Page 17 of Onyx Cage: Volume II
Taking a slow breath, I descended the stairs while I forced my features into an impassive mask.
Control.
I drew closer to her, near enough to see that she was wearing an embroidered teal gown that clung to her curves in a way that would have scandalized every last person in Socair. Her silvertiara held gemstones the same blue-green shade, wrestling her mass of hair into a rare semblance of submission.
She looked nothing at all like the feral princess I remembered.
The ballroom faded around me, sharpening at the singular, central point where Rowan stood. I should have greeted her parents first, then her sister, but I couldn’t seem to force myself from the path that led directly to her.
Korhonan said something I ignored, and she finally turned away from him to fully face me.
The surprise on her features had given way to something more guarded the closer I got to her, but her green eyes were as tumultuous as the stormy hillsides we had ridden through for days.
I gave her the requisite bow, greeting her as the princess that she was playing tonight. She sank into a graceful curtsey in response, the very picture of royalty.
Where had all this propriety been when her life was on the line?
It was a jarring contrast to the girl who had stood barefoot in my room with her tousled curls and my rumpled shirt, smirking at me before shoveling in several biscuits for breakfast every morning.
That girl had been familiar. Comfortable.Mine.
Not yours, apparently, an obnoxiously rational voice in the back of my mind corrected. She was Korhonan’s, then…and now.
“Lord Evander,” she said in a polite tone I barely recognized. “Welcome to Castle Chridhe.”
Oh, so it wasLord Evander, now, was it? Not Lord Arseling, oraalio, or whatever-the-hell-else she had taken to calling me from the moment we left the Summit.
Still, there was something brewing in her uncertain gaze, and she hadn’t so much as glanced back at Korhonan. She hadn’tofficially accepted Elk’s proposal yet. Because she was waiting on my permission?
I bit back a scoff.Not storms-blasted likely.
Because she wanted to stay in Lochlann? That was certainly possible.
Or was there another reason?
The answer shouldn’t have mattered.It didn’t. But I had a burning, irrational need to know. Like everything surrounding her since the moment we’d met, it stoked at the dying embers of curiosity that dwelled somewhere deep in my soul.
Curiosity. That’s all it was.
And once it was satisfied, I would walk away. For good, this time.
“Thank you, Princess Rowan.” I didn’t bother to hide my feelings about this game of politeness and pretension we were engaging in.
And if she wanted to stand on ceremony...
“I believe as a visiting dignitary, it’s my right to request the next dance.” Which was fortunate, since I might have actually started a war if I had to stand here and watch the two of them cling to one another for another minute.
Rowan’s lips parted in the barest hint of outrage, and I’d never been more glad about having taken the time to study all the Lochlannian customs I could prior to my arrival. Because there she was. A remnant of the savage girl from Socair. She held her hand out, even as she forced the rest of her features into neutrality. Or at least, as close to neutrality as she ever came. It appeared that even here, in her home, she could only hide so much.
Though this had been my idea, I realized my mistake the moment her skin touched mine.
For a fraction of a moment, I forgot how furious I was. I forgot that she was here on the brink of marrying Korhonanafter everything I had done to stop her. I forgot the way that she had left me drugged and how she’d conveniently forgotten to mention there was an enemy spy in my midst.
All I could do was drown in amber and citrus andher, in the memory of her body pliant and willing against mine, in the sight of her bare in the moonlight and her challenging gaze boring into mine just as it was doing now.
It took every ounce of self-control I had ever possessed to will my grip to stay light and impersonal, to keep her an arm’s length away from me when all I wanted to do was find the nearest wall and remind her that she was mine in a way that had nothing to do with blood debts or archaic laws.
She averted her eyes, and I couldn’t help but rake my gaze over her, taking in the things I missed in my perusal from the stairs. While the ladies around us wore gowns that fell off their shoulders and dipped low along their bust, I noticed that Rowan’s covered her shoulders and collarbone entirely.