Chapter 9: The Emissary and the Edge
The silence in the Great Hall was a physical weight. The Duke's gaze, a shard of glacial ice, remained locked on me, dissecting my every micro-expression for a sign of betrayal. The arrival of the Crown Prince's man was not a coincidence; it was a declaration of war, and I was the suspected fifth column.
Without a word, Lysander stood. The movement was fluid, predatory. He didn't look away from me as he addressed the hall, his voice cutting through the tension like a whip crack. "See the emissary to the receiving room.I will attend him shortly." His eyes finally released me, sweeping over his nobles. "The rest of you. Out."
It was not a request. The hall erupted into a sudden, hushed flurry of movement as chairs scraped and lords and ladies fled the brewing storm. In less than a minute, the vast space was empty save for the two of us, the crackling fire, and the ghost of the Prince's name hanging in the air.
Lysander descended the dais steps slowly, each footfall echoing in the sudden emptiness. He stopped before me, so close I could feel the cold energy radiating from him, could see the faint, tired lines at the corners of his eyes that only I knew the origin of.
"Did you know?" The question was a low, dangerous rumble.
"No." My answer was immediate, unflinching. I met his stormy gaze, letting him see the truth there. "I am as much his pawn as you are. He's checking on his discarded toy. Ensuring it's broken."
His eyes searched mine for a long, heartbeatless moment. The suspicion didn't vanish, but it banked, replaced by a different, more intense heat. Acknowledgment. We were allies in this, if nothing else.
"Then we shall ensure he finds it not just broken," Lysander murmured, his voice dropping into an intimate, conspiratorial register that vibrated straight through me, "but utterly beyond his reach."
Before I could process his meaning, his hand shot out. But not in anger. His fingers, long and strong, wrapped around the back of my neck, not squeezing, but holding me in place with an undeniable possessiveness. His thumb stroked a slow, deliberate arc just below my ear, a touch so shockingly intimate it stole the air from my lungs.
"He will expect a performance," Lysander said, his face inches from mine. His eyes dropped to my lips. "Let us give him one he will not forget."
The cold, logical part of my brain understood. This was a strategy. A show of force for the enemy. But my body, traitorous and awake, didn't care. The heat of his palm against my skin was a brand. The scent of him—frost and sandalwood and pure, untamed male—was an intoxicant. The possessive gleam in his eyes was a spark to tinder.
He leaned in, and for a heart-stopping second, I thought he would kiss me. His lips brushed my ear instead, his breath a hot whisper against the sensitive shell.
"Do not hold back," he commanded, the words a dark promise. "Give him every reason to believe I am thoroughly… captivated."
He pulled back, his hand sliding from my neck down my arm, leaving a trail of fire in its wake, until his fingers tangled with mine. His grip was firm, grounding, and shockingly warm.
He didn't wait for my reply. He simply turned, pulling me with him, our hands clasped together. We strode from the Great Hall, a united front, our footsteps echoing in unison through the stone corridor.
He didn't lead me to the formal receiving room. He pushed open the heavy door to his private study—the same room I'd fled hours before. Now, in the daylight, it was different. The air was clear, the malevolent energy gone, replaced by the smell of leather and old books. The Duke took his seat behind the massive oak desk, a throne of power and intellect. But instead of sending me to a chair opposite, he kept my hand and pulled me down.
Onto his lap.
A gasp caught in my throat as I landed against the hard plane of his thighs, the solid wall of his chest at my back. One arm wrapped around my waist, anchoring me against him, while his other hand came to rest possessively on my knee, his thumb drawing idle, distracting circles on the silk of my gown.
"He will be announced," Lysander murmured, his lips once again dangerously close to my ear. His voice was a low, intimate vibration I felt through my entire body. "Do not look at him. Look at me."
The door opened. Steward Valerius stood there, his face a mask of stoic disapproval. "His Grace's emissary, Lord Tavish," he announced, and a man swaggered in.
Lord Tavish was everything the North was not: perfumed, powdered, and dressed in the capital's latest foppish silks. He wore a smug, condescending smile that froze on his face as he took in the scene.
The feared Cold Duke of the North, seated at his desk, with his new bride nestled in his lap like a treasured prize. My cheek was pressed against Lysander's shoulder, my body molded to the hard lines of his. My fingers, of their own volition, were playing with the dark hair at the nape of his neck.
Lysander didn't acknowledge the man's entrance. He was looking down at me, his expression one of smoldering, focused intensity. He reached up and gently tucked a stray strand of my hair behind my ear, his knuckles brushing my cheek. The touch was feather-light, but it burned.
"You were saying, my dear?" he prompted, his voice a soft, private rumble meant only for me, though it carried perfectly in the silent room.
I swallowed, playing my part, letting my voice come out in a breathy, adoring whisper. "I was just thinking how the winter light makes your eyes look like liquid silver, my lord."
It was a dangerous gamble, a reference to what I had seen. I felt the faintest tremor go through him. His arm tightened around my waist. The look he gave me was no longer entirely an act. It was sharp, surprised, and blazingly hot.
Lord Tavish cleared his throat, visibly uncomfortable. "Your Grace, I bring greetings from the Crown Prince—"
"Quiet," Lysander interrupted, his voice losing its softness and turning to sharp flint, though his eyes never left mine. "Can you not see I am occupied?"
He finally deigned to look at the emissary, and the temperature in the room plummeted. The possessive warmth vanished, replaced by the familiar, terrifying cold.
"You have thirty seconds. Deliver your message and get out."
Lord Tavish, flustered and red-faced, stumbled through a prepared speech about the Prince's "concern" for my well-being and his desire for "continued cordial relations."
Lysander listened, his expression bored, his hand still making those slow, maddening circles on my knee. When the man finished, the Duke was silent for a long, tense moment.
"Tell the Prince," he said, his voice dropping to a deadly whisper, "that what is mine is mine. He would do well to look after his own possessions and forget about those he has already discarded. Now. Get. Out."
The dismissal was absolute. Tavish scurried out without another word, the door clicking shut behind him.
The silence he left behind was deafening. The performance was over.
But the heat was not.
Lysander's hand stilled on my knee. His arm was still a steel band around my waist. My heart was hammering against my ribs, and I was acutely aware of every hard inch of him beneath me, of the rapid rise and fall of his chest against my back.
Slowly, he turned my face towards his with a single, firm finger under my chin. His eyes were no longer silver with pain, but dark with a storm of a different kind.
"Liquid silver?" he quoted, his voice a low, dangerous thrum.
The air crackled. The line between act and reality had not just blurred; it had been incinerated.
I had no clever reply. I could only stare, breathless, at the man who was my husband, my protector, and the most terrifyingly attractive force I had ever known.
The game had changed again. And this time, the danger was a thrilling, all-consuming fire.
The silence in the study was a living thing, thick and heavy with unsaid words and the fading adrenaline of performance. His finger remained under my chin, a point of searing contact. His eyes, dark and unreadable, held mine captive. The scent of him—sandalwood, frost, and the faint, clean sweat of controlled power—filled my lungs, making me lightheaded.
"Liquid silver?" he repeated, the words a low, velvety rumble that vibrated through me.
My heart was a wild drum against my ribs, a frantic rhythm I was sure he could feel. The clever, defiant part of me had fled, leaving only a raw, humming awareness. "It was the first thing that came to mind," I breathed, the admission sounding like a confession.
A ghost of a smile, there and gone so quickly I might have imagined it, touched his lips. "It was effective." His thumb stroked my jawline once, a slow, deliberate caress that felt more intimate than any kiss I could imagine. "He believed it. He believed all of it."
The spell wasn't broken, but it shifted. The heat was still there, a banked fire in his gaze, but the calculating Duke was reasserting himself. His arm loosened its possessive hold, though he made no move to push me off his lap. I was excruciatingly aware of the solid muscle of his thighs beneath me, the warmth of his body seeping through the layers of our clothes.
"He was not just checking on a discarded toy," Lysander said, his voice losing its intimate timbre and returning to its analytical, strategic cadence. He was including me in his assessment, treating me as a partner in this particular battle. "Tavish is one of the Prince's more cunning weasels. He was sent to gauge the truth of our union. To look for cracks."
I forced my own mind to focus, to push past the dizzying effect of his proximity. "To see if I was miserable. To see if you were already tired of me."
"Precisely." His hand, which had been resting on my knee, lifted to trace the edge of his desk. "He saw neither. He saw a man thoroughly… preoccupied with his new wife." The way he said 'preoccupied' sent another shiver down my spine. "This will give the Prince pause. A lovesick Duke is unpredictable. A Duke who has found a source of… distraction… is less of a immediate threat in his eyes. It buys us time."
"Time for what?" I asked, my voice still softer than I intended.
His eyes met mine again, the storm in them now one of strategy. "Time for you to provide more of your valuable foresight. Time for me to solidify our defenses. Time to discover what new game the Prince is playing."
He shifted then, a subtle movement that signaled the audience was over. I took the hint and stood, my legs feeling unsteady. The loss of his warmth was immediate and startling. He rose with his innate, predatory grace, turning to look out the window at his frozen domain, effectively dismissing me.
But as I reached the door, his voice stopped me once more.
"Elara."
The use of my real name, my true name, the one he should not know, hit me like a physical blow. I froze, my hand on the cold iron of the door handle.
He didn't turn around. "The performance was adequate. But remember," he said, his voice cool and clear as ice. "We are not allies. We are co-conspirators. The moment your use ends, so does my protection. Do not confuse strategy for sentiment."
The words were meant to be a bucket of cold water. A reminder of my place. And they were. They chilled the heat he had stoked in my blood.
But as I slipped out into the corridor, his final warning echoing in my ears, a new, stubborn warmth took root in my chest. He had called me Elara. He had shared his strategy with me. He had trusted me enough to stage that intimate, dangerous performance.
He could claim it was all strategy until the mountains crumbled into the sea. But I had felt the tremor in his arm when I'd spoken. I had seen the dark, possessive fire in his eyes.
The Duke of Blackwood was a master of ice. But even the deepest frost could be shattered by the right kind of heat.
And for the first time, I allowed myself to wonder if I might be that heat. The thought was as terrifying as it was thrilling. The game was indeed on. And I was no longer just a player trying to survive.
I was a woman who had just stared into the heart of a winter storm and decided she wanted to tame it.