Thorne (Random Romance) Read Online Free

the terror of his approach, I knew that when he and I finally came face to face, as we must, only one of us would live through that day.
    Quillane
    I watched him out of the corner of my eye, wondering at the darkness of his mood. It wasn’t strange that my Emperor would feel the black dread of this looming war, but it was strange for him to allow me to see it.
    It was a rare day that Falco of Sancia deigned to discuss anything serious, and I wanted to take advantage of these fleeting moments. ‘I want to meet with Brathe and Lutius.’
    ‘Must we?’ he moaned. ‘They’re so boring .’
    ‘It’s not the time to be alienating the warders, Fal. We’ll need them.’
    ‘They’re the reason we’re in this mess,’ he muttered. Which happened to be true. The warders were the ones who’d kept the truth of the bond from us all these years, and admitted their secret only when Queen Ava and King Ambrose of Pirenti had threatened to tear down their temples unless they spoke the truth at long last. Yes, in fact there does seem to be a way to end the bond, now that you mention it …
    ‘Don’t be silly,’ I said faintly, distracted by thoughts of the northern nation.
    He sighed, eyeing me sideways. Falco, Emperor of Kaya, was an obscenely beautiful man. Golden hair tied at the nape of his neck, eyes the colour of diamonds, a wide smile of white teeth … Even I sometimes found myself staring at him in astonishment, wondering how such a man could have sprouted from the loins of two such plain parents. Taller in stature than most Kayans, he was lean and strong. It was a pity, however, that his body happened to be utterly useless. Unable to wield a sword or throw a punch, disastrously uncoordinated and full of cowardice, Falco’s only real qualities were his sense of humour and the secret compassion in his heart. His ability to make whomever he smiled at believe themselves to be the most important person in the world was both a skill and a detriment to him as, more often than not, the sudden absence of that smile would break the same person’s heart. Put simply, the man had charm. But he also happened to be an infuriating, idiotic, selfish bastard.
    ‘Fine,’ he sighed, ‘but only because you are looking particularly delicious today, darling. Did I mention that?’
    ‘The prince arrives today.’
    Falco sighed as if he couldn’t care less. ‘The beast, you mean? I don’t want to talk about him. I want to talk about you and I going into that closet over there, and I want to talk about how I could teach you the meaning of both our lives with only my tongue.’
    ‘You may not want to talk about him, but he is all too real. We’ll have to receive him soon.’
    ‘And have him traipse in here with his bloodied animal skins and human bone jewelry? The man is a savage. He’d stain our pretty white marble floors with his filth.’
    The serious discussion was over, clearly. Shaking my head, I turned to go inside.
    ‘Darling, you slay me,’ he laughed. ‘Just one little lick? I promise you’ll love it.’
    ‘I’d cut off that tongue before it came anywhere near me.’
    ‘You don’t know what you’re missing, love.’
    Maybe I didn’t. But regardless of how pretty or how charming my Emperor was, regardless of how I loved him, he wasn’t the one I wanted.
    Falco was born into his role, whereas I had been voted in. We were not married, nor bonded to each other, as that was illegal. He continuously tried to blur the lines though, unused to being denied even a single thing.
    With my gauzy skirts billowing behind me, I returned to my private chambers and removed a key from around my neck. Behind the bookcase was a passageway. Only three people alive today knew about this passage and the chamber it led to. Falco was not one of them, and I’d die before I did him the disservice of telling him.
    Securing the door behind me, I crept along the tunnel until I reached the bedroom and found her cross-stitching by the single