“Forced your hand?” he drawled. “And here we were under the assumption the mighty Marghazari couldn’t be forced to anything.”

Her breath caught. She had slipped.

She had let her temper get the better of her, when she knew she was supposed to be fawning over the ambassadors with sweetness to prove her grandfather’s innocence. Her cheeks burned.

Worse still, he had twisted her words and was looking at her like she was as non-threatening as a child. It tore at the insecurity deep within her that told her she would only be a pretty little fool: beloved, yet useless.

Decorum be damned. In that moment, she felt less the sweet rose petals, and more the deadly thorns.

“Haven’t you any manners?” she asked, a bite to the words. She had never been anything but loved and adored, and the way he looked at her made her heart freeze over. “You will speak to your princess with respect, ambassador, lest I have to cut off your tongue.”

“Princess?”

He raised a brow, mock surprised. He cocked his head to the side, looking at her intently. She wanted to point out that she was, in fact, dressed as one, and how daft he must truly be to not realize, but she refrained from doing so. Instead, she lifted her chin.

She felt small, somehow, even though she was far from it: with her tall stature, she was used to commanding the space around her. But somehow, this man was looking at her as if she was as clear and thin as water.

One look at her was proof enough that she was born of the mountains and the rivers: eyes blue-green, her hair as wild as the rustling trees. Soft brown skin like golden earth, she was solid like a tree, but she had the silken stream of the river and the contours of the valleys.

She knew she was beautiful; she twisted her lips.

“Be careful where those eyes travel, ambassador,” she said, saying ambassador like an insult. “People have been blinded for less.”

“You may blind me, but the truth we shall still see,” he said. Whatever humor he had granted her before was gone. Now his voice was somber. Durkhanai furrowed her brows. This was usually the part where people lowered their heads, excusing themselves. No one liked to be on the receiving end of the Shehzadi’s temper.

Yet Asfandydar took a step closer, meeting her gaze head on with a blazing one of his own.

“What, precisely, is that supposed to mean?” she snapped.

“I was at the summit,” he said, face hard.

So it was a threat.

Durkhanai did not even bother to check for a nearby guard; she knew no one would have the audacity to hurt her in her own palace.