Saris smirked. “I may not have much power, but I know how to use what I have.”
“Is that why you haven’t conceived yet?” Wycke asked, in as offhanded a manner as possible.
Saris didn’t meet his gaze.
“It’s Radre, isn’t it?”
“KingRadre,” Saris snipped.
“He’s forbidden you from giving our king an heir.”
Saris glanced away, making a production of smoothing a napkin across her lap. “Look, let’s not talk about our brother. You bring me my mate’s regards, so am I to believe he spoke with you?” She wrapped her queenly persona around her like a cloak—a heavy, musty, too-bulky cloak.
A quiet, “A-hem” brought their attention to the oldest living kitchen server in the kingdom's history. “Your breakfast, Your Highness.” How had he gotten here without setting out from the kitchen two weeks ago?
Yes. Broen followed through on his threat, likely paying a retiree good coin for the bit of amusement at Wycke’s expense. The server placed the tray before Wycke, then shuffled back the way he’d come.
Saris wrinkled her nose, which, unlike most locals, wasn’t the least bit pug-like. “Judging by your disheveled appearance and the reek of sex about you, my mate had reason to talk to you. By the ancestors, Wycke, could you not bathe before presenting yourself before your king?”
Wycke shrugged, fighting back the squirming in his guts her disapproval caused. “His men caught me, um… en route to do so.” Yes, he’d fully intended to bathe—after another round with his willing bedmates.
Placing her fork on her plate and crossing her arms, Saris focused her gaze on the table.
A chill swept up Wycke’s spine. He moved his chair closer to her side. “What is it, Saris? I’m sure this can’t be because of a brother who’s free with his affections.”
“Oh, Wycke.” Saris wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in his neck. Her hair mingled with his, with no discernable color difference. She pulled back, wiping her eyes with a napkin. “I have done a bad thing. A terrible thing.”
Wycke shrugged. “Can’t be worse than me.” Not with his reputation. A reputation he constantly strove to uphold.
“It is. I’m not sure if you remember the sorceress who lived in our childhood home. So powerful she could bring or banish the snows, and” —she dropped her voice to a whisper— “call dragons.”
“Call dragons? No one has been able to call dragons in centuries.” If so, Wycke would have paid handsomely to see one up close.
Saris kept her voice low, shifting her wary gaze from one side of the balcony to the other. “Lady Gimitri could.”
He’d heard stories of Lady Gimitri, most of them whispered, none of them good. “If she had so much power, how did our kingdom fall?”
Saris twisted her fingers together on the table. “The Dhugach sorcerer and his mages found a way to suppress her magic, I think.”
“How does a battle you and I had no part in lead to you doing something wrong?” Not that Wycke for a moment believed Saris capable of any misdeeds. Or a misdeed by his admittedly skewed standards.
“She scared me, but not enough to stifle my curiosity. Sometimes I’d go up to the tower to watch her prepare potions.”
“Sounds incredibly dull.” Wycke only remembered being afraid of the creature his father kept in the tower. He’d never admit to spying on Broen’s sorcerer, however, and send Saris into a tizzy of protectiveness.
For lecturing in general, she needed no excuse.
“She had a son named Pieravor.” The edges of Saris’s mouth briefly lifted into a smile. “A lovely child with dark brown hair. His eyes were the same light blue as a winter glacier. I played with him, sang to him while his mother worked. But when… but when… When King Umbri stormed the castle, Lady Nyanda pled with me to save her son. You were just a tiny thing then. Do you remember being called into the great hall while King Umbri decided our fate?”
“No, I’m afraid I don’t.” Wycke lifted a forkful of eggs to his lips. He’d continue the lie to his dying day. He did not remember his sister’s tears, the sorceress’s screams, the scent of blood and smoke. Nope, no memory at all. Usually, Saris kindly refrained from conversations about the day their father died.
Until now.
Saris let out a relieved-sounding sigh, fussing with her napkin. “All the better. When the king asked about Lady Gimitri’s son, I told him she’d flung the child from a window.”
Wycke couldn’t hide a wince. “I’ve heard those stories. How she’d killed her own child so no one else could use him. Disgusting mental image to conjure over breakfast, I might add. Though I’ve never truly believed the tales. You wouldn’t allow that.” She may not want one of her own, but Saris would never let harm come to another’s child.
“No, I wouldn’t. Instead, I gave him to my personal guard, a distant kinsman. I charged him with taking care of the child and sent them far away. I don’t know how, but I believe they went through a portal.”