Tempest’s body forced her to halt out of sheer exhaustion. She dropped to her knees, retching and gasping for air as beads of sweat dropped from her forehead to the cool forest floor beneath her/ A thorn cut into the palm of Tempest’s left hand and tears tracked down her cheeks. Children. Bloody children.
The telltale snapping of a twig beneath a boot cracked to her left, and she stilled. She lifted her head and scanned the flitting shadows between the trees.
Her heart thumped loudly. She’d been found. How did the king already know? Tempest curled her abused palm around a sharp rock and stood, sinking into a defensive position. The monster wouldn’t take her alive and she’d slaughter as many of his minions as possible.
She smiled grimly. They’d trained her to be an assassin. Death was in her blood.
The shadows melted into humanoid shapes but not the ones she expected. A huge black wolf loped into view and growled deeply.
She held her ground and bared her teeth at Brine. “I don’t know if you can understand me, but I need to see him. Now.”
Brine lowered his head and the hackles rose along his spine.
“Don’t you snarl at me,” she growled. “I’ve had a bloody horrible day. I know you’re not here just for anyone.” Tempest’s smile sharpened. “Take me to see the Jester.”
A hulking shape stepped around a massive tree trunk. She held her hands up in surrender and her expression softened when Briggs gave her an encouraging smile. Tempest threw one last glare at the wolf and focused on the healer. If he was here, things wouldn’t get bloody. Well, she wouldn’t draw first blood, but if the nasty beastie didn’t control himself, she’d let him get very acquainted with her rock.
She took a deep breath. “The Jester,” she said again. “I have information he needs.”
“Oh, is that so?” a playfully, sinful voice purred.
Tempest thought her heart would jump out of her chest at the sound of the low, melodic voice that belonged to one man and one man only. She spun around and eyed the kitsune who stepped out from the shadows of a hazel tree, looking altogether like a mythical forest king in a moss-colored cloak that perfectly set off the russet of his skin. He looked at her with gold irises—true, pure gold, not the amber of King Destin’s—glimmering with mischief.
Damn sneaky fox.
He sighed. “Is the rock really necessary?”
“You’d be surprised at what I can do with a rock.”
“I don’t doubt that.” He chuckled and held out a hand. “Are you ready to stand at my side?”
“Not your side,” she began, “but on the side of justice.”
Pyre smiled a grin full of sharp, delighted canines.
“Then it’s a good thing those two are one and the same.”
NOW ON TO THE ROOK…
One
Tempest
The king’s royal banquet had barely been going on for an hour, and Tempest was about to lose her mind. She did not know how she was managing to sit, quiet and obedient, surrounded by people who were conspiring to frame Talaga for everything that was going wrong. It did not help her nerves that she was serving as a double agent.
She ground her teeth together. Winter’s bite, she hated how that sounded. She eyed the gilded merriment around her. If anyone knew that she’d aligned herself with the Jester… Tempest blew out a soft breath. Anyone associated with the renowned Dark Court was quickly executed without hesitation. If she wasn’t careful, she’d find herself hung from the nearest pole.
“They should be exterminated,” a weasel-like man with thick, caterpillar brows muttered to his group of companions.
Tempest hid her scowl and kept her expression blank, taking a slow sip of her cider. It would be so easy to take out the blathering aristocrat. Her fingers twitched with the need to hold a blade.
Calm yourself. Killing everyone will solve nothing. Stop thinking like a Hound and think like a spy. Think like the Jester. What would he do?
Tempest bit back a laugh. She was reasonably certain that Pyre would waste no time in dismantling the king's court from within. He certainly had the skills and manipulation. But murdering Heimserya’s war council and its royal family—particularly the king himself—would not help the Talagan cause. No, it would only make things worse. Talaga did not have the numbers to survive an all-out war against Heimserya, which was why Pyre and his band of shifters needed Tempest.
A double agent.
She set her goblet down and smoothed her hands over her silky dress, all the while studying the highborn murderers around her. She still could not believe she allowed herself to be caught in the Jester’s intricate web.
One week had passed since she’d seen him.
A beautiful woman glanced in Tempest’s direction and whispered to her companion. How long could Tempest keep her secrets? She wasn’t overly worried about the gossips in court, but one of her uncles was bound to figure something out—Aleks, Maxim, or Dima. Tempest caught the eye of her fourth and final uncle across the table.
Madrid. Calling him her uncle was a bit of a stretch. He’d had a hand in training her, but he’d left the rest up to the other men. Not that she minded terribly. She was woman enough to admit that the head of the King’s Hounds scared her. His gaze slid over the crowd, pausing briefly on her.
Tempest feigned calmness, even as her pulse sped up. The slight tension in her shoulders disappeared when Madrid’s attention moved on. She needed to be wary of him. Temp had no doubt Madrid suspected, at the very least, that she was keeping something from him. But she hoped her obvious discomfort around King Destin was enough to distract him from the truth.
She examined the king’s empty dais. It was a relief he wasn’t in attendance tonight. It was difficult to hide her loathing for the man. Guilt pricked her. Partly, it was due to the king's betrayal of his people and his intent to frame the Talagans for the drug currently sweeping its way through village after village, killing almost everyone who consumed it. His alarming confidence, lusty appetites, and ruthless desire to gain whatever he wanted was problematic. Especially since he was determined to have her.
On the positive side, he hadn’t sent for her all week. His chambers were not somewhere she wanted to be. Ever. Sharing the king’s bed, or becoming his consort, was undoubtedly his intention. Her face twitched, and she clamped down on the urge to sneer at the thought. It seemed impossible to keep up the ruse that she was interested in him. And dangerous. He wasn’t one to be trifled with. For a moment, Tempest worried over the reason why the king hadn’t sent for her. Maybe he was capable of occasionally being too busy to deal with his hedonistic impulses. If only wishes came true.
Ladies simpered, and young men strutted about trying to catch the females’ attention. It made her sick. A war was brewing, people were dying, and yet these people were drinking and eating like nothing was wrong.
“You do not seem to be eating much, Tempest,” Madrid murmured. He spoke so quietly that nobody took notice of their conversation. Even though he stood on the opposite side of the table, she heard his words.
She blinked. The man moved too silently for his own good. “It is difficult to eat when talk of war is filling the air,” she replied.