“Nothing.” Alaric shook his head as if to clear it. And then he—
He did something odd just then. He reached out so that his fingers brushed against the teal sleeve that covered her upper arm. It seemed too deliberate to be an accident, but he retracted his hand as swiftly as though it had been burned. As Talasyn continued to narrow her eyes at him, perplexed, he returned all of his attention to his food, and he did not glance her way again for a long, long while.
Alaric had never been one for big events. He’d suffered through a surfeit of galas that his parents had dragged him to back when they’d still been maintaining the illusion that all was well between them. This banquet was by far grander than any of those affairs, funded as it was by the Nenavar Dominion’s bottomless coffers, but the feeling of revulsion that it elicited was very much the same.
It was the sheer artifice of it all. With the exception of his own retinue, no one at this table would hesitate to order his assassination if they thought that they could get away with it. Yet here they were, eating and chatting as if nothing was wrong, and he had to play along because that was what politics entailed.
Alaric’s thoughts drifted to Talasyn and how heartily she had laughed at Rajan Wempuq’s anecdote. For some reason, he had been expecting a sound lighter than air to complement her elegant gown and the stately surroundings, but her laughter had been vibrant and dulcet and unrefined. It had been a moment devoid of falsehood, her sparkling eyes warm like brandy. So he’d reached over to try to touch her, for whatever reason, like some brainless oaf, but at least he’d held himself back just in time.
He revised his previous conclusion. There was one other person at this feast who wouldn’t give any order to assassinate him. Talasyn would kill me herself, he thought, and it was with something that was dangerously close to affection, because that made her the most genuine person in the room.
A hush fell over the end of the table nearest the entrance, gradually spreading to the rest of the guests. Lueve trailed off in the middle of recounting an amusing story from her years as Urduja’s lady-in-waiting, her mouth hanging open in mid-sentence at the sight of something to Alaric’s left.
He turned to where the daya—and everyone else—was looking. A lanky figure stood in the open doorway, in an ensemble that was markedly out of place at a formal event, consisting only of an embroidered long-sleeved vest and trousers gathered at the ankles. There was an ornate band of leather and bronze slung around his hips, to which a hand crossbow was holstered. The new arrival’s tousled hair fell across his forehead and his walnut-brown eyes blazed as they swept the banquet hall. The expressions of the people that gazed back at him ranged from confusion on Talasyn and the Kesathese delegation’s part to full-blown alarm on that of the Dominion nobles.
“Who is that?” Talasyn inquired, sounding curious but careful to keep her voice low.
“Trouble.” It was Harjanti who answered, agitated. “Lady Lueve’s nephew, Surakwel Mantes.”
“He loathes the Night Empire,” added Ralya, shooting a look in Alaric’s direction that could have passed for nervousness. “This isn’t good at all.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Niamha Langsoune, Daya of Catanduc, ruthless and unflappable negotiator, was the same age as Talasyn but more poised than Talasyn could ever hope to be even if she reached a hundred. The young woman broke the frozen tableau that the banquet hall had become, springing to her feet with an enviable litheness.
“Surakwel!” she merrily called out as she swept toward the newcomer, a dazzling smile on her face. Her pleated overskirt had been woven to resemble the scales of a carp, and it swirled with her every step in glimmers of white and orange and yellow. “How good of you to join us—”
“Save it, Nim,” the young lord snarled in the Nenavarene tongue. He brushed past her and made his way to the head of the table, his gaze meeting Talasyn’s and darkening in recognition for a fraction of a second as he passed across from where she sat.
So this was Surakwel Mantes. The vagabond and pot-stirrer that Prince Elagbi had told her about. Her father’s exact words had been, At least Surakwel is off gallivanting elsewhere, or we’d have an even bigger problem on our hands.
Now Surakwel was here, and Talasyn had a feeling that she was about to find out just how big the problem could get.
He drew to a halt before Queen Urduja and dropped to one knee, head bowed, the gesture more perfunctory than respectful. Urduja regarded him warily for several long moments, as if he were a mongoose that had infiltrated her viper’s nest, in the silence of a hall where even the orchestra had stopped playing.
“Welcome home, Lord Surakwel.” She spoke for everyone’s benefit, her icy tones ringing throughout the vast chamber in Sailor’s Common. Probably so that the Kesathese delegation would have no cause to believe that they were about to be murdered in cold blood. “I trust that your journeys have been pleasant.”
“The last time I saw that one was a year ago,” Daya Odish told the other guests, drawing Talasyn’s attention. “He showed up at court and pressed upon Her Starlit Majesty the need for us to intervene in the Hurricane Wars—rather loudly, I might add. Surakwel was convinced that the Night Empire would soon pose a grave threat to the Dominion.”
Rajan Wempuq let out a gusty snort. “Well, he was right, wasn’t he?” He glanced at Alaric from beneath bushy brows, as though only just remembering that the younger man was there, within earshot. “No offense.”
“None taken,” Alaric replied curtly.
Surakwel was now rising to his feet before the Zahiya-lachis. “My journeys were pleasant enough, Harlikaan.” Unlike most of the other nobles, he spoke Sailor’s Common with the ease of one who used it frequently. “My homecoming, not so much, as I have just learned that you are in the process of brokering an alliance with a murderous despot.”
Like every other personage in Alaric’s immediate vicinity, Talasyn stiffened in her lacquered chair, her eyes darting to him. But her betrothed showed no reaction whatsoever.
At least, at first glance.
Alaric had peeled off his black kidskin dress gloves at the start of the feast. He reached for his wine and it occurred to Talasyn that he held the goblet tighter than was strictly necessary, his bare knuckles clenched to white.
Still, his expression remained neutral as he drank. When Niamha fluttered past, clearly on her way to Surakwel’s side, Alaric called out, “Your friend doesn’t like me very much, Daya Langsoune.”