She saw it then, the cliff that was crumbling beneath their lives, their marriage.

“You’re going to claim all of Askavi as your Territory, aren’t you? All the Queens will have to answer to you.” Queens who were from powerful aristo families. Queens who wouldn’t want to dine with a Purple Dusk hearth witch, no matter whom she’d married.

“I was satisfied with our life. I am satisfied with our life, with taking care of this valley and its people. Given a choice, I wouldn’t change anything.” Lucivar shook his head. “But I promised her, Marian. I gave my word that, if it became necessary, I would acknowledge the document I had signed that made me the Warlord Prince of Askavi.”

“What happens if the Queens won’t acknowledge your rule over them?”

He looked at her. She didn’t see her husband. She didn’t even see the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih. She wondered if Andulvar Yaslana had looked the same way when he became the Demon Prince.

She closed the distance between them. The Demon Prince would be ruthless, brutal. But the man who walked off the killing fields drenched in his enemies’ blood would still be Lucivar, her best friend, her husband and lover, the father of her children.

“Being the Demon Prince’s wife won’t be easy for you,” he said quietly. “It won’t be easy on the children.”

She wrapped her arms around him, rested her head on his chest—and felt his arms tighten around her.

“Storms and rough winds ahead of us.” She leaned back enough to look at him. “We’ll help each other get through them.”

“I love you,” he said softly.

Smiling, she added an aural shield to the shields he already had around the room. “Show me.”

* * *

* * *

“Prince Chaosti,” the High Lord said with a sweetly murderous smile, “I need you and your Dea al Mon warriors to assist me in a hunt.”

THIRTY-SIX

Unsettled by the latest interview with one of Dillon’s “conquests,” Surreal passed by the dining houses in the aristo part of the Rihland town. She was hungry and wanted food, but she didn’t want to be on her guard every minute.

Now, why did she think she needed to be on her guard? Was it because of the father and daughter she’d just spoken with who had heaped complaints and accusations on Dillon? Or was it because of the Warlord who had been tracking her since she’d left that aristo house?

She chose a dining house that looked clean, at least from the outside. On the inside . . . ? Definitely didn’t cater to aristos. The men and women who studied her when she entered wore the clothes of shopkeepers or laborers. Maybe some farmers who had come into town for supplies and were treating themselves to a meal before heading home. But she’d wager the food here was simple and good.

She was shown to a table at the back of the room and had made her selection from the day’s menu when the Warlord walked in. He didn’t wait to be seated. He strode to her table, pulled out the chair opposite hers, and sat down. He wore a Sapphire Jewel, and the fire in his dark eyes said he was looking for a fight.

As the dining house’s owner put a glass of wine in front of her and a tankard of ale in front of him, she noticed how everyone else abandoned their meals and left, forming a crowd outside the dining house.

“I won’t insult you by pretending I don’t know who you are,” he said, wrapping the fingers of his left hand around the tankard’s handle—leaving the gently curled right hand free to close over the sight-shielded knife she was sure he had ready.

Couldn’t blame him for that. Her right hand was gently curved around the handle of her sight-shielded stiletto.

“Just what is it you think you know, sugar?” she asked.

He looked at her right hand. “You’re the wife of the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan. And you’re Dea al Mon. I’ve heard a few whispers lately that you used to get rid of problems when you lived in Terreille.”

Well, that was interesting. She looked at his right hand in the same way he’d looked at hers. “You have a problem you can’t handle?”

“That depends on why you went to see them about Lord Dillon.”

“I was asked to look into all of Lord Dillon’s . . . liaisons.”

“Then someone should tell you the rest of the story and not just what they want you to know.”

“And that would be you?” She wondered how many other people in the town referred to that aristo family as they in a tone that held nothing but contempt.

He inclined his head. Took a long swallow of ale, his eyes never leaving hers.

She took a sip of the wine. Not a bad vintage. Better than she’d expected. “I’m listening.”

“A while back, Lord Dillon came into town. He’s from an aristo family, but he’s not too far above ordinary folks. Pleasant enough. Crosses paths with the daughter of that family, and she takes a liking to him. Too much of a liking, if you follow me.”

“I follow you,” Surreal said.

“While Dillon is happy to be the girl’s dance partner or escort her to a public gathering, she can’t talk him into warming her bed on the sly. Then a letter arrives from a bosom friend in another town, and suddenly Dillon goes from being a pleasant young man who can say no to unwanted sexual invitations to being a man who is expected to provide sex to any aristo bitch who wants him, because his reputation is being trashed behind calculating smiles. I imagine you’ve heard this story in other towns.”

“Similar stories,” she agreed.

The Warlord gave Surreal a sharp smile. “The girl is a coldhearted, spoiled bitch who is serving in the District Queen’s court to get some polish. If you ask me, the polish she’ll get with that Queen is the kind that will get her killed.”

“Will it be your hand that holds the knife?”

“Probably.”

Oh, he was interesting. “I’m still listening.”

“That whole family cares for no one and nothing but themselves—and they’re a little too proud of their Terreillean bloodlines.”

That was what had left her feeling unsettled—the sense of something familiar in a place where it shouldn’t have been familiar.

“There was a woman who worked at a dressmaker’s shop just down the street. Nice woman who comes from a good family, at least by the standards in this part of town. Met a Warlord at a public dance, oh, seven years ago or so. He was a persuasive and ardent suitor—until she became pregnant. Big surprise for her, since he’d sworn he was drinking a contraceptive brew.”