He turned his face away as if even looking at her now was beneath him. But she barely heard the last words.
Her mind had already twisted them, discarded the reprimand, latching onto the only part that truly mattered. The spark behind her eyes flared again, but this time with something different, … darker.
Not anger now, but cunning. Satisfaction. She smiled slowly, like a serpent coiling to strike, her head tilted with eerie calm, the tear-streaks forgotten.
“Tell me,” she purred, voice a velvet threat, “what do you have in mind?”
The king didn’t smile. But his lip curled with a hint of cruel pleasure, a glimmer of the ancient ruthlessness that had made him feared far beyond their borders.
“Revenge,” he said simply, like it was the most natural word in the world. “Of course.”
He
