A Kiss of Fire (A Kiss of Magic #2)(104)

Ariana hurried through the halls of the temple to the wing where Vich’s concubines were housed. They had been living under guard ever since Vich had fled. Now she hurried past the guard, another one she did not recognize, and entered Harea’s rooms. To her surprise, she didn’t find Harea in bed laboring to birth her child into the world. As the door was shut behind her she came face to face with Raj Vich.

Shock rocketed through her as she took a step back. Vich looked worse for wear, living on the run having done him no favors. They stood there staring at one another, Vich’s women standing in the background, a phalanx of guards at his back.

Now it settled on her how she had not recognized any of the guards. She wondered inanely if they were all Vich’s men. Was the temple completely overrun? It couldn’t be. So silently? No. No one knew he was there. He was there for only one reason.

Her.

With her he knew Sin would not fight him. He would never put her life at risk. With her he would have power over Sin. Because Sin loved her.

“Don’t bother screaming. All of the guards within earshot are mine. Now, you will come and you will come quietly or there will be bloodshed on your head. I will slaughter every man woman and child in this temple.”

“Including your own?” she shot back, eyeing the women behind him. They looked nervous. She couldn’t tell if they were in support of this man or if they were just wishing he would go away and stop being the cause of strife in their lives. She had not gotten to know them well enough to know what their minds were. Perhaps if she had she would know if there was someone among them who she could turn to for support.

“This is all your fault,” he said as if she had not queried him. “Things were going quite well with my brother. All I needed was an opportunity for something quite accidental to happen to him. Perhaps he would be thrown from his horse and break his neck, or perhaps a slow inexplicable illness, an insidious but undetectable poisoning. There were dozens of options, but I had time to plan it all very carefully. After all, with that Jadoc bloodhound of his, anyone working to harm the raja had to be either completely ignorant of what they were doing or had to be Jadoc enough to block any intent scans. Mordol was strong enough…but somehow you—“ He hissed, a sharp sibilant sound.

“All this time, while he was preparing that room, having that coach forged so they could withstand your power…all this time and I never knew what he was doing it for. Had I known it was preparation for a woman I would have acted sooner. But until you Sin showed little interest in women. To the point where I began to doubt his virility. I thought he might be impotent. How lovely that was. To think he could not produce and heirs that might rival me in my bid for the seat of raja. I even sent Harea here to him. You cannot tell this now because she is so bloated, but Harea was an exotic, delightful creature. Surely tempting to any man. And yet he did not touch her.”

Ariana was fiercely glad of that. The idea of the beautiful Harea in Sin’s arms was more than she could bear in that stressful moment. As it was she was sick with dread and the nausea was all but overwhelming. But she swallowed hard and kept herself steadily on her feet. Her eyes never left Vich.

“As you can see I then took her for myself…even though the last thing I was in need of was yet another concubine vying for my attentions. But perhaps she will be of some small use if she produces another son. One can never have too many sons to secure one’s legacy.”

“It is not your legacy. It is Sin’s,” she said, her tone steady and hard.

“Until he is dead. Which he will be soon. But in order for that to happen as expediently and as safely as possible, I need you. One has to assume that if a man is willing to go to the lengths Sin has gone to in order to secure you, you must be of great importance to him. My spies tell me you share words of love and affection. They also tell me you enjoy quite an amorous sexual relationship as well. So much for my theory that he is impotent.

“You see, I knew it was only a matter of time before he began to get brats upon you and I simply could not have that. So I tried to eliminate you. I figured if he felt as strongly as he appeared to, the loss of you might devastate him to the point of swearing off all women. Of going back to his celibate lifestyle. Thereby giving me more time to safely plan his death. It could not be done during the war…and we were so overwhelmed with the fallout and the land purchase…”

“You wanted Sin to do all of the hard work before you swept in and took over,” she said mockingly. This must have struck close to the truth because his eyes flashed with anger and discomfort.

“As it is I am inheriting a mess. It will take years to sort it all out, to correct the damage he has done.”

“The damage he has done? He increased the size of your country by half! He gave room to those who were living with barely enough space to breathe! He earned that land with the cunning and dedication of a true leader…a thing you could never lay claim to!”

Vich suddenly closed the distance between them and backhanded her across the face. She staggered back, but refused to fall to the ground. She instinctively lit a ball of fire in her hand, but Vich reacted swiftly and punched her in her head. The fireball disintegrated along with her focus and this time she did crumple to the ground.

“We’ll have none of that. Georg here will take control of your abilities from here on out.” He indicated the man Mariah had been flirting with. Ariana’s stomach plummeted. Mariah would feel tragically betrayed. She had been used…no doubt to learn details about Ariana and Sin. Mariah wasn't one to gossip, but in a flirtation one tended to let their guard down.