The Winter King

CHAPTER 3

The Treasure of the Tower

Khamsin approached the closed, freshly gleaming double doors leading to the Queen’s Bower. Once more garbed in a gray servant’s dress with a cap to cover her distinctive hair and a white bandage wrapped around her wrist to hide her Summerlea Rose, she carried a stack of freshly laundered towels as her excuse to get inside the bower and access the solar to retrieve her mother’s things.

The Winter King was in the map room with her father, working out the terms of surrender. Khamsin knew enough about diplomatic negotiations to know he would be gone for hours. Plenty of time for her to retrieve her mother’s most treasured belongings.

The Wintercraig guards standing outside the bower doors searched her from head to toe and inspected the pile of towels for hidden weapons. She explained the bandage on her wrist as a burn from the pressing iron and bit her lip to hold back her outrage as searching hands took a bit too much liberty near her breasts. If they were looking for an excuse to do more, she didn’t give it to them, and they finished their inspection and let her pass.

As soon as the doors closed behind her, she hurried to the solar door on the southern wall. The key she’d nabbed from Tildy’s dresser slid easily into the lock and turned with a satisfying click. The solar door swung open.

Inside, the room that should have been bursting with Queen Rosalind’s treasures was all but empty, only a few shrouded lumps of furniture and a haphazard pile of lamps, artwork, and personal effects remained.

She wanted to weep. They had saved so little. She’d loved every worn stick, every moth-eaten inch of tattered velvet that her mother had ever touched, but her father’s servants had discarded most of it as worthless trash.

She forced down the anger and useless sense of loss. “Look on the bright side, Khamsin,” she muttered to herself, “at least there’s less for you to search through.”

She stepped into the solar, leaving the door unlatched and propped open just the tiniest crack so she could hear if anyone entered the bower. With a brisk sense of purpose, aware that each second that ticked by was a moment closer to the White King’s return, she began to search. She started with the sheet-covered furniture, pulling cloths away until she found her mother’s dresser, where she’d kept the most treasured belongings. Unfortunately, the top of the dresser had been cleared off, and its drawers emptied. Khamsin turned to the jumbled pile in the corner of the room and began rummaging through it.

Halfway through the pile, she found her mother’s golden brush, comb, and mirror, and that gave her hope. A layer or two deeper, she came up with the miniature oil painting. Finally, near the bottom of the pile, beneath a tangle of long-outdated gowns, she saw the familiar, cracked leather bindings of Queen Rosalind’s handwritten gardener’s journal and her diary. At last! Khamsin snatched the books to her chest and bent over them, rocking a little as her breath came in relieved sobs.

Sounds—the click of a door latch, then voices—wafted through the cracked solar door.

Her heart leapt into her throat. She jumped to her feet, her mother’s treasures clutched to her heart, and tiptoed to the door to peer out the narrow opening.

A pale-haired man in blue walked past her line of vision. The White King’s second-in-command. What had she heard the servants call him? Valik? Then another man, one she knew instantly without even a glimpse of his unforgettable face. White-haired, golden-skinned, clad in creamy silk and a pale blue velvet vest: the Winter King.

What was he doing back so soon? She drew back in instinctive fear, terrified that he might turn his ice-cold eyes upon the solar door and find her standing there.

The two of them were talking in voices too low for her to hear. Valik murmured something and headed back towards the doors. She heard them open and close. Then the Winter King walked past her line of vision again, and she heard the sound of water running in the bath, muffled by the closing bathroom door.

Time to leave. She stuffed her mother’s things in the deep inner pockets of her skirts and crept out into the bower, turning to close the solar door behind her but not daring to lock it for fear the White King would somehow hear the click of the bolt. She hadn’t taken more then two steps when a mocking voice froze her in her tracks.

“Well, well, what do we have here? A pretty little assassin come to slay the Winter King in his bath?”

Wynter watched the girl—a slender young thing in a gray servant’s dress—freeze like a doe scenting the hunter. Her head came up, eyes wide and frightened. She stiffened when she caught sight of him standing in the bedroom doorway, the sound of his bath still splashing merrily away in the empty bathing chamber. Her eyes met his. He smiled, and it wasn’t a pleasant expression.

She bolted.

With a darting speed many a runner in his land would be hard-pressed to match, she leapt across the room towards the doors. He didn’t chase her. He didn’t even call out though the guards stationed outside the door would easily have put an end to her flight. He just crossed his arms lazily over his chest and waited while Valik emerged from his concealment behind a large breakfront and blocked her escape route.

She skidded to a halt, half-crouched, arms outflung, and sucked in her breath with an audible gasp.

“Stay a while, won’t you?” Wynter murmured. He sauntered closer as she straightened and turned warily back to face him. He’d given Verdan the rest of the day and night to decide which daughter would wed Wynter. Was this assassin Verdan’s answer?

He let his gaze wander over the girl’s smooth, unlined face. She was quite lovely. Her skin a fine, warm, Summerlander brown, her heart-shaped face blessed with high, sculpted cheekbones, full lips, and a pointed little chin that had the look of stubbornness about it. Dominating it all was a pair of flashing, storm gray eyes beneath dark arching brows.

“Such a pretty face for such an ugly profession.”

“I’m no assassin!” she protested. “I’m just a maid. I came to freshen your bath before you returned.”

“Truly? But that way”—he tilted his head towards the door in the south wall—“does not lie my bath.” His brows lifted in mocking inquiry.

She swallowed, and he could see the vein in the hollow of her throat pulsing like a fluttering bird caught in a snare as she tried to figure her way out of the lie. “I . . . er . . . I . . .” Stammering, openly nervous, she began to back away. Her eyes darted to the left and right, seeking a possible path of escape.

Well, that was interesting. Wynter’s initial assumption underwent an immediate reversal. Whatever she was, this girl was no assassin. A professional would have planned an entrance, and exit, and a plausible excuse for her presence if she were caught. And Verdan would have chosen someone older and colder, someone who would have killed Wynter, died trying, or slit her own throat if she failed at both, just to keep from revealing who’d hired her.

One other thing was also clear: whatever her reasons for being here, they had nothing to do with tending his bath.

So, if not to kill him and not to serve him, why had she come?

He nodded at Valik. “Search her.”

She stood, trembling and white-faced, as Valik quickly patted her down. Valik’s shoulders stiffened when he reached the voluminous skirts. The girl lurched back, trying to keep Valik from revealing whatever he’d found.

Gunterfys flashed. A single drop of scarlet blood welled at the girl’s throat and trickled down her skin in the shadow of the shining sword tip tucked just below her chin. Wynter didn’t believe she was an assassin, but then again, astonishing though the thought might be, he could be wrong.

“Don’t move,” he advised. “My blade is very sharp, and Valik’s life far more important to me than yours. You wouldn’t want to make me nervous on his behalf.”

She didn’t speak. She didn’t dare. If she even swallowed, she’d pierce her throat against his blade, and he could see she knew it.

Slowly, watching for any sudden moves, Valik crouched down and reached once more for her skirts. His hand disappeared into what appeared to be a deep pocket hidden in the gray folds.

Wynter wasn’t sure what he was expecting. A knife perhaps, or some sort of poison. Odd how disappointed he felt to see the jeweled comb and hairbrush, followed by a matching mirror. Obviously old, obviously of great value.

“Not an assassin, then,” he murmured. “Just a common thief.” He pulled the razored tip of his sword back slightly.

The storm gray eyes flashed. With his blade no longer pressed directly against her flesh, she’d rediscovered her courage. “I’m no thief! And even if I were, it would be better than being a cold, merciless killer like you!”

Valik reached into her pockets again and retrieved a small, leather-bound book which he handed to Wynter.

With his free hand, Wynter cracked open the book and leafed through the handwritten pages, frowning over the detailed sketches of plants and the instructions for their care. “I can understand the gold and jewels, but this? You would risk my wrath to steal this? A gardener’s journal?”

The girl surprised them both. She leapt back, away from the tip of Wynter’s sword, and delivered a swift kick to Valik’s jaw that sent the steward sprawling against Wynter’s legs, knocking them both down. She started to lunge for the journal, which went skittering across the gleaming floor, but thought the better of it when Wynter freed himself from the tangle of Valik’s limbs and tossed aside his sword to advance on her with unmistakable determination. She spun and raced for the doors.

He caught her just as her fingertips skimmed the brass door latch. One hand wrapped hard around her wrist, the other came up to block the close-fisted blow she plowed towards his head. The little fury meant to black his eye if she could!

He laughed with a mix of amusement and surprised appreciation. She couldn’t win. She had to know that. Yet still she fought. He hadn’t known there was a Summerlander alive still willing to confront him with such spirited defiance. Entire armies had fallen before him, yet this slight wisp of a girl dared to grapple, barehanded and defenseless, with the Winter King, a man who could slay with a glance.

He dodged a fist meant to break his nose and laughed again, enjoying himself for the first time in a very long while. How lucky for him so few of Verdan’s soldiers had possessed such raw, reckless courage! A thousand like her in their ranks, and the war might have ended quite differently.

His humor apparently didn’t sit well with her. She snarled and aimed another blow at his chin, which he blocked, as well as a vicious kick to his groin. He managed to block that, too—barely—but the hard toe of her boot still came close enough, with enough force, that his balls tingled from the near miss.

He quit laughing. There were some things a man just didn’t find funny.

“All right. That’s enough!” He shoved her hard up against the wall, one hand curled around her throat, squeezing just hard enough to make his point. He’d let her have her fun, now he would get his answers.

The struggle had dislodged her cap. Long black ringlets of hair, streaked with gleaming white, spilled halfway down her back. His eyes narrowed on the pale hairs threading through the much darker curls, and he recognized her at last.

“The little maid from the bailey.” He regarded her with even greater interest than before. She was the last person he’d ever have expected to find here. “Do you know how very rare it is for anyone who has ever felt my Gaze to risk invoking my wrath a second time?”

Panting, she glared at him. The heat of her Summerlander skin soaked into his hands. She was so soft, so warm. So brave and defiant. More intriguing than any woman he’d met in a long, long while, and undeniably pretty.

“Tell me, little maid, was one brush with death not enough for you? Or did the danger of it simply whet your appetite for more?” He pressed his thumb against the vein pulsing so rapidly beneath the soft, oh so vulnerable skin, and felt the answering leap as her heart pounded faster.

She felt like warm satin. Smooth and creamy to the touch, reminding him how long it had been since he’d tasted the sweeter pleasures of life.

“Is that it?” His voice grew husky. “Was the thievery just an excuse to seek a greater thrill? Perhaps you wondered if the Winter King’s blood could run as hot as it does cold? It can, I assure you.” He moved closer, pinning her lower body, letting her feel the unmistakable—and growing—bulge in his trousers.

Her face paled, then flushed with color. Her eyes grew huge in her fine-boned face. His free hand slid up her waist to cup one firm, full breast, fingers dancing across the fabric until he felt the satisfying jab of her nipple drawing tight and hard. A bolt of static electricity snapped between them, and a tremor shook her from head to toe.

“Get your hands off me!” she demanded. “Let me go!”

Behind him, Valik cleared his throat in disapproval, but Wynter ignored him. He was toying with the girl—in part, just because he could, but also because every cell in his body was stinging with life and heat for the first time in three long years.

Nor could she hide her answering attraction from him, even though she obviously wanted to. One of the gifts of the Snow Wolf clan was a heightened sense of smell, and though it had been three long years since he’d shared the warmth of female companionship, there was no mistaking the scent of sweet, warm musk emanating from her.

If she were even the least bit as willing as her body so obviously was, he would get rid of Valik and coax her into something a little more mutually satisfying than fisticuffs.

His thumb stroked her peaked nipple through the thin wool fabric. The static sparked again, and she gave a helpless moan. The sound burrowed oddly deep inside him, rousing a response like none he’d ever felt before. Possessive, dominant, compelling.

The little maid felt it, too. And it obviously terrified her. She began to struggle in earnest, slapping his hand away and pulling at the other hand still circling her throat. Her eyes had changed color, going from their original storm-cloud gray to a bright, strangely shifting silver, as unique as her white-streaked hair. Outside, the wind whistled, picking up enough speed to rattle the windowpanes.

Valik cleared his throat again. “Enough, Wyn,” he chided. “Let the girl go.”

Wynter felt his nostrils flare with an instant stab of aggression, and his upper lip curled back to bare his teeth. He even growled, low in his throat, like a snow wolf warning another male away from his female.

His response shocked him. Rationally, Wynter knew Valik was right. He was many things, most of them unpleasant, but one thing he’d never been was rapist. He had to let the girl go. But another, far more primitive and fierce, part of him refused. He had to touch her. Just this once at least. He couldn’t explain the compulsion, but he couldn’t deny it either.

He caught her hands and pinned them over her head, against the wall. He lowered his head towards her soft, parted lips. His lips claimed hers, his tongue plunging deep to conquer the sweet cavern of her mouth, while his free hand swiftly released the top few buttons at the front of her bodice. Her skin felt hot to the touch, as if fire burned just below the flesh. He started to slide a hand inside her loosened bodice, but she tore her mouth from his with a cry.

The window at his back exploded with a deafening crash.

Wynter cursed himself roundly and released her. He staggered back two steps and shook his head until the strange, almost hypnotic sexual compulsion faded, and his normal, cold clarity returned.

Fool! Idiot! She wasn’t the assassin. She was the diversion sent to lower his guard!

He spun around, reaching for his power. It leapt at his command with crackling, lethal force. To his right, Valik’s sword flashed free of its scabbard with a familiar, deadly hiss.

Khamsin dove for the bower doors. It wouldn’t take either Winterman long to realize there were no attackers, that there was only a broken tree branch, lying on the floor amidst a sea of scattered glass shards, flung into the room by a fierce gust of wind.

Outside, it was storming for the second time that day, the sky dark with clouds. The wild strength of the tempest matched her own mad, riotous feelings. Anger, fear, and—Halla help her—lust roiled in a fierce tumult in her belly. The skies echoed her emotions as they always did when temper or other strong feelings made her lose her grip on the powers of her giftname, Storm. Lightning flashed, and the first, deafening booms of thunder rattled the windows in their panes. Wind howled through the shattered window, and gusts of still-snowy air whirled inside.

The bower doors burst open before Kham reached them. The crash of the window had brought the guards running. She ducked to one side as the guards rushed in, then slipped out behind them and ran for the tower steps.

Time to leave, before she landed in even bigger trouble than she already was.

Halfway to the stairs, she stopped dead in her tracks. Too late.

The large imposing figure of Maude Newt, Mistress of Servants, blocked the only path of escape. She stood at the top of the stairs, flanked by two young maids who’d obviously come to tend the very tasks Khamsin had used as her excuse to get past the guards.

Kham instinctively reached up to pull her cap tighter over her telltale hair, only to plunge her fingers into bare curls. Her cap!

Newt’s beady eyes narrowed, and her face pruned tight with triumph and naked loathing. “You!” she exclaimed. Her hand shot out to clamp around Khamsin’s upper arm, the meaty fingers almost as strong and viselike as the Winter King’s earlier grip. “I knew I’d seen you skulking around here earlier. What are you about? You have no business up here.”

Her hard gaze swept over Khamsin, missing no detail of her disheveled appearance, not the loose, wild tangle of hair, not the flushed face, and definitely not the bodice unbuttoned low enough to bare the cleft between her breasts. A sneering, speculative look entered her eyes. “Or did you? Aren’t you the sly one. Come to do a little negotiating of your own, eh?”

“You know this girl?” The White King approached, straightening the cuffs of his silk shirt. He’d obviously realized there were no assassins lurking outside in the storm, and he’d leashed his terrible power. His steward Valik followed close behind, rubbing his jaw where it had met the hard edge of Kham’s shoe.

Newt gave the White King a tight, obsequious smile. “Indeed I do, sir. A wild, mannerless tatter who hasn’t yet learned her place.” Her fingers squeezed so tight Kham knew she’d wear a collection of bruises come morning.

She didn’t need the warning to hold her silence. The last thing she would do was let the White King know who she really was. Even facing her father’s wrath was a more welcome prospect than admitting she was an heir to the throne the Winter King had vowed to destroy.

“I hope she didn’t . . . upset you . . . Your Grace?”

Newt looked rather hopeful when she posed that last question, but to Kham’s surprise, rather than admitting he’d caught her stealing from the solar, Wynter Atrialan merely gave the Mistress of Servants a chilly look, and asked, “Do I strike you as a man who could be upset by some slip of a servant girl?”

The woman blanched and hurried to recover from her gaffe. “No, Sire, of course not.” She bobbed a rapid series of bows and curtsies. “Not in any way, Your Greatness. I never meant to imply any such thing. Please accept my apologies.” She started to back away, dragging Kham with her as she went. “Forgive me for allowing this girl to intrude on your privacy. It won’t happen again.”

He looked at Khamsin, and murmured something she could have sworn sounded like, “Pity.” But then his ice-pale eyes flicked back to Newt, and he said, “See that it doesn’t,” in a voice so cold she was sure she must have imagined the other.

“Pansy and Leila will freshen your bathing chamber, sir.” Newt jerked her chin in silent command, and the two trembling maids standing behind her bobbed nervous curtsies and fled past into the bower, all but running as if they couldn’t wait to finish their work and leave.

Her hand still clenched tight around Kham’s arm, Maude dragged her towards the stairs. Khamsin cast one, last glance back through the veil of her hair, and found the Winter King watching her. He had the strangest look on his face, something oddly wistful and bemused. Then the look was gone. He turned to reenter the bower, and the doors closed shut behind him.

“I’ve caught you now, girl,” Newt crowed with swaggering glee. “Caught you red-handed.”

Kham waited only until they were out of sight of the bower doors before yanking her arm from Newt’s harsh grip. “Get your hands off me.” The idiot woman actually tried to grab her again, but Kham evaded her and gave her a fierce glare. “Touch me again, and I’ll make you wish you hadn’t,” she vowed. Little sparks of energy popped and crackled at her fingertips. She was in no mood for further manhandling, especially not by the likes of Maude Newt.

“You won’t be acting so high-and-mighty when the king hears what you’ve been up to!” Newt snarled. But apparently the threat and the little show of power convinced her that Kham meant business, and she kept her hands to herself. “Get on downstairs now,” she snapped. “We’re going to see your father.”

Khamsin briefly contemplated the idea of running for it and leaving Newt empty-handed, but gave up the idea almost immediately. Newt didn’t need Kham in tow. She had witnesses. Half a dozen of them. Even if the White King kept silent, Pansy and Leila wouldn’t. They’d seen her distinctive hair, and their livelihoods depended on keeping in Newt’s good graces.

Her father was going to be in such a rage when he realized she’d openly defied him and entered the tower. Worse, that she’d been caught there by the White King.

Newt herded her down the tower stairs and through several levels of the palace towards the king’s private office. As they walked, Khamsin puzzled over the strange, unseemly twist her foray into the bower had taken. What had come over her? He’d touched her, and it was like electric flame—like the lightning she could summon—shooting sparks through her veins. She’d all but melted, boneless, at his feet. He was the Winter King, her enemy, a man feared for his killing coldness, yet when he’d touched her, she had not frozen. She’d burned.

Her face flamed just thinking about it. About him. His eyes, so pale, so foreign, piercing as if he could see into her very soul. His hands, commanding, callused from years spent holding sword and reins, capable of violence, yet also capable of rousing such . . . incredible sensations.

She shivered and felt the clenching in her loins that left her weak at the knees. Best she stay away from him from here on out.

Far, far away.

“What in Frost’s name that was all about?” Valik demanded as soon as the two skittish maids finished fumbling their way through their duties and departed.

Wynter stood beside the broken window, staring out at the storm-tossed sky. The maids had cleared away the broken glass, but the carpenters and glassmakers hadn’t yet arrived to replace the window. “I don’t know what happened, Valik. I can’t explain it.”

“I’ve known you since we were both infants, but I’ve never seen you act that way before.”

“I’ve never felt that way before.”

“What way?”

Wynter glanced down at the cap in his hands, surprised to find his fingers gently caressing the fabric as they’d wanted so desperately to caress the maid’s soft skin. He clenched his hands, crushing the cap, twisting the fabric in his hands.

“Driven,” he admitted. “Possessive. Enchanted, almost. I touched her and it was like . . . like fire in my soul.” He looked out into the roiling clouds. He could still see her in his mind, her flashing eyes and fierce temper, her hair like a night sky streaked with lightning. He could still smell the captivating, enthralling scents of her, the soft aroma of her skin, the heady perfume of her undeniable sexual response that even now made his body grow painfully hard just remembering it. He threw the cap on a nearby table and turned away from the window to pace the gleaming hardwood floor.

“I don’t like the sound of it, Wyn,” Valik declared, frowning as he watched his king pace. “You dined with the Seasons earlier. Think they spiked your food with arras leaf?” Summerlanders were infamous for their hedonistic ways, and arras leaf was one of their most powerful and renowned aphrodisiacs.

“To what purpose? So I’d plow a chambermaid? Or be off my guard for an attack that never came?” Wynter shook his head. “I’m not drugged, Valik. I didn’t leap on those little fawns Pansy and Leila.” He hadn’t felt so much as a passing interest in either of them even though he’d still been rock hard and aching from his all-too-brief interlude with the storm-eyed maid. “No, it was her. Something about her.”

He paced the length of the room again and paused beside the jeweled vanity set and the worn leather gardener’s journal Valik had removed from her skirts. Nothing about the girl made sense. Who was she? What was it about these trinkets that were so important? And what was that disturbing enchantment she’d cast over him?

“If the storm hadn’t crashed that tree branch through the window, I think I might have laid her down whether she willed it or no. Even with you in the room.” He cast a troubled glance at his friend as a new thought occurred. “Have I embraced the Ice Heart so long, I’ve become it?”

Valik’s furrowed brow smoothed. “No, Wyn,” he declared staunchly. “You might have swallowed the monster when you set out on this path, but it hasn’t consumed you yet. There’s still warmth in you. I’d know it if there wasn’t.” He clapped a hand on Wynter’s shoulder. “Forget the maid, and whatever witch’s trick she’s played on you. Claim your Summerlea bride. Breed your heir. When you hold your child in your arms, the Ice Heart will melt.”

Wynter nodded and took a deep breath. It was the longest speech Valik had made in months. And, as usual, he was right. Wynter was here to claim a royal wife and breed an heir—both for his kingdom and the one he’d spent the last three years conquering.

Fiery little maids—even dangerously enchanting ones—did not figure into his plans.

He would put her from his mind. Tomorrow, he would complete his conquest by taking one of the Seasons to wife, then he and half his army would depart. With a bit of luck and a lot of pleasurable effort, his princess would prove as fertile as she was beautiful, and he’d never set foot in Summerlea again.

Gravid, King Verdan’s steward, cast yet another disapproving glance at Khamsin’s appearance, sniffed. “His Majesty will see you now.” He nodded to the liveried footman attending the king’s office door. The footman pulled open the heavy, carved oak door and stood at attention as Newt and Khamsin passed.

They’d been forced to cool their heels in the outer chamber, waiting while the king concluded his meeting with General Furze and three lords Khamsin recognized as chief advisors of the king’s council. Khamsin had used the time to button up her dress and try to make herself more presentable. She would have liked to repin her hair, so as to avoid upsetting her father any more than necessary, but Gravid had no pins, and Newt had told him not to send a servant to fetch some. “Let her father see her as she is,” Newt had ordered.

Now, with her father’s dark, hot gaze searing her where she stood, Kham realized it made no difference anyways. Just the sight of her was offense enough to him.

Newt took every advantage to play it up, all but chortling with glee as she told him all about how she’d discovered the wayward princess acting in direct defiance of her father’s kingly will, making sure to put the worst possible spin on the entire sordid tale. “She was there, Sire, in the tower, bold as you please. Hair down, gown unbuttoned. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what she was about.”

Khamsin glared at the Mistress of Servants. “I wasn’t there to seduce him and you know it, you foul-minded old bat! Tell the truth, if you’re capable.”

“Silence!” her father roared. He shot a hard look at Newt. “Leave us!” he snapped.

The woman’s face fell. She’d obviously been hoping to witness Kham’s disgrace and punishment. One hot glance from her king seared away any possible objection. She curtsied and backed rapidly out of the room.

Verdan waited for the door to shut behind her, then advanced upon his daughter, his dark eyes flashing. “Is it true? You went there to play whore to the enemy of this house?”

“No, of course not! Newt is a liar, Father. I ran into her while trying to get away from him, and she knows it.”

Her father’s brows shot up. “So you admit you were there. In the tower. When I had expressly forbidden you to leave your rooms?”

“Yes, I was there, but—” She didn’t dare say she’d gone for her mother’s things. To admit that was to admit that she’d been in the tower before, in direct violation of his long-standing royal decree.

“But what? What were you after?” His hand shot out and his fingers wrapped around the same part of her upper arm left tender by Newt’s unkind grip.

She’d be bruised for a week. It was ironic. In the last hour, she’d been manhandled by the Winter King, Maude Newt, and her father. Yet of the three of them, her family’s sworn enemy was the only one whose hands had left no mark on her.

Verdan shook her with fierce, barely restrained fury. “Are you the traitor in my midst? Are you the one who’s been feeding him information?”

Khamsin blanched. “No! Of course not!” There was a traitor in Summerlea?

“Don’t lie to me, girl!” He shook her again, using both hands this time, making her head snap back and forth until she was dizzy. The book and picture in her skirt pocket banged against his thigh and he froze, scowling with sudden suspicion.

“What are you hiding?”

“N-nothing, Father.” The lie popped out, more from instinct than conscious thought, and she immediately wished she could call the foolish words back. Oh, Kham, you dolt! If you’re going to lie, try a lie that actually has a chance of being believed!

“Empty your pockets. Now, girl!” he barked when she hesitated.

Newt she might defy, but not her father, not her king. At least not openly in his presence. She was well and truly caught. Red-handed, just as Newt had crowed earlier. Kham reached into the depths of the pocket hidden in the folds of her skirt to extract the one remaining book and the framed miniature of Queen Rosalind.

Her father snatched the treasures out of her hands and stared at the small but perfectly executed portrait of his dead queen. With trembling hands, he skimmed the pages of the diary where she’d recorded the events of her last years of life in her own hand. The look in his face was horrible to behold. Staggering loss, utter devastation. If Khamsin had ever doubted her father could love as strongly as he hated, those doubts evaporated in an instant.

He doubled over, shoulders heaving with silent, shattering sobs. Heat gathered, concentrated, poured off him in dizzying waves as the Summer King’s own, not insubstantial power, came in answer to his anguish. The portrait and diary in his hands began to smoke, then to Khamsin’s horror, burst into flames.

“Father!” She rushed towards him, snatching off her apron so she could use it to beat out the flames that had engulfed his hands.

But when she neared him, he looked up, and the moment his eyes fixed on her, all his grief, all the devastation of lost love, coalesced into a terrible searing rage.

All focused utterly on her.

Khamsin came to an abrupt halt. “Father?” She’d never seen him look that way at her before. Never. For the first time since childhood, she actually felt frightened of him.

Without warning, his arm swept out and he backhanded her across the face with such force that she flew into the leather chair behind her. She landed, breathless and stunned, fiery pain shooting across her face from the place just below her right eye where his signet ring had smashed into her cheekbone. She cupped a hand over her cheek. The power of his gift was so hot, so raging, his ring had actually burned her.

“You dare?” he snarled, his voice incendiary. “You dare defile her things with the abomination of your touch?”

“She was my mother!” Khamsin cried. Was he really so cruel that he would deny her even a glimpse of her mother’s image or the chance to read a word written in her own hand?

“She was my wife!” He advanced upon her, eyes shining black and vengeful. For a moment Kham thought he would strike her again, this time a killing blow. She gathered her own power, preparing to defend herself, but at the last moment he spun away. “She was the one thing I loved most in this world, and you took her from me. You and your cursed gifts.”

The verbal blow struck harder than a fist, as it always had. “I was a child!” she cried.

“You were a mistake!”

Khamsin’s gasp sounded more like an anguished sob. The tears she’d sworn never to shed again in his presence burned at the backs of her eyes, fighting for freedom.

“You should never have been conceived,” he continued bitterly. “And if I’d known what you would do to her, I would have slain you in the womb.” His rage flared hot again, heat pouring off him in waves that made the room seem to shimmer and dance.

“Twenty years,” he snarled, his voice shaking with loathing. “For twenty years, I have suffered the affliction of your existence and the bitter fruits of your rebellious nature and destructive gifts. I will suffer no longer.”

Cupping her throbbing cheek, Khamsin watched her father with burgeoning dread as he yanked open his office door and shouted for his steward. He would suffer no longer? What did that ominous warning mean?