I Swore to Kill the Prince I Guard novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Third Thursday
At two in the morning the knight holds his dead sister's dagger to the sleeping prince's throat, and the prince is awake: he admits he signed the order that burned Rask Hold and asks for eleven weeks before the blade, until the door handle turns.
At two in the morning, Evander Rask put his dead sister's dagger to the Crown Prince's throat.
It was a plain hunting knife with a bone handle and a nick in the blade from a boar.
Maren had used it to cut apples.
Evander had carried it for eight years, waiting for this exact bed.
Prince Florian lay on his back in plum velvet, one arm flung over the pillow.
A single candle burned low on the nightstand.
Evander knelt on the mattress without making the frame creak, because he had practiced.
The point rested in the soft hollow under the prince's jaw.
He only had to lean.
"You're three Thursdays late," said the prince, and opened his eyes.
Evander didn't move.
Florian's eyes were hazel with a ring of gold, and they were not sleepy at all.
He looked at Evander, calm and unhurried, as though he had seen it coming for years.
"Don't shout," Evander said.
His voice came out lower than he meant.
"I wasn't going to."
Florian turned his head a finger's width, and the knife followed his skin down.
A bead of blood rose where the point sat.
Evander should have pulled back.
Instead he watched it.
"Sir Evander Rask," Florian said softly, his voice quiet and solemn.
Nobody in Highmere had ever called him that.
Here he was Evander Thorne, his mother's name, a big quiet knight from the border legion who slept on a cot across the prince's door.
"That isn't my name," he said, though his throat was tight.
"It's the one you were born with," said Florian.
The prince's hand came up from the pillow.
It was a slim hand with ink worn into the side of the first finger.
He closed it over Evander's on the hilt, warm and a little damp, and he did not push it away.
He pulled it down.
The blade bit another half inch.
Evander felt the prince's pulse jump against the steel, quick and light.
"Is it Maren's?" Florian asked.
The air went out of Evander's chest.
"Say her name again."
"Maren," said the prince.
"She was seventeen.
"The hounds at Rask Hold followed her to the chapel every morning."
Evander could barely hear him over his own blood.
"How do you know that?"
"Because I signed it," said Florian.
The words fell between them as plainly as a dropped coin.
"The order against House Rask.
"I signed it eight years ago, at fifteen, the day of my mother's funeral.
"My name at the bottom is my own hand.
"You swore to find the hand that did it.
"Here I am."
Evander had planned this night for eight years.
In every version the prince screamed, or begged, or lied.
None of them had him lying there with his chin tipped up for the blade, offering the very thing Evander had come for.
"Don't," Evander said, and he didn't know which of them he meant.
"Then do it," said Florian.
"Or let me ask for something first."
The prince's hand tightened on his, and the heat of those fingers went right up Evander's arm.
Evander knelt over him in the dark with his thighs on either side of the prince's hips.
He could feel every breath Florian took.
He hated that he noticed.
He had noticed for five months, since the autumn hunt.
Florian had laughed at one of Piers's jokes, and Evander had missed an easy shot at a standing stag.
"Give me until the thaw," Florian said.
"Eleven weeks.
"The Spring Crowning is on the twenty-eighth of March.
"If you still want to do it then, I'll kneel in front of the whole court and you can use my name on your blade."
"Why would I wait?"
"Because you have the right to know why I signed it," said Florian.
"I'll tell you, but not tonight.
"You wouldn't believe me tonight.
"I would like to be believed.
"It's a small vanity, and I think a man is allowed one before he dies."
The corner of his mouth lifted.
He was making a joke with a knife at his throat.
Evander's hand shook once, and Florian felt it.
"Good," he said, almost gently.
"You're shaking.
"That means you aren't sure yet.
"I'll wait until you are."
Evander took the knife away from the prince's throat, slowly.
A thin red line stayed on the skin.
Before he could think, he wiped it with his thumb, and Florian shivered slightly at the touch.
Neither of them looked away.
The thumb came away red.
Florian took Evander's wrist, lifted the hand, and drew the thumb between his lips.
He cleaned it once with his tongue.
Heat hit Evander low and hard, so suddenly he nearly swore.
"Get off the bed, Sir Evander," Florian said, softer than before, and not as if he wanted it.
"You should be at the door.
"Ordinary Thursday, ordinary guard."
"Why?"
The prince lifted two fingers toward the corridor.
The brass handle of the bedchamber door was turning, very slowly, without a sound.
"Because that isn't Piers," said Florian.
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