Deny Me, Dragon King novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: Held

Torren came down from the roof in his man's shape, bare to the waist, with scales still fading on his arms.

He didn't look at the guards.

He didn't look at Rosamund.

He looked at me, at the blood running down my wrist, and at Posy tucked into my chest.

Then he went down on his knees on the burnt stone.

"Show me," he said.

I held out my hand.

His fingers shook when he took it.

"The healer," he said hoarsely, to the air. "Now."

"Majesty," Odo said. "The lady?"

Torren rose, and turned, and every man on that roof took a step back.

Rosamund looked up at him from the floor, with her braids in her face.

"She would have gone down the hill anyway," she whispered. "She would have, Torren, I only wanted to frighten her, Aunt said..."

"You held a knife to my daughter."

"She wouldn't have fallen. I wouldn't have let her."

"She is five," Torren said, in a voice I had never heard from him.

It was very quiet.

"Take her to her rooms. Six guards on the door."

"The Council will hear this in the morning, and so will your brother."

Rosamund started to cry, and nobody stopped her.

They led her away past me, and she didn't meet my eyes.

I felt nothing for her.

Not satisfaction, not pity.

My hand was throbbing and my daughter was warm and alive against my neck, and that was all.

The healer stitched my palm in the nursery with a bone needle and a drop of poppy, and she grumbled the entire time.

Posy slept through it with Biscuit curled on her pillow.

Odo took the door.

Torren stood at the window all through the stitching, with his back to us, and said nothing until the healer left.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Deny Me, Dragon King from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.