Cvareh held his tongue that it could be a literal “you,” as he was notorious for avoiding the Court. “Petra and I believe so, yes.”
“So what is the real concern? A noble court hardly sounds like cause for too much agony. Worried you won’t have the most fashionable garb there?” She snickered, but the smile slowly faded from her mouth at his solemn expression.
“The Court is not some place that we all gather and gossip; we have the tea parlors and wineries for that. The only way for people to advance in Dragon society is by killing the rank above them. To keep things orderly, these duels must usually be sanctioned by the Oji, except during the Court. Then, nearly all duels are heard and seen out… One exception being if the Dono himself decides to intervene.”
Arianna stared at him for a long, hard moment. She tapped her nails on the table in quick succession and glanced over her shoulder at the fading light outside. Her magic was as silent as her lips, her thoughts locked away in some place he couldn’t reach.
She turned back to him with the look of resolve he associated with overt danger. “You’re going to be challenged.”
“I have no doubt of it. It’s possible you will be too.”
“Me?” The idea shouldn’t have delighted the woman nearly as much as it did.
“I introduced you as a Xin’Anh today. It’s not impossible some woman who had been craving the idea of being my mate could challenge you in an attempt to earn my favor.”
As Arianna considered this, she folded her hands behind her head. Her grin only continued to expand. “Someone craving you is almost comical.”
Cvareh rolled his eyes, slightly stung from her words. Not overly so, but just a bit more than he’d want to admit. “I am something here on Nova.” He would never dismiss the title Petra had given to him, what it meant to his House.
“You are,” she agreed easily with a small spring to her feet. Arianna’s fingers were like wriggling worms attached to her palms. “And that’s why you deserve a real woman, should a woman be your desire.”
Arianna advanced on him and Cvareh leaned back, his palms spreading against the heavy duvet that covered her bed. She straddled his knees, looming over him. It was imposing and dominating and it made him want to wrestle her to the ground. It made him want to submit.
“How do you define a ‘real woman’, Fenthri?” His voice had shifted to something he was barely familiar with. He liked the molasses quality of it as it coated his throat and honeyed his tongue.
“One who doesn’t lurk in shadows waiting for opportune challenges because they know you would otherwise never support them at your side.” She spoke as though the fact should be obvious, but it was a somewhat foreign notion to Cvareh’s Dragon blood. Foreign, but not unwelcome.
Cvareh straightened some, closing a hand’s width of distance between them. Arianna was too smart for him to assume she wasn’t aware of what she was doing. But what was she doing? Cvareh didn’t know, but he wasn’t bound by her logical mind. He was a man who could savor beauty and relax in knowing something was because that was how it should be.
When she was near him, like this, everything was how it should be.
“So, when do we begin?”
“Begin?” He swallowed, the word having application to a seemingly infinite number of meanings.
“I may be challenged. You will be challenged.” Arianna held out her hands.
No, my brother’s hands, Cvareh reminded himself. The idea sobered him some. This entrancing woman who seemed to hold a universe of possibilities on her tongue—if she deigned to share them—was made of the pieces of his kin.
With far too much focus, claws jutted like magic from her fingers. Arianna’s mouth curved into a wild snarl, the somewhat sensual woman from before lost completely to a wild and equally thrilling side. Cvareh’s magic heightened as he was aware in a very new way that she had him trapped between her legs, every vital spot within a hand’s reach.
“I need to learn to use these.” Arianna turned over her hands in utter fascination. “Why don’t we help each other?”
“You want to spar with me?”
“I can always twist Cain’s arm into it,” she said, as lightly as if the proud Dragon had already agreed to the matter.
Cvareh placed his hands on her hips. They were wide with strong bones underneath the muscle and flesh. He pushed her away just enough to stand. Face to face, a breath apart, he kept her in his grip far longer than what was necessary, just to feel her pulse under his fingers.
She didn’t step away; she let him hold her there. That fact he was somehow keenly aware of, despite having no reason to know it. He nor anyone else would ever touch her, hold her, keep her, unless she willed it so.
“We begin at sundown every day.” Cvareh fought the urge to pull her the rest of the way to him. To press her so tightly against his body that they no longer knew where one of them ended and the other began.
“It’s sundown now, Cvareh’Ryu,” she observed quietly.
“I suppose it is.” Though he had long been admiring the way the sunset lit her white hair afire. “Are you ready?”
“Am I ever not?” She gave him what Cvareh would dare call a coy grin.
It was a question he delighted in not being able to refute.
23. Petra
Petra ran her claws along the unfinished banister that led down from her personal roost in the Xin Manor. Let it never be said that she didn’t make sacrifices on behalf of her House. She had reallocated all hands and tradesmen from finishing different parts of the manor for the sake of building an amphitheater for the Crimson Court.
It had been a couple hundred years since the last Court had been held on Ruana, long ago when House Xin was still in power and the gathering was known as the Cobalt Court. A crumbling reminder of the long-ago glory days of House Xin, the amphitheater had suffered from disuse. No Xin wanted to lay eyes on it, like a shameful scar that would never stop weeping blood.
Petra was determined to see the place resurrected not just to its former glory, but even better than before. The laborers would work non-stop until the Court to complete her grand designs. But they would make the usual venue for the Crimson Court on Lysip look humble in comparison. She wanted retractable sunshades over the stadium seating. Cushions, special just for this Court, made for every seat. Running water, box seats, food and wine service throughout—nothing would be spared.
If Yveun was going to hand them the Court, she would show everyone why they deserved it.
“How does the construction proceed?” Cain waited for her at the bottom of the stairs.
“Slower than I would like.” As was usually the case. “But well enough. The foreman assures me that we will have it completed in time.” There were only two weeks left before the Court would begin.
“Gathering offenses on House Rok has proved no real difficulty.”
She snorted, as if it would have.