A Promise of Fire (Kingmaker Chronicles, #1)(114)

Calandra of Mylos catches my eye, not only because she’s young and beautiful, but because of the way she’s watching Griffin. She was watching him earlier, when he was prowling around the room looking ten feet tall and every inch the conqueror he is, and she’s doing it again now while he speaks with a group of guests near an open window. Her eyes are as hot as the reception room. “It was the woman who melted the Tarvans. I heard it came from her mouth, so it must have been Dragon’s Breath.”

“But that’s rare, and creature magic. How could she possibly have that?” the man by her side asks. He’s her husband, but her magic is stronger. I know it, and I can also feel it.

Calandra shrugs. “Does it matter? She’s working for Beta Sinta, which means Beta Sinta has Dragon’s Breath.”

“And who knows what else,” the husband mutters.

Calandra answers, even though it wasn’t much of a question. “He’s impervious to magic. He walked right into the castle and seized it. No one could touch him, not with their power, and not with a sword.”

Her tone matches her eyes, and her husband finally notices Calandra’s patent fascination.

Scowling, the man snaps, “I don’t know what everyone is talking about. Beta Sinta doesn’t look that terrifying or impressive to me.” Truth: Gods! He’s huge! If that man looks at me the wrong way, I’ll wet myself.

“No,” Calandra agrees. Truth: He’s gorgeous. I want him in my bed. I wonder if he’d whip me? Chain me? Hold me down? Make me beg?

I grimace, disgusted, annoyed, and irrationally jealous all at once.

“The Magoi woman might turn on him,” the husband says. “Why would a Magoi even work for a Hoi Polloi?”

“No self-respecting Magoi would,” Calandra replies haughtily. Truth: If he looks at me the right way, I’ll do anything for him.

The need to publicly stake my claim to Griffin burning in my currently invisible chest, I continue circulating. A handsome middle-aged man draws my attention, and I follow him into a secluded alcove where he joins a private conversation. When I see who’s talking there and recognize the people from physical descriptions, I wish I’d found them sooner.

These are people I know—or at least know of. Agatone and Urania are the parents, older, but still extremely powerful and without a doubt the most influential nobles in all of Sinta. Oreste, their only son, is clearly the man who just joined them. I had to brush up on a few Sintan nobles myself before the realm dinner. These Magoi weren’t among them. You don’t forget people who try to buy you for their adult son when you’re only ten. They never saw me. It was all done by messenger, and Andromeda’s response was to send the messenger back without any limbs.

I stare at Oreste, shocked by how healthy and attractive he is. He’s a good deal older than I am, of course, but there’s not even a mean downturn to his mouth, or a pinched look around his eyes. He looks perfectly normal and agreeable, and if Mother wasn’t such a snob, he could have been my fate.

“Well?” Urania asks.

“She’s fine,” Oreste answers. “Resting. She’ll be down later.”

I don’t know who Oreste is talking about. I don’t know of any sister, so maybe he took a wife?

“I didn’t expect to be, but I’m impressed,” Urania says, glancing over her son’s shoulder to take in the buzzing, crowded room. Truth.

Agatone arches a grizzled brow. “Sinta’s in a weak position for the Power Bid with a Hoi Polloi family on the throne.” Truth. At least in his opinion.

“I’m not sure…” his wife answers pensively. “If the rumors circulating are true, maybe we’re better off.” Truth.

“How so?” Oreste asks. He looks distracted. He’s watching the stairs for someone.

“These are unpredictable times. Tarvan royals are obviously up to something. And even though no one has laid the blame for the attack at Ios at their feet, I’m certain it was them.”

Definitely my top theory as well. I think they’ve been behind both attacks since I’ve been with Griffin. They have the money to buy mercenaries. And having Hoi Polloi on the throne next door is practically an invitation to invade. But we thwarted them when they sent the Giant after Griffin, and we beat them again at Ios. Unfortunately, officially blaming the Tarvan royals is also more or less a declaration of war, so it’s best to avoid that—for now.

“A few men and one woman massacred every last Tarvan sent to Ios to kill the new Sintan royals,” Urania continues. “That doesn’t happen unless there’s a lot more to them than we know.”

“Makes me wonder what else they’ve got up their sleeves,” Agatone says, looking to where Griffin, Piers, and Egeria seem to be regaling a group of people with a story we’re too far away to hear. Agatone’s voice conveys curiosity, and maybe even respect. The biting, jealous, condescending tones I’ve been hearing around the room are absent here in this corner where I imagined they’d be the worst.

“Everyone knows there was a great flash of lightning and then a deafening clap of thunder over Ios after the battle,” Oreste adds. “What if Zeus got involved to keep Beta Sinta alive?”

My mouth drops open in shock. In the haze and fatigue, that flash, the boom, that great, terrible voice in my head that I’d never heard before and didn’t recognize… It all got lost in the pleats of my memory, all those days without consciousness or thought. Zeus. It was Zeus!