Caerwyn didn't close the door even after the duke had long since disappeared. He hung in its frame, eyes forever following Edrien's pacing form. His gaze stayed on the Crown Prince, steady and measuring, as if he'd finally realised where the real danger might be. Edrien felt the weight of it like a fingertip at the back of his neck.
Silence settled in the office. The vows still hummed in the air—words about loyalty and land and secrets and marriage—their echo louder than the music drifting faintly from the distant hall.
Rhosyn stood by the table, small and straight-backed, that careful blank expression on her face again. The one she used on councillors and lords when she didn't want anyone to see what she felt.
He hated it.
Because it worked on him.
Her nails were clawing at the sides of her fingers, picking at the skin in little anxious scrapes. Her shoulders were set too stiff, braced for impact. She could feel his displeasure; he could see none of hers.
It only made the anger boil higher.
There were too many questions crowding his tongue. Why him? Why didn't you tell me? How could you offer yourself—
"How," he heard himself say instead, sharp and clipped, "how long have you been planning this?"
That at least he could manage without sounding like he was sentencing her.
Her chin lifted. "Since I found the key," she said. "Since I realised what was in Halvar's safe could be used to bind Duke Karsyn. Since—"
"Since you decided there was no need to involve me," he cut in.
A muscle jumped in his jaw. He could feel Caerwyn's stare like a nail driven into the side of his skull. He refused to look at him.
"We've spoken for hours about that vault," Edrien said. "About what it might hold. You found the key and the code, and you didn't think to tell me?"
Rhosyn's fingers stilled. "You were in Hartwell," she said. "Your father had you dancing for Greycombe while Merrow was tightening his noose. Someone had to move."
The words were reasonable. That only made them worse.
The secrecy felt like a betrayal. He'd always told her everything, even when he shouldn't. Even when it took him weeks, he still told her in the end. About his engagement. About Alestan's demands. About the way the ground was splitting under his feet.
He had gone to her for help and they had been a team.
Except… not, apparently. Not when it mattered most.
"Your land is choking," he said, the words coming out harsher than he intended. "Merrow is crawling over your border, bribing your people, strangling Ravelocke's trade—and you think this is something you face alone?"
"I thought," Rhosyn replied tightly, "that if I could fix the mess before it reached you, you wouldn't have to carry it too."
"You thought," he repeated, hearing his father's sneer in his own mouth and hating it, "that I was better as a convenient endorser than a partner."
Her eyes flashed. "That's not what I—"
"And the marriage?" he bit out, before she could finish. He couldn't stop the word from souring on his tongue. "Was that part of the private little plan from the beginning, or did you decide to offer yourself to him on a whim?"
Her lips thinned. "You know why I did it."
"Oh?" Edrien took a step forward, then another, until the corner of the table dug into his thighs. "Enlighten me."
Caerwyn shifted at the door. Edrien could feel the knight preparing to intervene and forced himself to keep his hands on the wood instead of grabbing Rhosyn by the shoulders just to shake sense into her.
She met his stare, unflinching. "I needed something to make him bite; sweeten the deal—make him commit."
"So you sweetened him up with marriage," Edrien said, voice going low and ugly.
He couldn't stop the images that flashed across his mind: her in Harrowfen colours, her in another man's bed, Karsyn's hands on her in ways that weren't just political. The thought turned his stomach.
He knew it was vulgar. He knew he was being unfair. Rage made him vicious.
"You hate him," Edrien said. "You've spent the entire week telling me how he's a monster, an opportunist, a threat—and now you're quite happy to pledge yourself to his bed?"
Rhosyn flinched. Just a tiny flicker around the eyes, but he saw it. Caerwyn's fingers twitched at the hilt at his hip.
"That is not what I'm doing," she said, fury burning the back of her throat.
"Isn't it?" The words tasted like his father's again. "You hide your troubles from me, you hide the key from me, you sit in rooms with him and broker deals that use you as leverage—"
"I was protecting you!" she snapped.
The shout tore out of her before she could catch it. It shocked the room still for a heartbeat. Even Caerwyn's breathing seemed to stop.
Rhosyn's voice dropped, but the anger stayed. "I was trying to keep this from reaching you. To keep your father from using it as another excuse to chain you. If Karsyn is bound to your cause, and Merrow has nowhere to go. Ravelocke stabilises, Harrowfen doesn't march, the king's latest monster is muzzled, and you—"
"And I?" he demanded.
"And you don't have to pick between your crown and your conscience quite as soon," she said. "You have enough battles, Edrien. Let me fight this one."
Her words should have soothed. They didn't.
They made something in him feel smaller, like he'd been left out of his own story.
"You keep saying let you," he said quietly. "As if I even get a say."
She hesitated. That was answer enough.
He could feel the uglier words rising, the ones he'd never let himself say. You were meant to be mine first. You're not his to bargain with. You were never supposed to stand beside another man like that.
He swallowed them. Just in time.
What came out instead was hardly better.
"I'm not going to let him keep you, Rhos."
On the surface, it sounded political. Reasonable. Crown Prince refuses to let northern duke secure powerful southern ally. But he heard the other words beneath it, the ones he didn't say:
Because you are mine.
She stared at him, searching his face. Caerwyn's eyes narrowed warily at the phrasing.
Rhosyn drew in a breath, steadying herself.
"I do not intend to marry him, Ed," she said. Slowly. Deliberately. "I needed his vow and his ink, not his ring. I'm buying us time, that's all."
The first half of the sentence loosened something in his chest. Do not intend to marry him. The second half burned.
Us.