Descend (Awakened Fate Book 2) (8 page)

“Tiago, you’re such a charmer,” she replied.

“Who’s your friend?” the gorgeous girl next to them asked, brushing a floating strand of her blonde hair away from her shoulder. Another girl sat to her right, obviously her twin.

I tried not to tense at the way both girls looked me over like they were running some sort of evaluation.

“Oh, come on, Siracha,” her sister said. “Haven’t you heard? This is the girl Prince Zekerian brought back from California.”

Siracha’s brow rose. “The spy?”

I glanced to Ina, hoping for help. “I’m not a spy.”

The blonde girl chuckled like I’d said something funny.

“Welcome,” the bronze-scaled young man said, his gaze running over me too, though his expression was anything but similar to the girls’. “My name is Count Velior.”

I wanted to turn around and leave.

“This is Chloe,” Ina supplied. “
Not
a spy. And new here. She, um, she’s from a tiny little place really far from Nyciena, and she’s hardly ever met another dehaian.”

Siracha’s red lips curved. “Country girl. How cute.”

“Be nice, Siracha,” her twin admonished. She looked to me. “You’ll have to excuse my sister. She really hoped
she’d
be the next girl the prince took an interest in, if you know what I mean.”

“Neria!” her sister protested.

The girl just laughed.

I looked between them all, but Ina just shook her head, Tiago was focused on Ina, and Velior hadn’t stopped watching me.

The door felt really far away.

“Have a seat,” Ina said as she sank down. Her long gunmetal tail flicked out over a few of the cushions, and her fin moved idly in the infinitesimal current. Tiago’s hand strayed over, brushing her scales, and she smiled.

Reluctantly, I joined her, keeping as far from the others as I could.

“So princess,” Tiago asked, still running his fingertips along her tail. “How was Santa Lucina? We heard that the prince had an adventure, but we’ve scarcely seen you since you came back.”

Ina smiled. “It was interesting,” she allowed. “Though not as interesting as my brother’s time there, obviously.”

“Obviously,” Velior commented.

Ina ignored him. “I did come across a nice shop, however. Brand new–”

“Princess,” Neria murmured. Her gaze twitched over, and Ina followed it.

From the other side of the room, a young man with silver scales and nearly white hair watched us.

Ina sighed. “Give me a minute.”

“You’re too nice to him,” Neria told her.

Ina tossed her a look like she agreed, but she still swam across the room. One of the guards followed her while, seeming as though he’d like to do the same, Tiago watched her go.

“That boy will get his family in such trouble if he doesn’t give up following the princess around,” Neria said. “Especially after upsetting her with that argument a few weeks back.”

“Egan’s from Teariad,” Siracha replied. “What do you expect? They’re all pea-brained romantics.”

Her sister grinned.

“So Chloe,” Velior said, still eyeing me. “We’re having a party later. You should come.”

“Please, Velior,” Siracha cut in. “She’s the prince’s girl, remember? Do give him
one
day to tire of his little country tryst.”

“Siracha!” Neria chastised.

“She could still come,” Velior replied with a smile. “After all, she has all night to join him in his bed.”

I blinked, heat racing up to color my cheeks. “Um, Zeke and I aren’t, uh…”

Siracha laughed, a scornful and knowing expression on her face.

I looked away, uncertain whether to be offended or embarrassed. Or both. I’d met these people five seconds ago, and already they’d concluded I was sleeping with the prince of their kingdom.

What the hell?

“E-excuse me,” I said, rising from the cushions.

“What did we say?” Siracha called.

Ignoring her, I headed for the door, and the guards moved immediately to stay near me.

Ina swam up as I reached the far side of the room. “What happened? You alright?”

I stared at her, incredulous. “Fine, except they all seem to think I’m sleeping with your brother.”

Ina paused. “Oh, they were just joking around.”

I could read the fact she’d thought it too on her face. I turned away.

“Hey,” Ina said, catching my arm.

I looked back at her.

Her face twisted with frustration. “I’m sorry, alright? Zeke’s bringing you back with him is the latest bit of gossip, and everyone just assumed…” She shrugged expressively.

I headed out the door.

She swam after me. “Chloe,” she called.

A guard cut me off, forcing me to stop.

Ina pulled up alongside me and waved him off.

“Come here,” she told me, gesturing to an alcove in the wall.

Without many other options, I followed her. The guards automatically formed a perimeter around us, keeping the servants and courtiers away.

“Look,” Ina sighed. “No one meant anything by it.” She paused. “Well, besides Siracha. The girl’s a snake, though of course she doesn’t let my brothers see that. And Velior just wants whatever he thinks the princes have. It’s not personal. But Zeke… he likes you, okay? I can tell. Two seconds around him and I can tell, even if for
some
reason he apparently hasn’t admitted it to you or himself.”

My brow furrowed. He’d never shown the least sign of that.

Ina didn’t pause. “And I’m guessing a lot of the girls who are used to getting his attention will notice it soon too, if they haven’t already. So they’re going to assume things. It’s kind of our nature. Human nature too, for that matter.”

I struggled to keep from grimacing and mostly failed.

“Don’t let it bother you,” Ina finished.

I managed a nod, though the grimace didn’t fade.

A small noise of frustration escaped her, and I followed her gaze to the silver-scaled young man. He was swimming toward us again.

“Guys?” Ina said to the guards.

One of them separated from the group and moved to intercept him.

“Let’s go to my apartment,” Ina continued to me. “Court’s boring today.”

Without waiting for a response, she swam up through the main corridor. The guards around me, I followed.

Dehaians bowed as always when she passed, but now I felt their gazes trailing us more than ever. How many knew the palace gossip?

A trio of snobbish-looking courtiers swam by, bowing to the princess and then studying me as we continued on.

I tried not to sigh. Probably all of them.

Not that it mattered, honestly. Ren’s belief I was a spy was a
much
more critical problem than the opinions of a bunch of dehaian busybodies.

It was just annoying.

Really annoying. Now that I watched for it, I could see courtiers whispering behind their hands as we passed, while their gazes tracked me with knowing expressions. What was it with these people? How was it that everyone just
assumed
, because I traveled here with Zeke, we were ‘
obviously
’ having sex?

Though that sort of made me wonder about him in general.

I shook the thought off. His life was none of my business. For that matter, whether or not he liked me was irrelevant too. I didn’t think about Zeke that way. And not because he wasn’t attractive – God
knew
Zeke was attractive – but because he was part of this world, a world I’d never planned on joining and that I fully intended to leave as soon as possible. And because there was Noah to consider, even if I wasn’t really confident about in what terms. He’d kissed me, yes. I liked him a lot. But I wasn’t sure I could claim we were dating. I mean, I’d
like
to. I
wanted
to. In my book, a kiss like that
pretty
much put you in the category of dating a guy. But I also wasn’t certain what Noah thought and I didn’t want to get ahead of myself. After all, that kiss could have meant less to him than it had to me. He could have just been caught up in the moment or whatever. But regardless, I wasn’t going to just
forget
him and go checking out some other guy now that I was down here. It’d only been a
day
, for pity’s sake. That was ridiculous.

And Zeke had never given a single sign he thought of me as anything other than some girl he was helping. At best, he was my friend and nothing more.

Not that it even mattered anyway.

Feeling like my mind was steadily becoming a pretzel, I kept myself from looking at any more courtiers as I followed Ina back to her room.

Chapter Seven

Zeke

It took me a moment after Chloe and Ina disappeared through the door to want to move.

And a few moments beyond that to gather my thoughts enough to swim up toward the royal suite.

I wished I could claim seeing Jirral had been a waste of time. It would’ve been easier. And while, yes, most of it
had
been useless, that part about the Sylphaen…

Shaking my head, I continued upward along the face of the mountain toward the entrances to the top floors. The cult couldn’t reach us here. All the psychotic beliefs and purifying crusades in the world wouldn’t get them past the soldiers surrounding Nyciena.

Though adding a few more guards couldn’t hurt.

Not that I was about to tell Jirral that.

Servants bowed and leaves of fejeria swayed as I passed. The veil around the palace deadened any sense of the surrounding water and cast a silvery sheen on the mountainside. Up above, I spotted Dad’s guards near the opening to his floors – a good sign that he was there and not off holding another audience with whichever nobles had come to town today.

“Prince Zekerian!”

I slowed and glanced back at the shout from below.

Kyne hovered by one of the windows. When he saw me stop, he pushed away from the opening and swam after me.

“We have preliminary results of the tests, highness,” he said. “Do you have a moment?”

I nodded. “What’d you find out?”

“The mixture is strange. Mostly neiphiandine, but with supplementary agents that appear designed to make it stronger, longer-lasting, and even less likely to be affected or overcome by stresses to the system.”

I grimaced. Those Sylphaen bastards wanted to
sacrifice
her. I’d call that a stress to her system. Why they needed to make sure she stayed in dehaian form while that happened, though…

“How long-lasting?” I asked, pushing the thought aside.

“It’s difficult to say. It would depend upon the young lady’s metabolism, her body chemistry, factors of that sort. But that brings up something else strange. In addition to this, there are other components to the drug. We haven’t yet determined their purpose, but in our tests, they seem to act as suppressants of some kind. It may be that they were intended to keep her body from flushing out the drug, or there may have been another intent behind their inclusion. We will need to run additional tests to be–”

“Yeah,” I interrupted. “Just… whatever you need to do to help her.”

Kyne bowed. “Thank you, highness.”

I nodded. Taking the motion as a dismissal, he turned and disappeared behind the fejeria of another window.

Drawing a deep breath, I kept going toward the soldiers above me. We needed more guards. More
anything
to keep those bastards from having a chance at whatever it was they wanted.

The soldiers moved aside when I reached them and the dark walls of the upper floor hallway closed around me as I continued onward. Compared to the lower levels, or even the nearby floors that held our own apartments, the décor up here seemed more subdued. The marble and gold accenting were gone, replaced by deep brown stone. The appearance was deceptive, however. Gold inlay traced wire-thin lines through the rock, picking out designs of all the territories of Yvaria, though the patterns only became clear when you passed and the light caught them a certain way. Tiny gemstones did the same, speckling every square inch of the corridor in a display that, as you swam along it, began to look like a child’s fantasy vision of a jewel mine. Bowls of translucent opal hung from the ceiling, holding flames that made the walls sparkle, and starbursts of larger gems surrounded them.

Dad knew what it was to impress, and leave no one who visited with any doubt of just
how
much wealth and territory he controlled.

Two more guards hovered outside the door of Dad’s personal audience chamber – the place in which all the nobles tirelessly bargained and clamored to be received, though only the elite few ever were.

“Is he available?” I asked them.

“Dinner has just arrived,” one replied. “Allow me to see if he wishes company.”

“Thanks.”

The man turned and slipped through the fejeria leaves.

A moment passed.

“–and I’m telling you two-person teams are enough. We don’t need to waste resources chasing my brother’s delusions, understand?”

I glanced over. At the far end of the corridor, near the opening to the rest of the castle, Ren swam out into the hall from one of Dad’s study rooms. A soldier followed, bearing the same tense and obedient look on his face that all the guards adopted when my brother was around.

“Yes, sir,” the man answered with a nod.

Ren turned and headed back inside.

I scowled, furious at his words despite my relief he hadn’t noticed me. I didn’t need another argument right now. Not when it was obvious what he’d say to the idea of even more guards against the Sylphaen.

The fejeria rustled as the guard returned.

“He will see you, highness,” the man said.

I nodded and swam by him.

On a cushioned seat behind a broad table, Dad was scanning over a collection of reports, his brow wrinkled with displeasure. A silver tray of food rested nearby, most of it already gone, and additional stacks of paper-thin, bleached seaweed lay on the table, the writing on them indecipherable from where I stood.

“Thank you for seeing me, Father,” I said, bowing uncomfortably.

He didn’t look away from the reports in his hand. “I have officials from Ryaira coming in ten minutes to discuss their ongoing border dispute with Teariad. What did you need to ask me about?”