Protect the Prince (A Crown of Shards Novel)

by Jennifer Estep

  “There has to be some other way for us to come to terms besides my marrying Dominic. Some trade agreement we can work out. I don’t want this marriage, and neither does your son.”

  “Don’t you think I know that? A man would have to be blind not to see how Dominic and Rhea look at each other. I don’t like this any more than you do. It brings me no pleasure.”

  I threw up my hands. “Then why are you doing it?”

  He sighed. “Because I have a court full of nobles just like you do. Several of those nobles lost their sons and daughters in the Seven Spire massacre, and they want blood in return for that suffering. And if they can’t have your blood, then they at least want Andvarian blood sitting on your throne—legitimate blood.”

  He raised his eyebrows, clearly referring to my feelings for Sullivan. First Dahlia, now Heinrich. Did everyone know how I felt about the bastard prince? Probably.

  “But I don’t even know Dominic,” I protested. “And he doesn’t know me.”

  Heinrich waved his hand. “Bah! That’s no excuse, and you know it. I had never even set eyes on Sophina before I married her. The two of you will get on well enough, which is more than most royals can say.”

  He was right about that, so I tried another tactic.

  “And what about Gemma? I don’t want to take a father away from his daughter.”

  Gemma had already survived enough horrors during the massacre. She shouldn’t have to worry about losing her father too—or, worse, what might happen to Dominic at Seven Spire. Maeven and the rest of the Bastard Brigade weren’t going to stop trying to murder me just because I married Dominic, and our wedding would make him even more of a target.

  Heinrich waved his hand again. “The girl is thirteen. She’s practically grown. Besides, she knows how these things work, and she’ll come to terms with it. And it’s not like she’ll never see Dominic again. He will visit her every chance he gets.”

  “And to escape from me, the horrible Bellonan wife that his father forced him to marry,” I said in a wry voice.

  Heinrich shrugged. “Dominic was lucky in that his first wife, Merilde, was a love match. You know how rare that is for most people, let alone royals. Now it’s time for Dominic to do his duty to his kingdom, just as I did mine by marrying his mother.”

  The king stared into the fire again, his eyes dark and distant with memories. I wondered if he was thinking about his first wife or Dahlia. Perhaps both. It seemed as though the two women were tangled up together, just like Dominic, Sullivan, Rhea, and I all were.

  Heinrich focused on me again. “I don’t want to force Dominic to marry you, but the massacre has tied my hands. I can’t be seen as letting you get away with what Vasilia did. I have to extract my pound of flesh from somewhere, and this is the simplest, most bloodless solution. Surely you can understand that.”

  I did, more than he knew. But I couldn’t afford to give up that pound of flesh to him, and I couldn’t afford to appear weak either, not here, and especially not in the eyes of the Seven Spire nobles.

  On an impulse, I reached over and grabbed his hand. I opened my mouth to tell him that together, we could find another way to fix our problems.

  But the strangest thing happened. The second my skin touched his, I realized that I could feel magic pulsing through his body. Only it wasn’t his magier power, and it wasn’t anything like Dominic’s or Sullivan’s lightning.

  No, this was something else—something dark, something sinister, something I doubted Heinrich even knew was there, given how soft and subtle it was.

  Poison.

  Chapter Eighteen

  I tightened my grip on Heinrich’s hand and concentrated, wondering if I was only imagining the sensation, but I felt the same thing as before. A small, dark, deadly current running through his veins, right along with his magic.

  Someone was poisoning the king.

  Who? Why? When had they started? And when were they planning to finish the job?

  Those questions and a dozen more crowded into my mind, but one thing seemed certain—the poisoner had to be someone close to the king. Or at least with access to his food and drink, since those were the easiest and most logical ways to administer poison.

  “Everleigh?” Heinrich asked, cutting into my dark thoughts. “Is something wrong?”

  I was still holding his hand, but instead of letting go, I placed my other hand on top of his and dropped my head, as though I was overcome with emotion and collecting my thoughts. Then I tightened my grip and let loose with my immunity, pushing the cold, hard power out of my body and into his.

  I had done this same sort of thing when Paloma had been poisoned with wormroot by a jealous gladiator in the Black Swan troupe. I had used my immunity to counteract the poison in her body and save her, and I was hoping I could do the same to Heinrich, even though he wasn’t seconds away from dying like Paloma had been.

  Back then, I had been so desperate to save Paloma that I had blasted her with my immunity over and over again until I’d finally snuffed out the poison in her veins, but I got the sense I couldn’t do that with Heinrich. He was already weak, and I might kill him outright if I used too much magic too quickly.

  I also didn’t know what poison Heinrich had been exposed to, but it definitely wasn’t wormroot. No, this poison was much softer, with a sweet lavender note, something that acted very slowly and built up over the course of several months, something that you didn’t even realize was killing you until it was too late.

  I sent the smallest trickle of my power into his body, testing the poison, but its magic immediately pushed back against my own, like a coral viper rearing up to strike. I gritted my teeth. This was not going to be pleasant.

  But I kept going, pushing my immunity into Heinrich’s body one tiny bit at a time, and I realized that the poison wasn’t a viper. It was more like a series of venomous, parasitic vines running through his veins, right alongside his blood. So I imagined that I was a plant master and that my power was a pair of gardening shears, slowly cutting through all those tangled vines.

  Snip, snip, snip.

  I cut through one poisonous rope after another. Every time my immunity sliced through one, the others drew together, tightening their grip on Heinrich and trying to strangle my power. Even worse, I felt the poison reaching out, as if it was trying to slither from the king’s body into my own. I had no idea if it could do that, but I wasn’t going to let it infect me, and I wasn’t going to let it kill Heinrich either. So I gritted my teeth and reached for even more of my magic, using it to shield both myself and the king.

  Heinrich shifted in his seat, clearly wondering what I was doing and wishing that I would drop his hand. I tilted my head to the side and peered up at him out of the corner of my eye.

  Even though I’d only cut through a small amount of the parasitic vines, I could feel and see the change in his body. His shoulders had straightened, his face had lost some of its tight, sickly pallor, and his blue eyes were clearer and brighter. He looked much more vibrant and alive, which encouraged me to keep going.

  Snip, snip, snip.

  As I cut through the poison, those venomous vines grew more and more desperate, and they lashed out at me over and over again, trying to break through my immunity. But I ruthlessly cut them all down and kept going.

  Snip.

  Finally, I cut through the last vine. I held on to Heinrich’s hand a moment longer, just to make sure I’d cleansed all the poison from his system, but I didn’t detect any magic in his body now other than his own magier power. So I rubbed his hand between my own two, as though I was warming it up, then let go and sat back in my seat.

  I dropped my own hands down by my sides, hiding them so he wouldn’t notice my trembling fingers, and slumped back against the cushion. I’d never used so much of my immunity in such a small, controlled way before, and I was utterly exhausted.

  Heinrich regarded me with open curiosity, but he didn’t say anything. Perhaps he didn’t know what to ma
ke of me. That was nothing new. Sometimes I didn’t know what to make of myself. Either way, I didn’t say anything to him. How did you tell a king that someone had poisoned him? I didn’t know, and I wasn’t going to try to explain it, much less my immunity. I had no idea whether he would believe me, and it was a risk I wasn’t willing to take.

  “Are you okay, Everleigh?” he asked. “You look pale. Here, have some tea.”

  He leaned forward and poured some hot, steaming tea. I managed to stop my fingers from trembling long enough to take the cup from him. I sniffed the contents, but the peppermint tea was free of the cloying, floral poison that had infected him, so I took a few sips to be polite.

  The awkwardness between us passed, and Heinrich leaned back in his seat, sipping his own tea.

  “Mmm. This was just what I needed,” he said. “Isn’t it amazing how much better a cup of hot tea can make you feel?”

  “Actually, in Bellona, we prefer our tea to be iced,” I murmured, making inane chitchat. “We feel that the ice deepens and intensifies the flavors.”

  He grinned, looking even more vibrant than before. “You Bellonans are rather barbaric that way.”

  He must have been feeling better if he was making jokes about tea, and I forced myself to return his grin with one of my own.

  “So I’ve been told,” I murmured.

  Heinrich drained the rest of his tea, then set down the cup. This time, instead of glancing into the fire, his gaze moved over to the spot along the glass wall where Dominic had been attacked. The rug there was pristine, as was the glass, but I could still smell the faint stench of the prince’s blood in the air.

  “I can’t believe that I almost lost another son last night,” Heinrich said. “Here. In my own palace. Those Mortan bastards. They won’t be happy until they’ve killed us all, will they?”

  He was talking about his family, the Ripley family, and perhaps me too, but something occurred to me about the assassination attempt. When the Mortans had rushed into the library, they had attacked both Dominic and me.

  But more of them had attacked the prince.

  I thought back. Most of the Mortans had bypassed me and headed straight for the prince, including the weather magier. I frowned. Maeven wanted me dead, so why hadn’t the majority of the assassins targeted me first? Or at least the weather magier, since she had been the most powerful? And why hadn’t they attacked while I was alone in the library? Why had they waited until after Dominic had showed up?

  Unless . . . I hadn’t been their true target.

  As soon as the thought slammed into my mind, I knew that I was right. The Mortans hadn’t been here to kill me. At least, not only me.

  Dominic had been their main target.

  Someone had poisoned Heinrich, and someone had wanted Dominic to die last night. Who? Why? Was some noble making a play for the throne? With both Heinrich and Dominic dead, Gemma would be the heir, but she was only thirteen, and it would be easy enough to influence her—or kill her later on.

  Perhaps Maeven wanted to put a puppet on the Andvarian throne, the same way she had wanted to put Vasilia on the Bellonan throne. Or perhaps this was about something else entirely. Perhaps someone wanted revenge against Heinrich and Dominic. Maybe one of the nobles who’d lost a loved one in the Seven Spire massacre wanted to take away the king’s family before they finally killed Heinrich himself.

  Those possibilities and a dozen others filled my mind, but there were just too many variables and unknowns to narrow down the possibilities and come up with a culprit. The only thing I knew for certain was that someone wanted the Ripleys dead—and me too.

  “What are you thinking about?” Heinrich said. “I can almost see the wheels turning in your mind.”

  “I—” I started to tell him my suspicions, but at the last second, I held my tongue.

  Heinrich had already lost one son. He wouldn’t like the news that there was a traitor in his ranks, especially since that traitor had to be someone close to him, someone with access to him on a daily basis. Captain Rhea, Helene, even Dahlia. They were all potential suspects, along with dozens of guards, servants, and nobles.

  Since I had no idea who might be plotting against the king, I decided not to tell him about it. After all, I had no real proof, just my own instincts and experiences with Maeven, and Heinrich didn’t strike me as someone who would believe a stranger over his own people. Besides, the king and I were on somewhat friendly terms now, and I didn’t want to ruin our tenuous truce.

  “Everleigh?” Heinrich asked again. “What are you thinking about?”

  “Your proposal,” I said, an idea popping into my mind. “I’m thinking about your proposal.”

  His eyebrows drew together in confusion. I turned over my hasty idea in my mind, but the more I thought about it, the more I believed that it would work. And right now, it seemed like the only way—the only way—I could figure out who was trying to kill us all.

  “I agree.”

  Heinrich frowned. “What?”

  “I agree to your terms. I will marry Dominic.”

  He stared at me in disbelief, clearly wondering why I had suddenly changed my mind, but I kept my gaze steady on his.

  “You’re serious?” he asked.

  “Absolutely.”

  He kept staring at me, but pure, genuine happiness quickly replaced his confusion. He leaned forward and clapped his hands together loud enough to make me jump in my seat and almost slosh tea all over my tunic.

  “Excellent! We’ll announce the news at court later this afternoon, and we’ll have a royal ball to formally mark the occasion,” he said. “Of course, a ball was already planned as part of your visit, but now, we will really go all out with it. I’ll get the servants to start working on the food, the guest list, and the invitations immediately. I want everyone to see this grand celebration and realize that both Andvari and Bellona are strong allies once again . . .”

  He kept talking, going on and on about all the things that needed to be done between now and the ball. I let his happy, excited words wash over me as I drank some more of my cooling tea. Heinrich didn’t realize it, but I had just discovered another piece of what it meant to truly be a Winter queen.

  Lying.

  Despite what I’d told Heinrich, I had no intention of ever marrying the crown prince. Rhea was right. We should all just love and marry whomever we wanted, duty and politics and money and power be damned. But that was a debate I would have another day with the Seven Spire nobles—provided that I survived my own scheme, of course.

  I wasn’t going to marry Dominic, but pretending to do so just might help me flush out the traitor. Someone wanted Heinrich and Dominic dead, and I was willing to bet that they would happily add me to their list once my engagement was announced.

  Bellonans were very good at playing the long game, and I couldn’t think of a better game to play than this one. Heinrich had said that his nobles wanted blood. Well, they weren’t getting mine—or my throne.

  But I would be more than happy to give them a traitor’s blood.

  Part Three

  The Third Assassination Attempt

  Chapter Nineteen

  Heinrich summoned his secretary and informed the other man about his plans to turn the upcoming ball into an engagement celebration.

  The secretary’s eyes almost popped out of his head, and the man was practically salivating at the thought of sharing the juicy gossip. No doubt word of my engagement to Dominic would spread like wildfire through the palace. Good. Hopefully, the news would upset the traitor’s plans, whatever they might be, and force that person to tip their hand. Although the downside was that I would have to be on guard until the traitor was caught—or I was dead.

  Heinrich and his secretary were deep into their planning when I left the library. I looked for Rhea, hoping to break the news to her before she found out from someone else, but she wasn’t standing outside.

  I started to head back to my chambers when a thought occurred t
o me, so I asked a servant for directions and went to a different part of the palace. Ten minutes later, I knocked on a door. A muffled voice told me to come in, so I turned the knob and stepped through to the other side.

  These chambers were similar to mine, although not as large and grand, but I focused on the woman sitting in a chair next to the fireplace. Her silver ogre cane was propped up against the table beside her, which boasted a decanter of Ungerian apple brandy and some glasses.

  Xenia was sewing what looked like a small blanket, and she didn’t look up from her work as I shut the door behind me, walked over, and dropped into the chair beside hers. A tea set was laid out on the low table in front of our chairs, along with trays littered with cake crumbs.

  “Did your entertaining go well?” I asked.

  Xenia shrugged, still focused on her sewing. “So-so. I learned a few new things, but nothing particularly noteworthy.”

  “Nothing to pass along to your cousin, the Ungerian queen?”

  She shrugged again. “Nothing special, no.”

  “Well, perhaps a royal engagement will interest her.”

  Xenia’s head snapped up, her attention suddenly squarely focused on me. “Whose engagement?” she asked in a sharp voice.

  I grimaced. “Mine. To Dominic.”

  I filled her in on my conversation with the king. I also told her about Heinrich being poisoned and my suspicion that the weather magier and other Mortan assassins had really been trying to kill Dominic instead of me.

  Her sewing forgotten, Xenia leaned back in her chair and studied me with narrowed eyes, as did the ogre on her neck. “You’re hoping that your engagement will force the traitor to do something reckless.”

  “Yes. And I want you to help me catch them when they do.”

  “How?”

  “We need backup,” I said. “People none of the Andvarians have seen and who have no obvious connection to us. So tell me—where are Halvar and Bjarni?”