This Woven Kingdom(This Woven Kingdom #1)(72)

“None before me?” He smiled to himself. “Do you often find yourself in a position of negotiation with spies and cutthroats?”

“A great deal too often, in fact. Why—did you think yourself the first to find me a subject of interest?” A pause. “You may turn around now.”

He did.

She’d pinned her hair back, buttoned a clean dress up to her throat. It had not helped. The modest frock had done nothing to diminish her beauty. He felt bewitched as he drank her in, lingering too long on her arresting eyes, the delicate curve of her lips.

“No,” he said softly. “I daresay I’m not the first.”

She stared at him then, surprise rendering her, for a moment, inhumanly still. Kamran watched with some amazement as a faint blush burned across her cheeks. She turned away, clasped her hands together.

Had he made her nervous?

“I gave you my word,” she said quietly, “that I would leave you unharmed in exchange for your honesty. I meant what I said, and I will not now go against myself. But you must leave at once.”

“Forgive me, but I will not.”

She looked up sharply. “I beg your pardon?”

“You asked for a confession in exchange for my life, which I readily offered. But I never once promised to forfeit my task. I will understand, of course, if you’d rather not stay while I rifle through your things—and I suspect you are anxious to return to work. Shall I wait to begin until you are gone?”

The girl’s lips parted in shock, her eyes widening with disbelief. “Are you as mad as you sound, sir?”

“That is twice now that you have called me sir,” he said, a slight smile on his lips. “I can’t say I care for it.”

“Pray, what is it you would prefer I call you? Do tell me now and I’ll make a note to forget in future, as there is little chance our paths will cross again.”

“I should be very sorry if that were the case.”

“You say this even as you kick me out of my own room so that you might surveil it? Do you jest, sire?”

Kamran nearly laughed. “I see now that you do know who I am.”

“Yes, we are both well informed. I know your legacy as surely as you know mine.”

Kamran’s smile faded altogether.

“Did you think me a simpleton?” she asked angrily. “Why else would the prince of Ardunia be sent to spy on me? It was you who sent those men to kill me last night, was it not?” She turned away. “More fool me. I should have listened to the devil.”

“You are mistaken,” Kamran said with some heat.

“On what point? Do you mean to say you are not responsible for the attempt on my life?”

“I am not.”

“And yet you were aware of it. Does it matter whose lips issued the order? Did not the directive come from your own crown?”

Kamran took a breath, said nothing. There was little else he could say without making himself a traitor to his empire. His grandfather had more than proven how readily he would decree the prince’s head be separated from his body, and despite Kamran’s many protests to the contrary, he rather liked being alive.

“Do you deny these allegations, sire?” the girl said, rounding on him. “How long have your men been watching me? How long have I been a subject of interest to the crown?”

“You know I cannot answer such questions.”

“Did you know who I was that night? The night you came to Baz House to return my parcels? Were you watching me even then?”

Kamran looked away. Faltered. “I— It was complicated— I did not know, not at first—”

“Goodness. And I thought you were merely being kind.” She laughed a sad laugh. “I suppose I should’ve known better than to think such a kindness might be granted without a hefty price.”

“My actions that night had no ulterior motive,” Kamran said sharply. “That much is true.”

“Is it really?”

Kamran struggled to maintain his composure. “Yes.”

“You do not wish me dead?”

“No.”

“The king, then. He wishes to kill me. Does he think me a threat to his throne?”

“You already know I cannot answer these questions.”

“You cannot answer the most pertinent questions, the ones most relevant to my life, to my welfare? And yet you smile and tease me, talk with me as if you are a friend and not a ruthless enemy. Where is your sense of honor, sire? I see you have misplaced it.”

Kamran swallowed. It was a moment before he spoke.

“I do not blame you for hating me,” he said quietly. “And I will not attempt to convince you otherwise. There are aspects of my role—of my position—that bind me, and which I can only detest in the privacy of my own mind.

“I would ask that you allow me only this in my own defense: Do not misunderstand me,” he said, meeting her eyes. “I wish you no harm.”





Twenty-Eight





ALIZEH STRUGGLED TO BREATHE. THE nosta glowed hot against her skin; the prince had not lied to her once.

It should’ve been a comfort to know that he meant her no harm, but she was not in full possession of herself. He’d caught her off guard, out of sorts. She seldom, if ever, allowed herself to get so angry, but today was a strange day, made more difficult by the hour.