Page 20 of Storm of Desire
But the flicker of a rebellious flame smoldered in herheart.
She didn't know why she was so angry. For years she'd felt hollow and empty, but it was only now she realized the extent of it. Some sort of survival instinct must have dulled the edges of her pain. Her world had become a landscape of bleak shadows, one she navigated carefully, locking away her innermost hopes and dreams. And she hadn't even noticed. She'd played by the rules of her mother's court. She'd kept her head down, and tried to remain unnoticed by the more dangerous players at court. A slow, painful stifling, where Árdís became a marionette wielded by her mother'swhims.
One glimpse of Haakon, and everything changed. Suddenly the world seemed full of color and life again. Dreams exploded to life in her chest. She could taste his kiss still. Her lips fairly burned with the memory ofit.
And her heart ached withrage.
A shadow shifted out the corner of her eye as she reached the doors to the throneroom.
Adrekiin mortal form pushed away from the wall he'd been leaning against, his hair black, and his clear, almost colorless eyes locked upon her. "Princess."
Árdís stilled. "Roar."
Her illegitimate cousin prowled the court like a rabid dog seeking scraps. Of all her uncle Stellan's sons, Roar scared her the most. Magnus had been cruel, but disinterested in her; Sirius was frightening in his own unique way, but if she were honest, he'd never lifted a hand against her; and Andri, the youngest, was herfavorite.
Somehow her brutal uncle had given birth to one son who knew what the words loyalty and honormeant.
Roar was not thatone.
"I heard you led my brother quite a chase in Reykjavik." His smirk revealed how much he enjoyed thethought.
Sirius hadn't been quite as pleased. The second Haakon vanished, so had she, slipping through the window after him, and darting over the rooftops toward the docks, desperate to draw herdrekiguards as far away from Haakon aspossible.
"Sirius needed the exercise," she said, in the most casual tone she could muster. They expected a spoiled princess here, and so she gave themone.
The hallway wasempty.
Everydrekiin the court would be gathering in the throneroom.
But if Roar thought, for one second, that she washelpless….
Árdís smiled, knowing what he saw when he looked at her. A gilded treasure he wasn't allowed to touch. It ate at him, but she could handle him. He wouldn't dare touch her, not with the threat of her mother's wrath looming overher.
Nobody crossed Queen Amadea if they valued their near-immortallives.
He circled her slowly, taking her measure with insolent eyes. Árdís swallowed down the choke of rage, and turned her head to track him. His skin was as pale as the snow-capped mountains to the west. Thick black hair brushed against his collar. It always looked a little oily, as though he'd raked his fingers through it. Or perhaps that was justhim.
"If you were mine," Roar whispered, his breath stirring across the back of her neck as he came around to her side, "I would keep you on a tighterleash."
She glanced sideways, beneath her lashes. "But I'm not yours. AmI?"
"Notyet."
"Notever."
Roar angled his head and smiled as if he knew a secret shedidn't.
Árdís swallowed. "You're going to make me late for my mother's announcement. If she asks, I'll tell her you waylaidme."
Roar clucked his tongue. "We wouldn't want that, wouldwe?"
He knew what it was going to be. Árdís's eyes narrowed. The court had been on edge in the last month, ever since her cousin Andri returned with the news of Magnus's death. Stellan's eldest son had been sent to make a treaty with Rurik, but Rurik had killedhim.
Or so theysaid.
A hand reached out, hovering just above her collarbone. A challenge. He wasn't touching her. He hadn't broken the rules. But she felt that touch as if he had, and he knewit.
"I swear to the gods that if you don't get out of myway...."
