“Where did you say she went to?” Xander asked the guard.

“The market, your highness,” he replied with a bow.

“Without a guard?” Xander’s tone conveyed his disapproval. He couldn’t understand the woman. First, she disrupted his wedding, professing love to him. Then, she gave him cold shoulders, addressing him rudely and disrespecting him before others. The woman was a living illustration of mixed signals.

“She went with her friend and Dante, your highness,” the reply snapped him out of his thoughts. Dante? Almira always rejected his offer to keep her company, yet she felt comfortable going into town with a spineless ugly slave. He felt insulted.

Xander stood, ready...