Chapter 67

My little heart squeezed then, forcing me to see my father in a whole new light. Had he tried to protect me? Lanzene and Matteau were always looking for another reason to attack each other, so it wasn't quite the compliment I would've wished for, but still… War? For me? I barely fought the urge to preen.

"I told you not to choose a wife from Stormare," Arik said between gritted teeth. "Its strategic importance to our enemies, to our own economy, means that alienating the king was not in our best interests."

Arik wasn't talking to Magnus like he was his king. He wasn't even giving his liege the respect due an older brother. Arik was dressing him down like a small child in front of the entire court, and that couldn't stand.

"Lord king—" one courtier said, bowing low, but the tension was evident in his voice.

"Everyone out!"

He might've been weak, but Magnus had the imperiousness of a king. He pointed his finger to the doorway and some courtiers instantly moved towards it. Others hemmed and hawed, obviously wanting to know more about the military threat, but the king's resolve held. Curiosity didn't outweigh the customary need to obey a direct order from their ruler.

"Magnus, darling—" Giselle purred, but when she tried to sidle closer, he turned on her with a glare.

"You as well. I want no one in this fucking room but the wench that is to be my wife and the bastards who signed a marriage contract that could result in the whole country being plunged into war."

"You do not wish me to inspect your wife to be, Your Majesty?"

Selene's tone was perfectly conciliatory, but Magnus turned on her with a fury that had every muscle stiffening. He surged forward, hand raised, ready to do what, I didn't know. But right as he came close, something slowed his steps… He took in the black robes and then me, a dangerous light in his eyes.

"Yes, Holy Mother, I do. Inspect the girl and make sure she is indeed pure because if she isn't…" He glanced up at Arik, his lips twisting into an ugly smile. "Well, that would nullify any contract anyone might sign."

So in the end, my life depended on one thing yet again: whether or not a man had touched me. I blinked, the room coming into stark focus, so I caught the heated looks each one of my mates gave me.

"We don't need to be in the room when this happens," Arik said in a much gentler tone. "We can wait outside, let the Holy Mother do her job—"

"Why, brother, are you shy? Surely you've seen a woman's cunt before. I certainly won't be leaving the room because I'll be doing more than looking soon enough. If she's intact, I'll claim her, perhaps even get a baby in her belly before the day ends." His lips twitched as he heard a guttural growl come from Roan. "Well, Holy Mother?"

It was better that this was happening in an almost empty room, I told myself furiously as I felt my dress inch higher. At least every bloody courtier in Khean wasn't looking on, but as I felt the cool air of the room play across my legs, I couldn't stop the tears from forming in my eyes. I'd learned to blink them away when I was still a child. A princess does not weep unless it was at a state funeral. A princess remains calm and serene behind her veil at all times. I could almost see cloth around my face, shielding me from their collective gaze, but was it a veil or a shroud I saw? I didn't know as I hissed, feeling the woman slide my underwear down, then separating my thighs with all the clinical cool of a healer.

I'd never forgive Magnus for this. Right now I felt reduced to my most elemental parts, little more than a piece of meat tested for tenderness. My whole body jumped as Selene probed and inspected, forcing me to feel a horrible sensation of being opened before all of them. One tear slid free, then another, the only acknowledgement of my violation that I could allow before her hands drew away.

"Your future queen is still intact, Your Majesty," Selene said in a cool voice.

Well, at least there was that. My value as a woman remained, which just made my lips twist into a bitter smile. Despite everything I had done, despite all I had experienced, I—

"Well, not for long."

The king pushed forward like a greedy child, intent on snatching all the sweets for himself before anyone else could grab them. "You are to become queen now." I watched him undo his breeches with a growing sense of horror, red spots forming in Silas' cheeks as his hands slid downwards. To snatch knives from hidden pockets I was sure, and part of me wanted it so very much, but this was the thing I'd neglected to consider in all my impetuous decision making.

Killing a king before I was made queen, before Arik had identified a power base to support his claim, would just have the lot of us facing the scaffold and some distant cousin being placed on the throne. I shook my head slightly, something Silas caught, even as he stared into my eyes, mutely pleading to be given free rein to despatch this loathsome creature. The fact remained that while he was trained to kill in increasingly creative ways, I'd been schooled in this.

Lying back and thinking of my duty to my country and my husband's, as he performed his husbandly duties. "Just think of something far more pleasant," a confidant had told me once. "A field of flowers perhaps? Feel the sun on your skin and the breeze in your hair, not him." She smiled then as if seeing just that. "Never him." She had blinked then and focused back on me. "They can only touch you if we allow it, in here." She tapped her temple with an elegant finger. I clung to that idea with my whole heart as I watched the king's knee press into the bed.

"I wouldn't rush into that, not if you want to avoid war."

Arik's eyes stabbed so viciously into his brother's back, I marvelled at Magnus' ability to ignore it. The prince's gaze was filled with an unearthly blue fire that threatened to consume the both of them. Magnus seemed fired by a similar impulse, turning slowly to face his brother.

"And what has war to do with my queen?"

"You're not married yet." Silas bent down to gather up the papers that had been discarded, but Magus knocked them from his hands, which made Arik smile. "Stormarian law does not recognise marriage by proxy. If you were in such a hurry to claim your queen, you should've done a little research, brother."

"The contract says that the queen's family must attend the wedding, that she must be allowed to observe the religious rites of her people with a period of purification in the women's temple," Silas read, his voice picking up as he scanned the documents. "If these conditions are not fulfilled…" He looked up then. "Then the marriage and the agreement are voided."

Magnus didn't move, instead remaining frozen half on, half off the bed as he stared at the lot of them.

"This is what you agreed to in my name? This is what you signed as a representative of Khean? You allowed your own country to risk war for…" His focus shifted to me. "A girl?"

He had more to say, the king working up to a right royal rage, when a sharp knock at the door announced he had a visitor. That gave him another target to comfortably unleash his terrible mood on as he jerked himself away and stormed over to the door, jerking it open to see a man in a richly braided uniform standing there.

"What?"

"Apologies, Your Majesty." The solider bowed low. "I realised this is an inopportune moment to interrupt, but I bring word from the borders."

"What now?" he drawled, looking the soldier over. "More money, more troops needed, I assume."

"All of that now, sire, in greater need than ever before." Magnus went still, losing his sardonic attitude. "The wolf shifters, Majesty…"

"What have the beast men done?" he asked in a low growl. "What have they done?"

"Word is some have deserted. Soldiers have left battlefields; commanders have handed their position to the next ranking human soldier. The reports have been coming in thick and fast all day. Beast men all over the border have left their posts."

The soldier was trying to maintain calm and failing utterly, swallowing hard as he stared at the king.

"Both our flanks are utterly exposed, and the Lanzenians and the Mattenite forces are on the march."