them aloud, and to this person who knew him better than even his own mother and father.
Lohail looked down, lashes veiling his jewel bright eyes. “If you value her, keep her close. I find myself intrigued.”
The comm link went dead and Vykhan nearly snarled. Damn Lohail and his jealousy. If he touched a single hair on Reign’s head in this game of his, he would need to pray to Haeemah for mercy. Vykhan would show him none.
He took a moment to rebuild his splintering emotional shields, then strode out of his office, swiping at his wrist unit. “Obe’shan. Report.”
* * *
Reign entered his office, brown eyes trained on him in that focused, wary stare that always daggered into his gut. She stopped in front of his desk, hands clasped behind her back.
Vykhan did not tell her to be at ease. The silence stretched on until he finally spoke. “What are you hiding, Reign?”
“Sir?” She wielded that word, the distance it implied, perfectly.
“Do you have undisclosed assets in the city, Reign?”
Her gaze slanted towards the vase of flowers on his desk. So, yes. When she didn’t answer, he stepped around the barrier. She shifted, mirroring his movements. Vykhan engaged in a brief, vicious debate with himself, but halted an arm’s length away rather than seizing her upper arms and dragging her against him. That he even felt such an impulse. . .damn Lohail.
“If I did?” she asked.
She was trusting him by even this subtle admission. He could order her to disclose her sources and cease whatever side operation she must be concurrently conducting on Ibukay’s behalf—or he could trust the female he’d chosen as his wife, that fate had chosen as more than wife.
Not betraying the effort it took, he lowered his head. “Take care. If an enemy desires to harm Ibukay, you are the most direct route.”
Her gaze narrowed, her posture relaxing when he didn’t demand she betray her assets. How could he, when he could not betray his own?
