Etiahrough the first night of the tour with little trouble and, as promised, without causing any House Skalia casualties. There were casualties—a lower-ranked knight took a brokehrough the weakened get during the jousting dispys and hemed on the field; anhter was hit oemple and expired quietly while the healers worked on what they believed were more urgent injuries—but Etian hadn’t been involved iher death.

  Pasiona watched from beh the fluttering opy of the royal stand, a frozen observer, as Etian dispassionately ripped away swords, kicked feet out from under, and generally took apart her father’s best batants.

  He had wondered whether Lord Zinote would order his men to lose in order to please the king. That had happened in a tour wheian was young. It had infuriated him so much that he’d flooded the field with his oppos’ blood until it became obvious that if anyone wao survive against the child terror, they would have to fight for real. That was when they began speaking of him as the sed ing of Josean.

  Ziour held no hint of simir pyag. His men were well-trained and powerful, some of the best Etian had fought, excluding the Royal Thorns. Of course, as his father’s Thorns could only defeat Etiahey worked in pairs nowadays, and Zinote wouldn’t allow his shabby middle-aged Thorns to pete, the local soldiers stood no ce agaiian.

  On the sed night of the tour, in the final sword match, Etiahe boyfriend, Darios of Thivera.

  Darios was uglier up close. After his he herald read out a host of triumphs from the previous year on the northern front. In another life, Etian would have learned from the battle-hardened warrior, but before the match even began, he could see that nothing short of the prince’s death would salve Darios’s fury enough to make him an ally.

  Pasiona ignored both fighters equally when they saluted the king and lord. Her ice-blue eyes skimmed the crowd as if she were bored with the proceedings.

  Etian couldn’t bme her. He already knew how the match with Darios would go.

  The fg dropped. The mad-eyed brute charged. Reckless, unthinking. All his battle prowess swept away by the surge of emotion. A fight that could have been incredible, absolutely wasted.

  Etian ducked uhe wild swing of the greatsword and hooked Darios’s foot out from beh him. Darios hit the trampled, muddy grass on his face. Etiahe point of his swainst the back of the man’s neck.

  Matches were decided by the deathblow, but tour rules left it up to the fighters whether that deathblow was a literal one or an agreed-upon simucrum. Darios couldn’t tinue fighting from this position, which was why Etian had chosen to drop him forward rather than onto his back. It bettered the ce that he could keep his promise not to kill anyone.

  “Priianiel!” the herald cried in triumph.

  Polite cheers from the crowd. A one-sided match didn’t provide much excitement. Maybe the pairing would be better.

  Etian saluted the king and made to leave the field.

  A wounded animal roared behind him. Running boots thumped and squelched on muddy ground. The wind whistled around the raised greatsword.

  Etian spun and spped the bde aside with his bare hand, then cracked Darios in the jaw with the cage hilt of his fal. Flecks of spittle and blood speckled his lenses.

  The blow startled the rampaging bull, but didn’t stop him. With a battle cry, Darios arched his huge bde upward at Etian’s thigh. Etiaeel with steel, redireg the attack harmlessly.

  Darios hacked and sshed and roared like a ered bear, tears p down his stubbled cheeks. He either didn’t care or was gd to know that he was attempting murder and suicide at the same time.

  Etian parried until he saening, thehed his sword. In one swift move, he snatched the wounded bear’s closest arm and, with a sharp twist of his upper body, she elbow backward with a meaty ch.

  Darios swung the greatsword one-hahe pain had yet to catch hold of the brute. Etian ducked ihe swing, caught Darios’s other arm, aed the destru. Then he kicked the weeping warrior to his knees and stepped away.

  “Pasiona,” Darios whimpered to the trampled, muddy grass. “My heart and soul, my everything.”

  Royal Thorns flooded in to take trol of the incapacitated fighter.

  All around the field, the spectators burst out in shouting and appuse. The royal stands were in chaos. Jadarah cackled while Kelena looked on, white-faced and trembling, and Lady Zinote cowered away from the mad queen. Lord Zinote roared orders to his men and assurao his king that this was an e he never expected. A on lout of a soldier fixated on his daughter! She certainly would never have enced such lowborn attentions! And to attack the prince while his back was turned! Well, this disgusting behavior would be rectified, oh yes…

  Through the blood on his lenses, Etian watched Pasiona. In the moonlit afterglow of battle, she was geous, an unfeeling abaster statue. As her lover was being dragged off the field, not a flicker of emotion crossed her face.

  Etian wondered if it ossible that he could love after all.

  ***

  With the tour over, the mood in the hall was festive to the point of rauess, the drinking and music stio the afternoon.

  “Where is your trophy?” Pasiona asked Etian during the feast.

  After the disastrous championship match, Zinote’s wife had presented him with the tour’s swordpy cup. He had no idea where that useless bit of metal had gone.

  “An attendant or thief somewhere has it. Your boyfriend didn’t listen when you told him to stay down.”

  “I didn’t tell him to stay down, I told him if he was going to keep fighting to make certain he died iempt.” Pasiona fidgeted some roast aroue. “You didn’t kill him.”

  “I promised you I wouldn’t.”

  She paused. “He wanted me to run away with him.”

  “You chose not to endanger your family.” Etian caught her ssh and redirected it. “Did you want to say yes?”

  “Who cares for wants?”

  His move was a wild gamble, but instinct told him it was the right one, and since gambles should be uaken without hesitation to have any ce of success, he lunged without sed guessing.

  “Usually I don’t,” he admitted. “I hought I would live a life where mine would matter.”

  Pasiona ughed icily. “I know mine won’t, and I’ve never been stupid enough to wish otherwise.”

  Except while you were in his arms?

  “I’ve had half a hundred noble daughters throwing themselves at me since I was made heir to the throne,” Etian said. “If I’d been forced to marry one of those idiotic peahens, I wouldn’t have been very happy about it either. I know I wasn’t your first choice, but you are mine. If you ever want something, as long as it doesn’t interfere with or harm the kingdom, I’ll get it for you.”

  “That’s a fool’s offer.” She looked at the empty seat down amongst her father’s fighting men. When she went on, every word was drenched in irony bitter enough to taste. “ y a brute oner back from the dead?”

  “He’s not dead. At least, he shouldn’t be.” They could likely step outside and hear his screams. “Your father ahem not to kill him.”

  To assure he wouldn’t fall out of Hazerial’s favor, Lord Zinote had ordered Darios of Thivera be made a cautionary tale for any maertaining the idea of falling in love with a lord’s daughter under royal marriage iation. When the priests were finished with him, whatever was left would be a living horror.

  “Then kill him,” Pasiona said.

  Etian waited for her to make out as if she were joking. She didn’t.

  “That’s what you want?”

  She sipped her wine. “It’s what he’s begging for by now, wouldn’t you say?”

  If Darios of Thivera could still beg.

  “What he wants and what you want may not be the same thing. I meant it when I said I would grant whatever you wanted.”

  “He won’t—” The i her voice cracked. She fussed with her shimmering dress, pretending to find crumbs to sweep away. When she spoke again, she had herself bader steely trol and had unknowingly won the prince’s plete and utter devotion. “What he wants and what I want are the same in this case. No warrior soul abide living forever disgraced and maimed, he told me once.”

  At the avaible opportunity, Etian excused himself from the feast. Pasiona stayed until the bloodsve her ran out of wine.

  ***

  As long as Etian had his lenses on, he was a fair shot with a longbow, and his aim was in top form after the days and nights hunting with woodsmen on the road.

  On the loour field, an impromptu altar had beeed, a stake at its ter. The ghost city hanging above the lord’s manor was nearly invisible in the daytime sky, but the strong gods did not discrimiween day and night. Blood was blood.

  The priests’ motions formed a simple enough pattern, diving into their carrion for mi a time, then swooping away again all at once, like a murder of excitable crows.

  A clear shot to the target opened. A b twanged from deep in the cover of the lord’s forest some two hundred yards away.

  Etian put an arrow through Darios of Thivera’s broke, pinning him to the blood-soaked stake.

  ***

  The royal wedding was set to take p the City of Blood that ing spring, ostensibly to give the bride time to pn a grand spectacle, but in truth to make certain no child was born to the future queen dubiously early.