Her magic rose to the surface. Magic flaring along with her brimming anger. She needed to tamp it down or else Killian would actually find himself thrown against the wall with Shadowbreaker against his neck.
“Cyrene, sit,” Killian insisted, gesturing to the chair again. “It was not my intention to insult you. I see that I was mistaken about our interactions. I do not frequently misjudge the circumstances.”
Cyrene stared at him. Ignoring the blood magic that had roared into her ears at the anger. She needed to ignore it. Sit down and finish the diplomacy she had come here for.
She felt a hand on her shoulder.
“Domina,” Dean said softly. He held the chair out for her. “Your seat.”
She swallowed, met Dean’s careful eyes, and then took the proffered seat. “Thank you.”
“If it is not an insult to you, Domina,” Killian said, regaining the formality that he had broken down, “and you are not here with your guard”—his eyes shifted to where Dean still stood with his hand on her chair—“I would not mind borrowing him for the night to seal our deal.”
Cyrene’s mouth popped open in surprise. Oh. Oh!
She had seriously misjudged Killian’s interest in Dean. He hadn’t known Dean as the Prince of Eleysia. He was romantically interested in him.
She couldn’t bring herself to look at Dean. “You…want to…”
Killian shrugged. “Forgive me, Domina. Marriage alliances hold no interest for a man who finds appeal in both sexes.” He chuckled. “Or perhaps I have just not found the one.”
“This would seal the deal?” Dean asked before Cyrene could respond to Killian.
Her eyes flickered up to him in shock. But he wasn’t looking at her. He was looking at Killian. His beauty fully on display in the candlelight. She didn’t understand how anyone could look at him and not see the prince underneath. The beautiful man who had stolen her heart in a forest in Aurum. So young and wild and foolish they had been. And now, hardened and fierce and wholly changed, they were finally clawing their way back to what they had found so easily once upon a time.
Killian raised an eyebrow. “He speaks.”
“Would it?” Dean demanded. The prince more a king than Killian ever would be.
“Yes,” Killian said slowly. “Yes, oh, yes, I think it would.”
Cyrene saw it then. He would say yes. He felt as if his honor had already been stolen after what happened in Domara. What was one night to get them the Tiekan army? One night for an alliance?
“No,” Cyrene answered for him. She stood from her chair again and curtsied to Killian. “Thank you for dinner. It was illuminating, to say the least. I believe I will need a night to think on what we have discussed. Why don’t we finish this talk tomorrow and then draw up paperwork before we agree to anything?”
Killian easily lifted to his feet. “As you wish, Domina.” His eyes swept back to Dean’s. “The offer is always on the table.”
Dean bowed deeply and then escorted Cyrene out of the room.
Once they were far enough away from Killian to not be overheard, a bubble of laughter erupted out of her chest. And then she was laughing so hard that she could barely contain it.
Dean impassively looked at her. “And what is so funny?”
“The king of Tiek just propositioned the prince of Eleysia and had no idea,” she said, snorting.
He shook his head at her. “You are outrageous, you know this, yes?”
“Oh, come on. You’re never going to live this down. Every time you get serious, I’m just going to remind you of Killian offering to sleep with you to gain his army.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have let you do it.”
“Hey,” she said, suggestively nudging him. “I don’t share well either.”
He raised his eyebrows. “And what exactly does that mean, Cyrene?”
Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I think you know what it means.”
“Hey, sometimes, a guy likes to hear it.”
She laughed at him mirroring her words and then threaded her fingers into his. “I like this. Us. I think there should be an us.”
And Dean smiled the most brilliant, perfect smile she had ever seen. “Glad you’ve caught up. There’s been an us for a while.”
30
The Alliance
“You need to push him for the paperwork to be completed today,” Kaliana said as they walked toward the throne room the next morning. “It’s just like him to promise the world and not get anything in writing.”
“Yes, we’re well aware of that,” Dean muttered behind her.
“You should have just slept with him,” she told Cyrene.
Cyrene rolled her eyes. “For one, that’s not happening. And two, you were the one who said that I should make him chase me.”
“He’s the king. He doesn’t chase that hard.”
“Yeah, well, that isn’t me,” she said with a chin tilt.
Kaliana rolled her eyes. “Please, everyone in the castle knows that you were sleeping with Edric.”
Cyrene stopped in her tracks and grasped Kaliana’s arm. “I never ever.”
But Kaliana just looked wary. “Cyrene, it’s okay. It was a long time ago.”
“I am serious. It never happened.”
“But you were on his barge for procession,” Kaliana whispered.
“Ever,” Cyrene reiterated.
Kaliana seemed to look at her with all-new eyes. “Truly?”
“I swear it. We were never together. Not Kael either,” Cyrene told her. “Those were all just rumors. I was very young and incredibly naive when I first came to court, Kaliana, but I was not stupid. Don’t you remember me asking you to leave court? I did not want what was happening to me. I wanted adventure.”
Kaliana blinked a few times. “You truly wanted to leave. I just…I thought that you were posturing, testing my limits, or trying to trick me. Like I would send you away, and then you would run to Edric to tell him that I was sending you…” She trailed off as she must have realized the absurdity of it all. Then she pulled Cyrene into a hug. “I am sorry that those Dremylon boys and my pride ever kept us apart.”
Cyrene returned the hug, amazed that they had gotten to this point at all. She would have never guessed this two years ago.
“All right, let’s move it,” Dean said, gesturing for them to keep walking. “We need to focus on the task at hand.”
Cyrene and Kaliana broke apart with a laugh and then continued toward the throne room. Cyrene knew that last night hadn’t gone how she had planned with Killian, but she was sure that they were close to that alliance. They just needed to decide on an amount and what to do about the port, and then she would have succeeded here with the Tiekan army. All thanks to Kaliana.
Then, they stepped into the throne room, and all the air was sucked out of the space.
Kael Dremylon stood like a black cloud of energy before Killian.
Cyrene’s eyes widened in shock. She should have felt him. Should have been able to tell that he was here by the sheer weight of the bond. He stood a couple of dozen feet away from her, and yet…she felt nothing. Nothing at all.