She found another sitting room and curled up on a sofa, shivering, to wait for Witch’s summons.
Daemon prowled the Consort’s suite, stared at the unlocked door that would give him freedom, then turned away to pace to the windows and stare at the Queen’s private garden. He had promised, had given his word he would remain in his suite when that other male came here for lessons.
Not just another male. Nephew. Daemonar. Not a rival. Just a boy the Queen wanted to train because the boy would become a strong man one day—if he could tolerate the boy’s presence enough to let the boy live.
He paced and prowled, prowled and paced in a room that seemed to be shrinking with every circuit he made from door to windows, windows to door.
Had to stay away. Had to stay here. He’d tolerated the arrangement the first few times he and the boy had been here at the same time, had even been able to join the boy, and two other Warlord Princes, in a sitting room beyond the Queen’s part of the Keep to talk about the lesson.
This time it felt different. He didn’t understand why, but it felt different.
Still unwilling to break his promise, Daemon turned away from the door leading into the corridor—and the small sitting room directly across from the Queen’s suite—and tried the door that opened into Witch’s bedroom. It was unlocked, which gave him some relief.
He walked into the room, walked over to the bed, and ran a hand over the covers, breathing in the various scents. A hint of scent, physical and psychic, from the witches who tended the Keep and kept these rooms clean drifted up from the sheets and bedcovers. Nothing else in Witch’s room except her own psychic scent—and his. No indication that the other male was trying to stake a claim in his territory.
Nephew. Daemonar. Not a rival. A Brother in the court. So hard to remember that today because something was scratching at him. Had been scratching at him.
Returning to his own room, Daemon removed the cufflinks from his shirt and tossed them on the dresser, then undid the buttons one . . . by . . . one. He shrugged the material off his shoulders, letting the shirt fall to the floor. Today even silk abraded his skin.
He would stay in his room. He would keep his promise. The boy was no threat to him—or to her.
He shaped his Red Birthright power into a psychic probe that rippled through the Queen’s part of the Keep. Rippled over the boy. Rippled over . . .
Intruder.
Smiling a cold, cruel smile, Daemon unleashed his sexual heat and sent it out to touch everyone in this part of the Keep—to ensnare everyone who foolishly entered his territory. And yet . . .
He recognized her tangled mind and her psychic scent. How could he not recognize her? But today even she was an intruder.
One person where there should be none besides himself and his Queen? That he could tolerate. Had to tolerate. He’d given her his word. But two? Two?
Standing in the corridor with no memory of choosing to leave his suite, Daemon stared at the sitting room door, then turned away. After wrapping a sight shield around himself, he located the intruder and headed for that room.
He was several man-lengths away when she bolted from the room and ran past the metal gate that marked the boundary of his territory.
Letting her go, he went into the sitting room to figure out what she had been doing in there—and spotted the tangled web.
Dropping the sight shield, he wrapped a tight Black shield around himself. Then he approached the table and carefully probed the wooden frame and the spools of spider silk. Nothing dangerous about those things. No spells or traps laid for the unwary. Which left the tangled web itself.
He braced one hand on the table, his long black-tinted nails cutting into the wood, and took that mental step to the side to see what the tangled web revealed.
A minute later, he stepped back, stepped away, his rage so huge it rolled through the entire Keep and so cold that ice formed on the windows, looking like frozen streaks of lightning.
The enemy had no face. Not yet. But . . .
He turned away from the web and headed back to the small sitting room across from the Queen’s suite.
. . . the male who had invaded his territory was part of it, and he would know why, even if it meant taking the boy’s body and mind apart piece by piece in order to find out.
He opened the sitting room door and stared at the boy. Nephew, yes. Brother in the court, yes.
It didn’t matter. What mattered—all that mattered—was the boy was somehow connected with a laugh filled with joyful malevolence, and that sound—that sound—had been laced through all the pain and fear and misery of his childhood until he became old enough and strong enough to fight back. To be the destroyer instead of the destroyed.
He stepped into the room. The boy looked up—and the Sadist smiled a sweetly murderous smile.
Sitting cross-legged on a padded bench near one of the large windows, Daemonar carefully opened the old book of scenarios to the page he had marked with a ribbon. The scenarios—exercises using actual experiences as examples of what to do or not do—were nothing like the books Lord Endar had acquired for the lessons he gave the Eyrien children. From what the Rihlander boys said about their lessons, Daemonar figured they didn’t have a book like this either.
Why didn’t anyone in Askavi have a book like this now? Protocol was important, and knowing what to do in a court was important, but this information was equally useful. Prince Chaosti admitted that teachers among the Dea al Mon had a book similar to this, but the scenarios were read aloud and then discussed because there wasn’t one correct answer since the answer changed depending on who was the dominant power at that moment.
The books he was using for his lessons with Auntie J. couldn’t leave the Keep. Some were too old and fragile. Others were too valuable to be removed from the Keep’s library. It was a concession made by Geoffrey as a favor to Auntie J. that Daemonar was allowed to keep the books in this room and read them here.
That was one of the reasons he always arrived early for his lessons. The other reason . . . Well, he wasn’t sure if he was doing it for himself or for her, but he thought maybe Auntie J. wouldn’t feel as lonely if there was someone in the part of the Keep where she stayed. He wasn’t sure she was lonely, and he wasn’t sure she couldn’t leave or if her Self could leave but the shadow wouldn’t take shape outside this part of the Keep or in the Misty Place. He knew his mother sometimes wanted to be alone—really, physically alone—but other times she enjoyed what she called quiet company, when she would be reading or doing some needlework and the rest of them, his father included, would be working on one of those puzzles that were broken into pieces and had to be put back together.
So he came early to be quiet company if Auntie J. wanted company, or just to read more of the scenarios—and to figure out who would be the best adult to approach for getting new copies of this kind of book made so that he could take one home.
His first choice would be Uncle Daemon because his uncle enjoyed books and appreciated the knowledge they held and might see the value of having more young men, especially Warlord Princes, learn lessons Daemonar was sure were important. But even when Prince Sadi joined him and his father and Prince Chaosti to talk about the scenarios and how they would have responded and the choices they actually had made in similar circumstances, Sadi felt . . . strange. Not sick. Just . . . strange. A little off.