Stepping out of the open door, he nodded at the servants before exiting the room, heading down two flights of stairs to the floor containing Otis’s room. The corridor was empty, so there were no eyes to see him pick the lock on the door and swiftly shut it behind him. His brother had clearly not had an opportunity to come back, his uniform jacket still slung over the chair as it had been the night before.
Smoothing the sheets, Keris then extracted the package of letters from his pocket, examining them in the sunlight to ensure there was no obvious damage. He’d seen them in Otis’s hands enough times to know them well, and in his mind’s eye, he could see his brother’s thumb running over the edges of the twelve precious letters that were all he had left of his wife. His eyes skipped over an official missive from his father, which was likely what had inspired Valcotta to steal the package in the first place. Yet as Keris ran his own thumb over the edges of the love letters, counting, his stomach dropped when he reached only eleven. He swiftly recounted, but the number was the same.
One of them was missing.
“Shit!” he snarled. “She kept one!”
Then the memory of the Valcottan woman’s voice filled his ears. All of them. On my honor!
And there was nothing more important to a Valcottan than her word. Which meant one thing for certain: Keris hadn’t seen the last of the beautiful thief.
14
ZARRAH
Just after dawn, Zarrah limped inside the gates of the Valcottan palace, several of her soldiers racing to her side.
“It’s nothing,” she said. “A bar fight that I found myself in the middle of.” Then she made her way up to her rooms and collapsed on her bed in exhaustion.
A second later, the door opened.
“I’m feeling hurt, Zar,” Yrina said. “It appears as though you went out for a bit of fun without me.”
“It wasn’t fun.” Zarrah kept her eyes closed, feeling the press of the Maridrinian’s chest against her back. The heat of his breath against her cheek. “A good reminder of why I don’t go drinking with soldiers.”
Her friend made a noise that was simultaneously pity and amusement, then Zarrah felt the bed sink and heard Yrina’s soft intake of breath. “God, woman. Did you run through a field of broken glass?”
“Is it that bad?”
“It’s not good. Where is your other boot?”
Probably in a gator’s belly was the answer, but Zarrah said, “Lost it in the fight.”
Yrina whistled between her teeth. “You really were out for some fun.”
The bed shifted. Water splashed. Zarrah clenched her teeth as Yrina immersed her battered foot in a basin, washing it clean before she began picking debris out of Zarrah’s flesh with a pair of tweezers. The smell of alcohol filled the air, and Zarrah had only a second to bury her face in her pillow to muffle her scream as Yrina doused her foot, cleaning the rest of the Nerastis filth from the wounds.
“You going to tell me what you were doing on the other side of the Anriot when the Empress specifically ordered otherwise?”
“I wasn’t.”
“Don’t lie. You reek like river water.” She paused, then asked, “Did it have something to do with the fire at the Maridrinian palace?”
Yrina was sworn to her and had always kept her confidence. But more than that, Zarrah hated lying to her friend. “Fine. Yes.” Zarrah kept her face buried in her pillow to hide the heat burning across her cheeks. Never mind that her actions were in deliberate violation of the Empress’s orders, what she’d done had been nothing short of a total disaster. She felt a fool and had nothing to show for it but a shredded foot and a stomach full of shame.
Yrina was uncharacteristically quiet as she wrapped a bandage around Zarrah’s foot. Then she murmured, “Don’t let Bermin goad you, Zar. Remember, it is in his best interest to see you make mistakes. The Empress is fickle, and that which she giveth, she can easily taketh away. For you to remain as general of this garrison, you must be perfection in her eyes.”
And to the Empress, perfection meant obedience.
“I’ll leave you to get some rest,” Yrina said. “And I’ll start a rumor that you lost your boot beating the woman who looked too longingly at your lover.”
Zarrah groaned into the pillow. “Don’t you dare.”
“Perhaps you’re right,” Yrina said thoughtfully. “That’s not something you’d do. You’d beat your lover with the boot for inviting temptation, right?”
“I don’t have a lover.”
“That’s half your problem. You’d enjoy life a great deal more with a man dedicated to your pleasure.” Yrina swatted Zarrah across the ass, finally luring her out from under the pillow if only to scowl at her friend’s departing back.
The last thing she needed was the distraction of a lover. Over the years, she’d taken a handful of men into her bed for a night or two, but she’d always been careful to keep it to that, knowing that hers would be a carefully selected political union, not a love match. A consort from a powerful Valcottan family, the union bringing strength to the crown. And in recent months—years, if she was being honest—she’d not brought any men to her bed at all, for they weren’t a distraction she could afford.
Exhausted as she was, the sun was already glowing through the stained-glass windows of her room, sending spirals of color across the white silk of her sheets. Past time for her to have been up and completing her exercises, which meant sleep wasn’t an option.
What she needed was a cold shower to slap some alertness into her.
Limping to the adjoining chamber, Zarrah unfastened the buckles of her leather corselet and discarded it on the floor, followed by the silk camisole that was still glued to her skin from sweat.
Her fingers ached as she unfastened her belt, but as she tugged down her trousers, she heard the distinct sound of crinkling paper.
Frowning, Zarrah reached into the deep pocket and withdrew a folded letter, her heartbeat accelerating as she slowly unfolded it. Perhaps her efforts had netted her something worthwhile after all.
Unfolding the letter, she read. Dearest O, every minute we are apart feels like an eternity…
What in the name of God had she stolen?
Starting over, Zarrah read the letter once, then again, searching the overly poetic piece of nonsense written by a woman named Tasha for any sign of a code, but there was none. Nothing that was even the slightest bit useful.
She’d risked life and limb to steal that bastard’s love letters.
But that wasn’t what set her heart to racing, her stomach threatening to empty its contents onto the glass-tiled floor. No, the worst of it was, she’d promised to give the letters back. All of them.
And a Valcottan always kept her word.
Her day did not improve.
The Maridrinians raided not an hour after she returned—likely in retaliation for what they perceived as an assault on their palace. They attacked one of her patrols, the battle short yet fevered, resulting in heavy casualties on both sides, and each time she spoke words over one of the fallen, her guilt pooled higher in her guts until Zarrah was certain she might drown in it.
Dead because of her actions. Actions that had netted her nothing but shame for undertaking such an ill-considered escapade in the first place.