A Promise of Fire (Kingmaker Chronicles, #1)(112)

Happiness is a strange, frightening, fragile feeling when you’re not used to it. I turn into him, laying my hand across his chest and draping my bent leg over his thigh. I guess I can get used to the touching.

With a contented sound, Griffin puts his hand over mine. It engulfs mine, twice its size.

I stare at our joined hands for a long time, wondering what tomorrow will bring.





CHAPTER 31


The next evening, Jocasta sends her maid to do my hair. She styles it half up and half down, and I’m careful of the expertly braided coils interwoven with delicate gold rope as I finish dressing for the realm dinner, my nerves in a tangle. Griffin comes in just as I’m strapping on my sandals, and I find him devastatingly handsome in his new dark trousers and snowy white tunic with gold trim. He leans against the wall, folds his arms over his chest, and crosses his legs at the ankles, watching me. He looks relaxed, but his eyes burn, and my temperature rises.

Straightening, I walk to the mirror, feeling wraithlike under the gossamer folds of my new gown. They float around me like layers of soft mist. I’m much too slim, and in my olive-skinned reflection I see a ghost: dark hair, green eyes, hollow cheeks, and haunted eyes. I thought this girl was dead.

Griffin comes up behind me, sweeps my curls to the side, and kisses the back of my neck, making me shiver. “I’ve seen the others. They’re the royals, but it’s you who looks like a queen.”

I shiver again. “I hate queens.”

“You hate Alpha Fisa.” He holds out a thin gold torque, stretches it open, and then pushes it closed around my neck.

I touch the cool, light metal, asking, “What’s this?”

“Decoration.”

He picks up my right hand and slips a ring onto my middle finger. It’s gold with a large, square emerald, light green like my eyes.

My stomach dips wildly. “And this?”

Griffin presses my fingers to his lips. “A gift.”

“From the coffers?”

“From the agora.” He releases my hand. “I saw it and couldn’t resist.”

Emotion mushrooms in my throat, making it hard to breathe. “I don’t have anything for you.”

Griffin’s smile turns wolfish. “We’ll discuss that gigantic falsehood later tonight.”

Heat swamps me, and I flush until it feels as though even my hair catches fire.

“Come greet the guests,” he says, starting for the door.

I shake my head, resisting the urge to fan myself. “I’ll come down later. I have no official place here. I can’t be in the receiving line.”

His expression hardens. “You’re Beta Sinta’s future wife. I think that’s official enough.”

My mind blanks in shock. Then I sputter, “E-excuse me? When did you decide that?”

His eyes turn wary. “What did you think I was going to do with you? Sully you and watch my illegitimate children run around the castle?”

The blood drains from my face so fast I get dizzy. My heart pounds, and my vision wavers. Suddenly seeing it as a betrothal gift, I drag off the jewelry Griffin gave me and toss it back to him. He makes no effort to catch anything, and the torque and the ring bounce off his chest and drop to the rug. “I can’t marry you.”

His tone turns disturbingly neutral. “Why not?”

I stare at him and can’t answer. I’m terrified Andromeda will discover the extent of our relationship and sink her deranged claws into Griffin, but he’ll never accept that, so I don’t say anything.

In the face of my silence, he asks, “Then what are we doing? What are you doing? Live together, or die trying. Those weren’t just idle words. I meant them.” He reaches out and touches my chin, making me face him when I try to turn away. “Did you?”

Griffin towers over me. His eyes probe mine. I wish he were raging. Then I could rage, too.

Desperate, crazy, crushing emotion overwhelms me, and I suddenly can’t believe how much he means to me. A sharp pain lances through me, regret and guilt. My eyes find the items on the floor. If he’d thrown gifts back at me, I’d be spitting mad, claws bared, fists flying, and possibly prepared for a lifelong grudge. Thank the Gods one of us is smart enough not to let me ruin the only good thing that’s ever happened to me.

For once, I get over myself and bend down to pick up the jewels. I slide the ring back on my finger and then hold out the torque as a peace offering. Griffin helps me slip the gold band back around my neck without a word of reproach.

I take an unsteady breath. “My notion of right and wrong is mostly self-taught.”

His eyes remain shadowed, his expression even.

I swallow. “It’s clearly a work in progress.”

Some of the tension drains from him, and his face softens.

My hand rises to his chest. I feel his heartbeat under my fingertips, aware of how lucky I am to have him, petrified of all the ways I could lose him. “I want to be with you. I don’t want to be anywhere else.”

Griffin cups my face in his hands. “I want you to be with me, too.”

I feel ill. My heart is beating too fast. My stomach is in knots. “But I can’t marry you.”

His nostrils flare, and he tenses again, squeezing my head a little. “Why not?”

“You don’t even know who I am!”