Page 60 of The Queen's Line

"He's sleeping, it's fine."

My cock was still stiff from my dream, and if it weren't for their words and the strange echo of the conversation that had bled its way into my fantasy, I might've stood and shut my door just to relieve myself of the pressure begging to be touched. Instead, I suffered on my side, waiting to see if they'd continue.

"Why send a perfectly good member of the queen's line up to this shithole province? Something's wrong with her, I'm telling you."

I knew the voice, but couldn't place it amongst the men. They were still all new to me.

"Council says she's missing the Hunger."

"She looked plenty hungry for it in the library the other day. Anyway, the Hunger's just royal bullshit. An excuse for queens to spend their lives with their legs spread."

My fist clenched in my sheets, arousal dying off the longer I listened.

"Think it's more likely that they want her away from the capital and the crown. A princess who cancels taxes? Doesn't suit the council, does it?"

"Saved my uncle from having to sell his apothecary though," the second man said, a little sullenly.

"Fornow. But what do you think will happen in a few months? Taxes will start up again twice as bad, and the council will claim there's no money to put to the roads to bring in doctors. They'll just hit us hardest in the worst months."

"There never was money put to roads. No, you're right. I know. It's probably just a device to win temporary favor before they do something worse."

"Exactly."

The voices hushed as I huffed and tossed over onto my other side, my eyes shut, my mouth hanging open in feigned sleep. I heard the quiet clunk of armor being removed, uniforms unbuttoned, and tried to remember who was coming off guard duty at this time of night. Slowly,slowly, I opened my eyes just the slightest bit, only enough to get a rough impression of who was in the dormitory.

One figure was medium to short height, stocky but not round. That would be Brummer, and he would've been the voice who had an uncle who was saved by Bryony's halt on taxes. I waited, and waited more, but whoever the man was urging the conversation against Bryony, he never stepped in front of my door. Brummer slunk away into his bunk, and I lay awake in my bed, running the conversation through my head.

Did they think Bryony was conspiring with the council, or was the council conspiringagainstthe princess? I couldn't make heads or tails of it.

Either they want her to disappear up here, or she'll leave soon.The words from my dream—overheard and bleeding through fantasy—echoed again.

I wasn't even sure I'd really heard the words, or if the dream had impossibly manufactured the thought. With the first raucous snores from the guard's sleep, I sat up and moved to dress. The sky was still black with the middle of the night and my shift wouldn't start for hours. I was familiar with the slight purpling shift of color that meant dawn was approaching and it was still a long way off, but I was too uneasy to go back to sleep. I dressed in my uniform and my belt and sword sheath but left my armor behind. I moved better without it, and it was more for show than function.

I stopped in the doorway of the dormitory, waiting to see if Brummer or his conversational companion woke. There were others sleeping in the room. Yorley was missing, likely down in Rumsbrooke drinking at a tavern. I studied the men in their beds, running through a checklist of who I couldnothave heard, and who it might've been, landing finally on Nicholas Walsh. Nicholas Walsh was older, but good looking, and had been a well-respected captain in the army until he aged out without promotion. He never looked me in the eye when he spoke to me, and I wasn't sure if it was because I was darker than him and he didn't like it, or because he thought he should have my position instead. I'd be watching him now.

I moved softly through the dorm and up to the palace, checking every guard in their station on my way, ignoring their glares. I was their nanny, checking needlessly on her charges. Except I wasn't so sure it was needless. My instincts as a man told me most of these guards didn't see any nobility in their position. My instincts as an animal told me there was a threat, vague and distant, and that it was time to keep an eye on what was important.

"What are you doing up?" Stanley Piper whispered as I joined him in the princess's hall.

"Not sleeping. You can stay or you can take a free night off," I answered, keeping my voice low.

Stanley's brows bounced at the offer. I didn't dislike Stanley, he was young and quiet and had a slight limp that was always worse after a night standing on duty.

"Fine," he said with a shrug and a nod.

I took his place in front of the doors as I waited in the dim candlelight for him to leave. The hall was silent and still shining like new. I stepped forward, just slightly peering through the crack in the door to the suite. It was dark, quiet. My hand turned the knob slowly, waiting for a rustle of activity. Nothing.

The moon was bright enough in the sky, light falling in through the windows of the sitting room to reveal that it was empty, that the bedchamber doors were shut and a little warm light slipped across the floor from inside. It wasn'toutsidemy duty to take a position in the sitting room, even if I'd never instructed anyone to do it before. Princess Bryony had made it clear she preferred a level of privacy and I was willing to give it to her, or at least grant her a good illusion of it.

Right now, I needed to know she was safe.

I stood in the heart of the room, my ear turned to her door, my eyes on the hall, my hand on my sword, and waited for dawn.

21

Wendell

Thao blinked smugly at me as Bryony dug her fingers into his thick fur, scratching behind his massive ear as she lounged against his ribs. Golden eyes met mine, and breath puffed through his giant nose, whiskers twitching and tail thumping against the grass.