Lorraine froze, her breath ragged in her chest. Slowly, she turned—and there he was. Leroy stood in the center of the hall, his hair damp with sweat, his cloak disheveled, his eyes burning with something she could not bear to face.
"Why?" His voice was low now, but all the more dangerous for it. "Why do you keep running from me?"
Her lips parted, but no sound came. The throne loomed behind her, not a symbol of power now but an empty shadow of it, pressing her down, leaving her exposed. She no longer felt like the powerful person in the room as she stood there. And that was a first.
He was speaking to her. After all the walls she built, after every attempt to slip from his reach, he had found her, and of all the questions he could have asked…
Why do you hide the truth that you can hear, that you can speak?
Why do you break every law and put my life at risk?
Why are you humiliating me by dressing like this and mingling with the lowly people down here?
