Kyra would not have chosen Leyus. He was distant and intimidating, and he frightened her. Yet it all made more sense than she cared to admit. Leyus had always been a little too lenient with her. He’d had reason to kill her many times when she’d lived among his people, especially after he found out she worked for the Palace. But instead, he’d always sent her off with a warning.
And then there was the way the clan kept track of her movements in the forest. Pashla had made it sound as if they watched all comers, but with Kyra it was more than that. Kyra thought back to that time Leyus rescued her from Zora’s attack, and the two times Pashla had saved her, once when Zora threatened her in the clearing, and once when Adele attacked. No, Leyus wasn’t just having her watched. He was having her protected.
It was that thought that spurred her into action. Even now, Kyra could sense someone watching her, and the questions became too insistent to ignore. Why would he do this, yet stay so cold and aloof? How long had he known?
“I know someone’s watching me,” Kyra called out into the trees. “Pashla? I need to speak to Leyus.”
The forest went quiet at her voice. She cast around, alert for any response, but nothing came, and slowly the sounds of the forest returned—the fluttering of a winter bird’s wings, the high bark of a fox. Kyra leaned against a tree, swallowing her disappointment and trying to make sense of everything Craigson had told her. Her mother was a woman who led a village an unfathomable distance away. And her father…
Something shifted around her. “Anyone there?” Kyra asked. She definitely sensed someone coming toward her now, someone quiet enough to keep her from zeroing in on a specific direction. It might have been Pashla, but it didn’t feel like her. Kyra fell still, ready to run or fight if needed.
Leyus stepped out from between the trees as naturally as if Kyra had been waiting in the antechamber to his throne room. She looked at him, really looked at him this time. He was tall, larger than life, bronze-skinned, and strong despite his age. She didn’t resemble him at all. His face was square and angular, his nose and eyebrows pronounced, in contrast to Kyra’s heart-shaped face and softer features. But something stirred within her when she studied his eyes. They were amber, just like hers, and the arch of his lids felt familiar.
Craigson’s story just seemed so unlikely. How could this imposing Makvani man possibly be her father? He certainly wasn’t looking at her like she’d imagined any long-lost father would. Leyus regarded at her as he always had, with the same distant, proud gaze, and a touch of wariness or disdain.
“I met a trader,” said Kyra, glad that her voice didn’t shake. “Or he used to be a trader. By the name of Louis Craigson.”
There was a flash of something dangerous in Leyus’s eyes. “And what did he tell you?”
Kyra couldn’t do it. Couldn’t come right out and ask him if he was her father, like some waif in a talesinger’s ballad. “Why did you protect me when Zora tried to kill me?”
Leyus gave a grunt of disgust. “The caravanner should watch his tongue. I spared his life once, but I may not do so again.” He looked at Kyra. “You’re Maikana’s child—is that what he thinks?”
It was surreal, hearing the same name coming out of Leyus’s mouth. “Aye.”
He looked her over carefully, just as Craigson had, though Leyus’s scrutiny was more severe. “You have the look of her people, as well as some of their…peculiarities. Though your face resembles her sister more than her.”
That repeated detail about Kyra’s aunt drove it home for her, made it clear they had moved beyond her childish daydreams to a reality that was so much bigger than two imagined parents. There was an entire world Kyra didn’t know about, with implications and echoes that she was just starting to feel. Kyra realized she was trembling, and she pressed her arms to her sides in an attempt to stop. It was suddenly important to her that Leyus not see her shaken.