And if that weren’t terrifying enough, directly in front of him, the apparition’s gauntleted hands rested on the hilt of an enormous sword that balanced, point down, on the shining marble floor.
Leisa had never seen a sword like that before. It was far too big and too heavy to wield in battle, with a blade at least a hands-width at the base, and long enough it would probably be chest high on her. It was a weapon meant for only one thing—to remind those around it of the implacable, inescapable nature of death.
And it could belong to only one man—the King’s Raven. This was obviously the one she’d been warned about, a combination of faceless warrior and nameless assassin.
King Soren had spoken of his brutality and the impossible tasks he’d undertaken for his king. No one had ever beaten him, no quarry ever escaped. His legend, according to Soren, was the linchpin on which Garimore’s quest for power turned.
While comfortably ensconced in Princess Evaraine’s suites back in Farhall, Leisa had dismissed such stories as mere embellishment. This Raven was, after all, just a man. Perhaps no more than a large man in armor carrying a blunt weapon, wearing a mask to make himself appear more mysterious. Tell enough stories, and anyone could appear threatening.
But now?
She swallowed convulsively and concluded that perhaps not all of the rumors were unfounded.
Prince Vaniell saw her staring, turned his head, and made a small sound of disgust.
“If you’re going to make your little pet lurk, Father,” he said with a sneer, “please have him do so somewhere more befitting his gloomy affectations. All that black makes me feel positively funereal, and you know how I hate anything depressing. Besides,”—and here he threw Leisa a dazzling smile—“unless you’re planning to execute someone in the front entry, he really doesn’t match the decor.”
So apparently, the king’s pet assassin didn’t intimidate everyone.
Leisa glanced his way again, wondering whether the assassin might decide to be offended simply by her scrutiny, but it quickly became clear his attention was elsewhere.
Faster than thought, before she could draw a single breath, that enormous sword moved, seemingly without effort, flashing from hand to gauntleted hand in a whirling arc that ended with the point of the blade resting in the center of the prince’s cravat.
With a soundless slither, the silken cravat separated and fell from the prince’s neck.
One of the nearby officials let out a high pitched scream of terror and crashed to the marble floor in a dead faint.
And Prince Vaniell—the vain, party-loving playboy—never so much as flinched.
How very interesting.
Unless Leisa was very much mistaken, curtsies had officially become the very least of her worries.
Chapter 3
The princess was watching him.
And beneath the strange weight of her gaze, the Raven could tell at once that she was not what he expected. Not what anyone expected.
In size and shape, she was still the slender, colorless creature that gazed lifelessly out of the portrait in the prince’s quarters. Still the mousy, unassuming woman the king had demanded his son woo and marry.
Her appearance lied.
But then, so did his. The point, he supposed, of all that armor. They hadn’t needed so much metal to chain him, but it served its purpose. To terrify and intimidate.
Just as the princess’s outer “armor” served to make her appear fragile and harmless.
He would have wagered there was nothing fragile or harmless about her, but there was no one to wager with. And in any case, he had no plans to share his observations. No one cared what he saw or what he thought. He was mute judgment made flesh, and he did only what his master commanded.
His master, who seemed to have forgotten that beneath the armor of his bodyguard lay the heart and mind of a living, breathing creature. To Melger, the Raven was no more than a thing—a tool to be used and not regarded unless it broke.
And he would not, could not break. After ten years beneath the weight of these chains forged by magic and steel, his life had been reduced to a single quest.
Revenge.
That revenge took many shapes in the private chambers of his imagination. The sweetest, most beautiful shape was death, and the Raven was almost past caring whose. Any death would do—any death besides those demanded by the king—but even that seemed no more than a distant dream.
More often, the shape of his revenge was defiance.
The opportunities were rare. His captor was as canny as he was evil, and rarely allowed more than a sliver of space for interpretation in his carefully worded orders.
But in the unrelenting darkness that was the Raven’s existence, that sliver had become his life. The sole reason he continued to draw breath.
If he could have, he would have chosen to end those breaths and thus end his slavery forever. He was not given even that choice.
For the first few years, he remembered feeling only rage. Raw and impotent. Fury at his foolishness, at the betrayal that had brought him to his knees, at the pitiless hypocrite who held his leash.
Now, there was no heat left to fuel his fury. He was cold as the winter’s snow, warmed only by the creeping tendrils of magic that drove him, and had seeped so far into his soul that he feared there was little left but darkness.
Once, he’d had a name. Now, he was nothing. Only dark purpose. King’s Raven, cloaked in the blood and the screams of the king’s enemies.
And he had been staring at the princess for long enough that she seemed to feel it—feel the weight of his gaze, or perhaps the pull of the darkness that cloaked him.
Whatever she sensed, she began to sway on her feet, like a fir tree in the winds of winter.
“I… I… oh dear,” she murmured, and fell.
But before she lost the battle with gravity, the Raven caught the stray edge of a thought that trickled through the control bond.
We can’t have her hurting herself. Farhall will blame us.
It was one of those rare moments where he had a choice. A true command had not been made, but he could interpret it as one. We can’t have her hurting herself. And he found that he wanted to get closer. Close enough to determine what she might be hiding. Close enough to find out whether he could see beneath her armor.
So he moved. He still possessed the lightning-swift grace of his people, and it was little challenge to catch her before she hit the floor.
Little challenge once she rested in his arms to determine that her faint was as genuine as Vaniell’s protestations of devotion.
And yet, she remained limp, her eyes closed as she feigned unconsciousness.
He held her suspended above the floor—her slight weight barely a burden in his arms—until, after a few moments, her emerald green eyes fluttered open.
After an instant of confusion, they landed on his mask, and she momentarily stopped breathing. Like a prey animal sensing a predator, her slender body tensed, preparing to fight or run, while her pulse accelerated wildly beneath her skin—a deer, caught in the sights of a hunting wyvern. The scent of her terror hit him, and he felt himself recoil in frustration.
Was it the armor? Or was it him? He would never know. All he knew was that no one could face him without fear, and his nose would be forever filled with the stench of that emotion.
Words pierced his focus.