Palace of Silver (The Nissera Chronicles #3) - Hannah West Page 0,60
in fine clothes fit for my right-hand woman, she would never outshine me.
“Serve me instead and consider your debt repaid,” I said. “Every luxury that I enjoy will be yours.”
“It would be my pleasure, Your Majesty,” she said, curtsying. We smiled at each other.
“My first request is that you clean up the priest and prepare him for a funeral. You will stay an altar girl until he’s nothing but a brittle crisp on a pyre. After that, you will serve as my right-hand woman.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“But first, tell me everything you know about the sealed scroll. Where is the priest hiding it?”
“He would never tell a lowly altar girl where the apocrypha is hidden,” she answered.
For a beat, I doubted my decision to spare her. With the right threat, I could make a loyal lackey out of anyone. Perhaps she was not worth my time.
“But last night, Father Peramati asked me to summon the huntsman, Severo Segona, for an urgent errand,” she added. “He gave him the scroll to spirit away. He said even the king wouldn’t know where to find it.”
“Interesting,” I said, pleased. “Any idea where he might have taken it?”
“The Father has connections to a group of religious radicals called the Uprising. I think he may have sent it to them for safeguarding. He normally uses me to pass along messages, but he wanted someone quick and dangerous for this, in case anyone tried to intercept.”
“Quick and dangerous,” I mused, rolling the gold ring between my thumb and index finger. “Move the body out of sight for now. Then summon the huntsman to the priest’s private quarters.”
Your first execution. How does it feel?
I feel…riveted.
Nexantius responded with a low laugh and stroked one cool finger down my back. He was everywhere, inside and around me, yet still barely a breath across my flesh.
A knock sounded on the door. Propped up on the priest’s writing desk, I crossed my legs and rearranged my black skirts until they revealed everything up to bare thighs. “Come in!”
Severo Segona cracked open the door and peered into the fire-lit room cramped with bookshelves and Agrimas iconography. When he saw me, his gaze snagged everywhere I expected it to.
“Where’s Father Peramati?” he asked.
“Saying his nightly prayers in the edifice. Come in and shut the door, Severo.”
After a brief pause, he did as I asked. I held out the wooden chalice I’d filled with red wine, propping the other hand on the desk cluttered with inkwells, leafs of parchment, and wooden scrolls. “Drink with me.”
He hesitated before crossing the room to accept the wine, his brown eyes luminous.
“Your Perispi has improved,” he said.
I tossed my cascade of hair to one side, exposing a bare shoulder. “I’ve been practicing.”
He smiled. He was delicious. Every time I saw him, I couldn’t help but imagine caressing his loose coils of black hair, his pronounced cheekbones, his soft and full mouth. The same fingers that had just wrapped around the priest’s wattle now found their way around the distinguished curve of his upper arm. “Do you find me appealing to look at, Severo?” I asked.
“I think you know I do.”
Even though the words were reluctantly spoken, I sighed at the pleasure of hearing them in his husky voice. I hooked my leg around his.
“King Myron has been kind to me and my family,” he said, planting his chalice on the desk without taking a drink. Wine sloshed over the lip and stained a leaf of parchment. “If I had known this was the reason you called, I wouldn’t have come.”
He sounded like he meant it, yet he didn’t move away.
“What my husband doesn’t know can’t break his heart,” I whispered. “Besides, aren’t forbidden things more tantalizing?” I knocked an open inkwell out of my way so I could lean back on my elbows. It spilled over scattered pieces of parchment, blotting out whole pages of writing. Severo didn’t stop me as I slid my hand from his chest to his solid abdomen. Where Myron had become cushy from middle age and endless meetings, Severo’s body had been neatly hewn by his job of spilling blood and rending flesh.
A primal part of me wanted to see him at work.
I reached for his hand and brought his callused palm to my lips. His deep sigh made desire shudder through me.
Don’t lose track of your purpose, Nexantius said.
“I heard the priest sent you on an errand last night,” I said. “Whom did you meet?”