Song of Blood & Stone (Earthsinger Chronicles #1)(46)

She threaded her fingers through his hair, so short now there was barely anything to hold on to, and pulled his head up so she could peer into his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“I don’t want you to think that I . . . that I care what anyone else thinks. I just don’t want it to be harder for you than it has to be.”

“All right.” A quiet acceptance of an unavoidable fact. “What have you said about my presence here?”

He settled onto his elbows, still on top of her, and her core warmed at the press of him against her.

“You are my honored guest. You saved my life and lost your home in the process. There may even be a medal involved.”

She matched his smile, battling the sadness that kept creeping in from the corners. The clock struck the quarter hour.

“You really should go and get some sleep,” she said, smoothing a finger across his brow. “Can you discreetly get back to your rooms?”

He sighed, rising to a knee. “I can use the back passageways. There are hidden corridors throughout the palace too narrow for the servants to bother with. I used to hide in them as a child.” He reached for her. “How I wish I could stay beside you the whole night.”

She did not give voice to all the things she wished that would never be.

He stood, finally, retrieving his scattered clothing and dressing. Jasminda admired each of his body parts as they were hidden from her view. Now that he was no longer naked, her mind cleared enough to remember her plans.

“Might an honored guest of the Prince Regent get a ride down the mountain?”

His brow furrowed. “Certainly. I’ll have Usher, my valet, assign you a driver. Where do you want to go?”

She wasn’t sure she wanted to share with him the real reason she’d come to Rosira. It felt too personal, the wound far closer to the surface than she’d thought. But there was no point in hiding it; her driver would no doubt reveal her destination if questioned.

“My mother’s family is here. I want to see them.”

Jack paused his fumbling with the buttons of his sleeves. He stood across the room and nodded once, simply, with a look just as intimate as what they’d shared that night. She’d expected questions, for him to perhaps scoff at her errand or even rail against her family’s abandonment. But his look said he understood the whirling emotion wrestling within her. That he knew how hard this was for her and why she had to do it.

She glimpsed a well of pain inside him she had never seen before, one that tugged at her in a new way. And it made it all the more difficult when he kissed her good-bye and walked out the door.





CHAPTER SIX


The address Jasminda had been writing to for the past two years was a fifteen-minute drive from the palace. Situated in an obviously well-to-do neighborhood, it sat midway up the steep incline of Rosira’s skyline. Two stories of butter-colored stucco, topped with a red-tiled roof, loomed over her. Bushes trimmed in perfect spheres decorated the tiny front yard. The breeze off the ocean rippled her hair as she exited the backseat of the town car Jack’s valet had provided for her.

A gated driveway led to a small carriage house in the back. She wasn’t prepared for the grandeur. The house was nowhere near the scope of the palace, but it was a far cry from the cabin she’d grown up in. Even the windows were ornate, rectangular at the bottom but arched at the top. How could Mama have lived here? Had she felt as stifled as Jasminda did simply looking at the home’s exterior? Or had she secretly longed for this life from her place in exile on the borderlands?

Jasminda stood before the massive, double wooden doors and ran her fingertips over the brass door knocker before raising it and rapping three times. While waiting for a response, she struggled to figure out what to say. No words had come to her in the days since she’d first thought of confronting her grandmother. Perhaps the words would find her tongue once the two were face-to-face.

The door opened, revealing a white-haired woman, not strict or severe in appearance as Jasminda had imagined, but plump and inviting with Mama’s golden eyes. Those eyes widened as they took in Jasminda from head to toe.

She tugged self-consciously at her dress. Nadal had arrived that morning with a stunning array of clothing for her to choose from, hemlines ranging from a respectable mid-calf to an eyebrow-raising above-the-knee. Beading, sequins, and tassels adorned the collection. But she had chosen the simplest frock, cream-colored and stylishly loose-fitting, with a waistline that grazed her hips. Now she wished she’d selected something fancier, something that screamed, I’m staying in the palace and am the very close acquaintance of the Prince Regent.

Her grandmother’s gaze flicked to the shining auto parked in front, with the uniformed driver in place, then back to Jasminda in confusion.

Jasminda notched her head higher. “Olivesse Zinadeel?” she said.

“Yes?” Her grandmother’s voice was reedy, nothing like the rich tones of Mama’s.

“I’m Jasminda. Emi’s daughter.”

All the color drained from the old woman’s face, and she did another full body scan of Jasminda. Searching for similarities? There weren’t many to see on the outside. Everything that made Jasminda like her mother was on the inside. Her love of gardening and making things grow. Her thirst for knowledge and hunger for books. But she liked to think she was more practical than Mama had been, not as much of a romantic. Still, when her grandmother snapped her mouth shut and shook her head, pain cleaved her heart in two.