Sara Larson - Defy

PRINCE DAMIAN’S CHAMBERS were in an uproar when I rounded the corner and rushed through the door, sword drawn and ready — just in case.

“Alex, go assist Nolen. Asher, come over here,” Deron shouted the moment I rushed through the door.

The entire guard stood around the outer room, swords drawn. There were also some of King Hector’s men standing near Prince Damian’s door — which was shut. I hurried across the room to where Nolen stood behind his desk.

Asher had filled me in on the way back, telling me that the would-be assassin had been a girl masquerading as a maid delivering the luncheon service to Prince Damian’s rooms. It was unusual that he had been in his room for lunch. He usually joined his father and the rest of court for luncheon and dinner. When the girl had pushed the cart into his room, she’d drawn a knife from her waist and lunged at the prince. Antonio had stopped her in time and supposedly she was now being detained for questioning before being executed.

“Where is the prince?” I asked when I was close enough to speak quietly to Nolen.

“In his room. It was quite a shock to him, I’m sure. He’s not used to women attempting to murder him.” Perspiration dotted Nolen’s forehead, which he wiped with an already limp handkerchief. It looked like Nolen was suffering from quite a bit of shock himself.

“Where is the girl now?”

“Over there.” Nolen pointed to the other side of the room, and I realized the king’s men were not hovering near the door, as I first thought, but surrounding a chair just to the side of it.

Nolen continued to chatter in my ear, but I stopped listening the moment one of the largest men shifted his weight, moving aside so I had a clear view of the would-be assassin. She was tied to the chair and gagged. But when our eyes met across the room, hers widened.

“Asheshka!”

She struggled in the chair, trying to speak around the gag. Panic burned hot in my veins. What was Tanoori doing here? When had she left our village and become an assassin ?

“Why hasn’t someone taken her to the dungeons yet?” I yelled over her attempts to speak my name. “Remove her from the prince’s rooms immediately! Keep her tied up and gagged.”

The other guards looked to Deron. His dark eyes met mine questioningly, but then he nodded. “Do as Alex says. One of us will be down to interrogate her as soon as possible. No one else speaks to her until then, is that understood?”

“Yes, sir,” the tallest man said. “You heard ’im, let’s get her down in the dark where she belongs.”

I watched as the other men took her from the room, still struggling, her neck straining as she tried to speak through the gag. With what I hoped was an imperceptible shudder, I forced myself to turn away, to remain in control. Calm, collected.

“Asher, take Jerrod and Kai out in the hall,” Deron barked out. “No one enters or leaves these chambers without being searched — do you understand? No one!”

“Yes, sir!” Kai responded first. Jerrod and Asher both nodded as they all trooped out the door.

“Alex, you, Rylan, and Jude stay here with me outside the prince’s bedroom door. The rest of you may leave. We have this under control.”

“I’m not sure we should leave. Maybe you aren’t capable of handling this job. The king will want a report of how something like this happened,” the largest of the king’s men said.

“I am the one in charge of the prince’s safety,” Deron said. “If you have a problem, you are welcome to make it known, but not right now. Right now we need to make sure he is secure.” Deron met the man glare for glare. “Alex,” he continued, without turning to look at me, “go to the prince and check on him.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. My heart skipped a beat as I turned, heading to the door of Prince Damian’s bedroom. Hopefully this time, he would be his normal, petulant self. I didn’t think I could handle any more surprises today.

I knocked once and when there was no response, I slowly opened the door. “Your Highness?”

The room was darkened, the curtains drawn. At first, I couldn’t see anything, until my eyes adjusted to the thickness of the gloom. The prince sat in his large armchair, his head between his hands, elbows propped up on his desk. His perfectly pomaded hair was actually in disarray. There was a feeling of heaviness in the room, as though the air had taken on the weight of something unseen, something pressing in, pressing down .

“Your Highness?” I repeated, my stomach twisting nervously when he didn’t respond.

Prince Damian lifted his head, his piercing blue eyes meeting mine. There was a look of such unguarded unhappiness on his face that my heart lurched unwittingly beneath my ribs.

“Alex,” he said, his voice low, in a tone I’d never heard before.

“Sir?” I took a half step toward him.

The prince stood up abruptly, turning his back to me, and I froze. A strange, unaccustomed silence settled upon the room.

“Sir, are you … all right?” My heart beat harder in my chest.

He drew in a sharp breath and I flinched. Had that been too womanly a thing to say? Would a man have asked after his well-being? I was a member of his personal guard — shouldn’t it be normal to be concerned if he seemed … out of sorts? This was twice now that I’d seen a side to him I never had before. I felt unbalanced, as though the ground I stood on were suddenly shifting beneath me.

“The girl — where is she?”

“She’s in the dungeon awaiting questioning, sir.”

“Very good.” When he faced me again, the unhappiness, the something that was in his eyes, was gone. Here was the prince I knew. He reached up to smooth his hair back into place, his motions practiced, memorized, almost lazy. One eyebrow lifted while a small smirk slowly pulled at his mouth. “You will make sure she receives the full punishment of the law, I assume? You, who always puts duty first, right, Alex?”

I wasn’t sure I understood what he was asking of me. It felt like there was an underlying question, a hidden meaning beneath his drawling voice. Sentencing Tanoori to death while practically yawning.

“She will undoubtedly be punished to the full extent of the law, Your Highness. Your safety is of the utmost importance.”

“As it should be. As it should be.” He lifted something from his desk, and rubbed it between his thumb and forefinger. It looked like a trinket of some sort. He suddenly closed his fist over it, and I barely heard it clink against the signet ring on his finger. “I’m quite all right. It was a shock, of course, to have the servant come at me with a knife. But my men are good and stopped her in time, obviously.” A strange look crossed his face when he looked down at the object in his hand — that same hint of grief I’d seen earlier this morning when he briefly spoke of his brother. “If she had succeeded, though, do you suppose anyone would mourn my loss?”

I stiffened. “Sir?”

Prince Damian looked up at me, his expression hooded. “My mother is gone. My brother is gone. My father hardly realizes I’m alive. If I had died today, do you think anyone would have cried at my funeral?”

I stared at the prince, at a complete loss for words. My hands were clammy at my side. “Sir, I … I believe there would be many —”

“Would you have cared?” He cut me off abruptly. “If you had come back from the practice ring to find me lying here dead, would you have cried for me, Alex?”

“Y-your Highness, how can you ask me such a thing?” I realized too late that my voice had come out too high, too feminine, but he didn’t even blink.