No wonder. He envied that hair.
How he could be in lust when his brother was missing?
He was a man, she was attractive, if soulless. It was nothing more.
Since he was heartless, they were a match. He smiled grimly as he listened to her proclaim the scouts and other soldiers and detectives had come up with nothing—no trace of a path, no way to tell where Xander had gone.
She was giving up. Those words and the hint of a glistening drop of a tear in her eyes did not fool him.
“I am sorry.”
“He told me you were in love with him, even though the contract was at first nothing more than words on paper, and a way for you to gain the throne.” She had to marry to ascend, everyone knew this. “That you would allow him a place beside you.”
“Yes.” She didn’t look anywhere but at the distant mountains, where they rimmed the sky, beyond the dullness of the harbor waters.
He thought she had swallowed then. Not sadness, it could not be that. Soulless bitch.
“True love does not give up after a day.”
“I am a princess, with great powers, but I cannot order my soldiers beyond our borders without permission from other countries, or there will be war. I cannot.”
“I see.” And he eyed the harbor too, and the palace surrounding this balcony, the many walls that intertangled and humped each other, climbed over each other. This strange architectural maze of a palace had grown like a tree grows roots. Haphazardly. “I see.”
He left her as soon as was polite—okay a bit before that. He wasn’t one for long, weird conversations.
Outside the gates, Ruff joined him again, sniffing his knee as the creature tended to do.
“What do you think, Ruff? Is this a time for dangerous interventions?”
Ruff twitched his nose.
“Yes. Yes, I agree. You are correct.” John tapped his sword hilt, then catalogued his hidden assortment of daggers, garroting wire, and poisons. “Yes, we should.”
That night, having purchased and arranged horses, then left them concealed in the nearby forest, he scaled the palace walls. Using his memory of the various intersections and climbable parts to guide him, he reached her balcony and slipped open the door latch with his blade.
He woke Princess Po with a knife to her throat, saying, “Come with me if you wish to live.” And he was pretty certain he could do this—keep her alive. Killing a princess was not what he should be doing tonight.
The bed had sunk only a little beneath his weight. He could tell it was a good-quality mattress and so any blood on it would likely wash out.
Alive, man. Remember?
She blinked up at him.
“You’ll have to do better than that. What makes you think that will convince me?”
The answer threw him, nevertheless the spiel he’d rehearsed came forth.
“Why do I threaten you? Because you and my brother were supposed to be suffering from True…” He finally lost track of the spiel and added querulously, “Because I am a perfect killer.”
“Perfect?” Her crescent-shaped scarlet eyebrows rose.
The moon had slipped light through the balcony window, and he could see her, all of her, in that diaphanous gown which revealed more nipple than a princess should show to…
John swallowed. “Yes. I can sense creatures, and I kill without guilt.”
“Show me.”
“What? Now?”
She nodded.
What the? “The rat on the ceiling cornice.”
“There is a rat? In my bedroom?” So indignant.
He drew a second dagger and flung it sideways and at an upward angle without looking. A squeak sounded and ceased. “There was, yes. It is dead.”
“Oh. I think I see it now. Ew.” Her throat moved under his knife blade. “What was it you wanted?”
“You will come with me. I can use you as trade when I catch my brother’s kidnappers.”
“Hmmm. Not enough. Me as trade sounds rather iffy. Kill me and you die. My guards will hear my scream, and I will do so. Stalemate. Go now, without me.”
Such a firm voice. He actually doubted himself, for a second.
“Then…” He reached up and took hold of his spectacles. “This. I have been to Hell and back.” He removed the glasses, meaning he could not, temporarily, see her face in good focus, but she would not realize this. He growled the last words. “Fear me.”
CHAPTER TWO
“ Well. Why didn’t you say?” Fire eyes. Cool.
Which was a strange reaction to have. She should not be thinking that when he could slit her throat. Except, he was Xander’s brother, and it seemed unlikely. There was fear but a toned-down version of fear.
This was almost exciting.
“What’s your name again?”
“John…” He cleared his throat. “…the Wickerman.”
Not of Guerre? The change of his surname added to his mystique. However, her forgetting he was called John, that was terrible and Diplomatic Error #23 in her Handbook of Diplomacy and Spycraft. Names were her weakness. She could recall Pi to one thousand digits but most people’s names, no, unless they were close friends or officials she met daily.
Names withered in her memory into random stacks of letters.
Xander was a great guy, someone for whom she had indeed felt what she was almost certain was love. Love was foreign territory for her, so she always felt unsure, as someone might the first time they saw a penguin. This! This is a bird? Love was like that for her. Her father had been kind, generous, good at teaching her how to run the kingdom, but bad at hugging and love.
She’d wanted, somewhat desperately, to find out what had happened to Xander, but there were constraints. She could not agree to everything, no matter what people thought. The royal advisors had advised her of the perils of interfering further. There was also
