Janive was up next. She smiled at Xandrie and Demelza on her way past, and she shed her good girl image the second the flag was dropped.
She went after her opponent with rage and skill; Xandrie could hear Vincent, who stood behind them, exclaim, and it took a lot to impress her weapons instructor, so she knew Janive must be doing well. None of them were prepared for a perfect score, though. When the page held up her card and the crowd saw a ten, they went wild.
Xandrie felt her heart thumping way up in her throat. She stepped into the ring, determined not to disgrace herself. She’d do her best, damn it. She didn’t need a ten - she just needed to get high enough to get through to the semi-final.
She didn’t dare look to the King’s box, not wanting that distraction.
She pushed the world out of her mind and drew her spirit in tight. The crowd fell away, Vincent fell away, even Rhey fell away. All she could see was her sword and her enemy. She lunged, she swiped, she tried to make the blade an extension of her arm, then her heart, remembering the dance Rhey had taught her one night, so long ago. Her footwork was shoddy compared to his, she missed as many times as she landed a hit, and she was a sweaty mess by the time the bout was over. She wanted to hang her head, but Demelza’s words rang in her ears: “Show no weakness.”
She lifted her eyes to the royal box and waited on the page. The Elders conferred for longer than usual. Was it possible to earn a negative score? She felt the shame rise and spread throughout her. The page stepped forward and turned over the card.
The crowd exploded.
Vincent ran into the ring and threw his arms around her. She could hear Demelza screaming her name, but she could hardly see for the tears. She’d scored a nine.
The rest of the afternoon zoomed by in a flurry of knives and swords, lunges and feints, but by nightfall it was decided: she, Saskia, Janive, and Althara, a woman she hadn’t even seen fight, were through to the semi-finals.
Demelza didn’t seem the least bit concerned.
The songs of victory reverberated throughout the entire compound. Xandrie was victorious and the entire city - the entire Kingdom - seemed to roar its approval.
The Ball
He didn’t know whether no one had seen fit to warn him, or if he’d scratched the unfortunate event from his memory, but the next night, they were to have a ball.
The ballroom was decked out in its most sumptuous decor. The orchestra was in the galley, the fires roared, and the tables were piled high with truffle-drenched roasts and sculpted delicacies. Drinks were ladled from an ice-carved swan the size of a horse. By the time the King arrived, his guests were gorged and giddy, sweeping around the dance floor with some abandon.
Xandrie was at the very center of the melee.
Rhey tried not to stare, but it was impossible. She had come to the Palace in a guard uniform too large for her frame. For the most part, she’d trained with Vincent in a dun tunic that did nothing to show the curves and contours of her frame. When she fought, she’d been resplendent in her armor, which, true, didn’t hide much, and he’d seen her with nothing at all, too, but tonight, she had slid into a hip-hugging, curve-caressing slice of crimson silk that rippled as she moved, but clung to her thighs and ass in ways that made his heartbeat land squarely in his groin.
Vincent twirled Xandrie around the dance floor; how easy she looked in his arms. Rhey choked back the jealousy, determined not to embarrass himself in front of the entire assembly; the woman was his, he knew it, Vincent knew it, the whole damn palace knew it after he’d made her scream his name. He turned his attentions to his partner, a lovely woman who had been struck dumb the minute he’d taken her hand. When the tune ended, he returned her to her seat, then took the hand of his next, designated partner. He grinned when he saw who it was.
“I would dance with my King.”
Elza.
The old friends took their places, Rhey signaled the orchestra, and the two of them thrilled the room with a dance they’d invented when they were children.
Though he couldn’t see Xandrie, he could smell her light and lively scent. As he turned Demelza through a simple box step, he caught a glimpse of that column of lustrous red silk, this time in Nathos’ grip. He had to laugh. The man was about as elegant as a workhorse, but at least, he’d been a good sport. He normally stayed on his seat.
“You don’t mind, do you?”
He nodded at Xandrie and Nathos, just as the man trod on the hem of his partner’s gown.
“Go, rescue her,” Elza rolled her eyes.
Rhey practically ran, incapable of staying away another second. He tapped Nathos on the shoulder. “May I?”
The Elder looked as if he’d just won some windfall at the card table. He couldn’t have been more grateful.
“Red becomes you,” Rhey said. He bent close and whispered in her ear. “But you should wear gold.”
She smiled, knowing how much he liked his gold, after spending so many nights in his den now.
But that was it; he just liked it. The only thing he was obsessed with these days was her.
He felt her falter. Surely he hadn’t done a Nathos and trodden on her hem? She sagged in his arms. He relaxed his hold on her, confused by her limp body. Her eyes rolled back in her head until only the whites showed. Her knees gave way and she was slumped in his arms, entirely unable to support herself.
“Andera?” he bellowed.
The orchestra ground to a halt and the dance floor was clear of guests in seconds.
“Get me the head mage, now. Tell her we will need a compound of willow bark and oak-burned brandy.”
Vincent was at his side. “You suspect poisoning?”
Rhey bent close and inhaled her breath. “I don’t suspect it. I know it. That smell of rotting fruit?” He lifted Xandrie into his arms and stormed towards the doors. “You’ll find who did this, Vincent. Find them before I do.”
Because if he got his hands on them, they’d wish they’d never been born.
Andera, their best mage, rushed to Rhey’s private chambers to administer the antidote to a recumbent Xandrie. Rhey had to hold her head back, while the solution was trickled into her slack mouth.
“If you’d been but a moment longer, Sire, the lady would not merely be blue in the lips. She’d be laid out on a slab, colder than ice.” Andera pressed a vial into Rhey’s hand. “Three drops, every hour on the hour and no visitors. She needs rest.”