THE DESERT ROSE | ONGOING

Insufferable Men!

"Are you still upset?" Inara asked in a low voice.

"No,"

"Good. I want to ask you for a favor."

Alina's hand halted as she lifted an eyebrow in the princess's direction. If she's asking for another dangerous__

"Can you prepare or__ arrange cosmetics for me that can hide bruises and scars?" the princess's voice was laced with hesitation as she tried to come up with appropriate words.

Alina's eyebrows curled in a frown. "Why? Are you hurt somewhere?"

"No, but I will."

"Why you__

"Please don't ask, Alina. You won't like the answer."

The genuine gleam in her friend's eyes made Alina clamp her mouth shut off any further nagging. She should have very well given me the order. Why bother giving it a fancy name of favor?

After a bit of contemplation, Alina opened her mouth, "I do know to make a cosmetic salve that can hide scars like a second skin. I've learned it from the Turkish maid who used to work for a land lord's wife."

Relief washed over Inara's face, "Thank my stars that you have a certain interest in this sort of things. What would have I done without you?" the princess gave her hand a grateful squeeze.

Taking the rabbit away from Alina's arms, Inara placed it down on the tender grass, letting it loiter freely, again.

"Oh, and do stuff your essential herbal supplies inside my chambers as well because approaching royal kitchen or healers again and again can surely arise nasty suspicions for us." The princess made sure to keep her voice cautiously down as she uttered those words, smiling sweetly for the guards to think that they were having a private-to-ladies conversation.

It took everything inside Alina to not ask aloud the chain of questions erupting in her mind. But she was smart enough not to risk letting out her princess's plans in public.

Inara averted her eyes from Alina's face to the marble corridor that flanked the garden from three sides. From the distance, she could make out the figure of two men treading their way to the court hall. Her eyes hardened as they approached nearer, their silhouettes becoming clearer.

She would never mistake Kir for anyone else. The crown prince, her half-brother, and one of the persons she hated the most.

As if sensing her reluctance to meet him, he seemed to have decided to head straight in her direction. Inara stiffened, she'd had walked away from him if he wasn't the crown prince.

"Shahzadi," he said when he reached a feet's distance away from her, pinning her with his piercing gaze.

"Valiahd," She echoed with equal graveness. Her gaze slid to another man beside him. Danyal. Son of emperor's favorite concubine and also her half-brother. Both of them exchange an acknowledging nod.

She avoided looking into Kir's eyes. Those agate eyes they both shared. Those cruel sadist eyes. She could see all the sins in them, shallow and cold. She will never forget how those eyes danced in brutal amusement when he killed Alina with his own bare hands.

Bile raised the princess's throat.

The thick air between them made Kir's lips tug upwards in a smirk. "You look like a peacock, Inara." He crooned, hinting at her dress.

The princess fumed. They were of the same age and they'd never got along, not one moment since their childhood. So, offending him a little wouldn't harm her much.