“I’ll pay twice— no thrice as much.” Orion strides to where I’m sitting I jump when he goes down on his knees at my feet, “Young lord, what are you doing? Please get up.” He doesn’t. Instead, he takes both my hands in his. “I’ll take you home. I’m sick of that stupid water, and the house of moon,
“Talking to Francis about your contract.” He grins “You one day career as a courtesan was a huge hit.” “Lucky me.” I roll my eyes “So this means it’s not the church doing this, but some cult. If it’s about some kind of drug, does that mean it’s not a curse?” “The festival is in two days.” Zen says
“I can’t believe you guys went to the Yivera district without us.” In the drill halls, Cassain and Gabriel are brooding in one corner. Outside in the courtyard, Derik is cutting through a barrage of arrows Arryn shoots with his twin axes. Lukas and I are sitting cross legged on the veranda floor, m
A grim air settles on our group. “I still don’t like it,” Cassain crosses his arms “Are you sure you want to handle the Lycans on your own? Just one last time caused us over twenty causalities of trained warriors.” That’s another thing that makes tonight an anxious one. All the people we’ve arran
He’s already turning, going for the ladder. My heart sinks to my stomach, nervousness and agitation crunching my lungs. He’s doing it again. The same thing he’s been doing for the last two days. The words are out of my mouth before I can think of better ones; “Why are you running?” Zen stills in
“I can’t feel my fingers.” It’s been a whooping two hours since Arryn and I took this post and nothing has happened yet except for both of us getting closer to freezing to death. Above us, dark clouds have covered the sky, and the cold wind is picking up. “Obviously.” Arryn says, scribbling someth
Outside the town hall, there’s absolute chaos. People are rushing everywhere. I spot the uniform of the first order soldiers in the fray, but my eyes swim over the crowd. There’s no lycan where the screaming man was standing. Only a mess of blood remains. My vision goes past that and to the alley
The sounds of the festival are deafeningly loud. Sitting cross-legged on top of one of the taller inns in the market square, I look down at the people laughing and chattering below without a care in the world. Whatever else I can say about the Crown’s safety measures for the Empire, they’ve done a
I barely manage to find a waste bucket before everything I had for breakfast retches out. My throat burns. My vision is blurry. I dry heave every single thing in my stomach, warmth seeps out of the corners of my eyes. I can’t breathe. The smell of blood is everywhere. I sit there, holding the edges
The smell of rotting flesh is disgusting. Its muscle memory to pull the gloves over my hands, pick a scalpel off the medical tray. The body on the metal table in front of me has no head. ‘You have to take a sample of flesh, a sample of blood and take a look at the internal organs.’ Aunt Cynthia’s
How adorable. Apparently, I’m the only one who thinks so, since when I turn back around, everyone from the fourth prince and the first order to passing strangers and our coachman is looking on in disbelief. Is it so difficult to imagine Zen would get along with children? “Don’t leave your mouth ha
“My Lady, am I mistaken or is the fourth prince avoiding me?” I look up from knotting the satchel to my belt to face Zen. There’s a slight furrow in his brows, and he looks at Lukas, standing far, far from us and talking with the first order soldiers. The fourth prince has indeed, been avoiding Ze
I need to move. But even as I think that, I cant bring myself to move. He’s holding me too firmly, I think, entirely reasonable. I won’t be able to slip away like this. Even the most critical part of me can’t find that to be entirely an excuse. After last night, I doubt there’s anyone who would lik
I wake up to the sound of a door knock. My sleep hazed brain registers the sound, recognizes it, and promptly ignores it in favor of cuddling into the warmth of my bed once more. I don’t want to wake up just yet, since last night I fell asleep so late— Last night? My eyes open, blurry with sleep,
But he’s looking at me now, as if the answer might crush him, as if he’s bracing himself for it. I reach out to drape my arms over his shoulders gently, they hang down in front of his chest lightly. “Why? Because you did your job?” I ask quietly, hold his gaze “Or because you didn’t hesitate to do
“Lift your arm, please.” I say, and my voice comes out soft If we weren’t sitting so close to each other, I would’ve missed it. His shoulders tense up, the even breathing stilled into nothing. “You don’t have to do that, Dinah.” Zen finally says My brows furrow. Zen might be a warrior among warri
On the second floor hallway of the hotel, my eyes drift to the room where Zen is supposed to be. My room is just at its side. I wonder if I knock on his door right now, would he be annoyed? He did ask not to be disturbed. The image of his bloodied arm flashes in my mind. Just a moment. I just want