Page 44 of City of Snakes
“Thenhow? You need to tell her about the book—about how she fits into the prophecy. Soon...Now. Should we go tell her now?”
I shook my head. There would only be one chance to convince a woman who loathed me to agree to have a child with me. I damned well wasn’t going to try it in front of Elsedora. “It’s my choice when to tell her, and it will be her choice to accept or decline when she knows the full prophecy.”
“And if she chooses against the prophecy, what then?”
“You won’t have to worry about losing me.”
Elsedora sighed. “Well then, the least you could do is bring her flowers or something. After all—your people just tried to kill her under your roof.”
I sighed.
Elsedora rolled her eyes and motioned for me to follow her out. “Fine...Maybe just growl at her less.”
Happy to have ended the heavier conversation, I joked, “Some women like the growling.”
She laughed as we made our way down the stairs. “I have always wondered what the appeal was.”
We approached the kitchenette. Laughter carried into the hall. It sounded like cool rain on a hot day—like pure, unfiltered joy.
Despite everything that had happened to her the night prior, Queen Sybilla laughed as she leaned into Ryn’s shoulder, looking at something on the table. The two of them were arm to arm, heads drawn close. I could imagine them painted like that.
They were too chummy already.
Sybilla gasped out another chuckle, but it rasped, and she coughed, which drew my eye to the back of her neck. I knew bruising still lay beneath the blue ribbon she’d decorated her throat with. She’d refused to see a healer, and that had pissed me off.
Peeking over their shoulders, I caught sight of lewd sketches splayed out on the table.
“Look at how crooked his—” Her words caught in her throat upon seeing my shadow on the table. From the side, I could tell her face had sobered, and she turned the parchment at once.
“We were just taking a look at some of theliteraturethat was on our prisoners when we stripped them,” Ryn explained, choking down a laugh as I rounded the table.
Their proximity to one another twisted something inside of me.
Enough of that—remember the list.
Let Ryn be there if she needed comfort, laughter, happiness—he smiled enough for the lot of us. Plus, those comforts weren’t things I could ever offer her.
As if sensing my displeasure, Ryn scooted over to put a hand’s distance between himself and our new ally. He couldn’t help but smooth her emerald silk tunic sleeve before folding his hands on the table and peering at me with a cocked eyebrow.
One out-of-place strand of silver hair, still wavy from his braid, hung loose, and he shook it away. “Good morning to you too, Krait.”
I hummed a response. Maybe it was a grunt—El would have called it a grunt.
He didn’t need to ask what my problem was.Instead, he glanced over at Sybilla, and a dimpled smirk crept onto his face.
Both Ryn and El knew the implications of finding the Last Daughter of Isleen. They knew what the prophecy entailed…
Sybilla’s attention shifted between the two of us. She skeptically said, “It is as if I amnotthe one who can read minds around here. Can you boys use your words, please?”
I huffed out a sigh. “Learn to break in if you’d like to hear our thoughts,” I deadpanned.
Her gaze narrowed on my lips while her fingers danced momentarily across the wood table as though playing the same piano chords repeatedly.
“Are you ready to question the prisoners?” I asked.
“As ready as I can be.” She straightened.
She rose and rounded the table toward me—all business now. It was irksome that all prior amusement had left her when she’d seen me. From behind her, Ryn stared at me with a look of sheer mischief.
