Page 103 of Prince of Night and Storm
All these imaginary voices in my head. I’m supposed to be working on this. My therapist is definitely overpaid.
The therapist,says one of the voices, biting off each word,should be executed.
“Nyawira,” Baba says in quiet Kikuyu, his voice grounding. I think this isn’t the first time he said my name.
Forehead creased, I slowly turn my head to look into his dark, calm eyes, blinking mine clear. “Baba.”
“Tell me something you see.”
“The wine bottle.”
He winces a little. “Tell me something you hear.”
“Renaud. He isn’t breathing.”
“Now,” he says, “tell me something you feel other than the pain.”
Hands. On me. “I want to go home, Baba.”
He is utterly still. “Soon, bébé. Do you think you should apologize to our Prince?”
“Yes, Baba.”
“Stand down,” Renaud says, the command glacial.
The command isn’t for me. He also doesn’t look away. Everything fades except for cruel blue and distant gray.
Why. Why me. Why this. What did I do.
A flicker of movement. I turn my head to meet pale blue eyes too icy to be steel, but too flinty to be soft. The veiled White Guard standing an arm’s length away, blade in hand. They aren’t the threat; I turn back to the Prince.
No one moves in the absolute silence, not even myinscrutable father who stares at the Prince. Renaud's guard is not nearly so copacetic, but merges back into the shadows.
I bite back a cry as the Prince yanks the knife out and puts it right back in its place.
At least I'll die defending my honor, and the dignity of Faronne.
Death?
Wild laughter in my mind. Wild, and dark, and chaotic. An ancient maelstrom.
Death? We cannotdie.
The wildness rises, snapping to be let out. To meet the leviathan in him.
Our blood formed a pool beneath our joined hands and a sinuous stream slithers off the side of the table. It’s mostly red; he’s already stopped bleeding. Only my wound still weeps.
Gaze still not leaving my face, the Prince lifts my wet palm and places a soft kiss over the wound, his pupils blown wide, gaze and steel grip holding me trapped as I feel the delicate, almost erotic probe of his tongue. I make a noise—the tongue dipping into my hole is painful, but to anyone else it would appear he’s offering gentle pardon.
Kissing the boo boo all better.
Pain, obscenity, his complete control over me and the situation tightens those silken strands that wrap me round and round until I’m nothing more than the bound doll dropped at his feet, to be spread for his pleasure.
I count to ten. Over and over. No one else understands what’s happening. No one will help. I stabbed the Prince of Everenne at a peace banquet after hours of his gracious solicitude and no one will understand it was desperate self-defense, or care. They don’t see the Dark web he weaves, and I am alone.
Continued defiance, in this moment, will donothingbut seal my deserved death in the Courts’ minds. The stupid rabid halfling.
I don’t curl my fingers and try to pull away. The Prince takes what he wants, and there’s nothing I can do to stop him. Yet.
