Astrid fell upon the sofa beside Fi, arm draped across the backrest, not looking at her.
“Astrid,” Fi whispered. “What the fuck is going on?”
“I thought you wanted nothing to do with daeyari,” Astrid returned dryly. “Now you show up with one? You’re full of surprises, Fi. I suppose you always have been.”
Fi scowled her indignation, and a flash of guilt she couldn’t afford to let surface. Not now. Antal wanted her to learn if Verne’s Arbiter was involved in the Thomaskweld attack, but first, Fi needed her own answers.
“I’m not here forhim,” Fi said. “I just need to know—”
“Thank you for your time,” Antal said across the room. “My apologies for visiting unannounced.”
“Unannounced?” Verne said mildly. “Nonsense. I assume you’re here because I had your governor killed?”
9
We’re apparently both very bad at this
The room snapped cold as a Winter stormfront.
Fi sat up straight, a moment of… no, she couldn’t have heard that right. Antal went as still as his metal sculpture in Thomaskweld, tail frozen in a low curl.
Merciless Void. Fihadheard that right.
“I expected you here yesterday,” Verne continued, tail swaying like a contented cat. “Did it take you this long to figure it out? Or were you being polite?”
Were daeyari negotiations so different from what Fi was used to? Some immortal tactics she couldn’t wrap her head around? But no. Antal looked equally stunned. So much for whittling that secret out of Verne’s Arbiter.
Astrid lounged against the sofa, chillingly calm.
Unsurprised.
“It was you.” Antal dragged the word over his fangs. “You sent your Arbiter into my territory? Attacked my capital?”
“Why deny something you’re proud of?” Verne batted a hand, fingers flashing black claws. “I wanted to be thorough—the parts of your government that mattered, at least. The governor. The mayors of the major cities. A handful of head guards and attendants. The rest will cooperate, if they’re smart.” When she shrugged, bells chimed from her antlers. “Though, honestly, Iprefer a clean slate. Can always replace anyone who doesn’t fall in line.”
Fi didn’t recall how to breathe. She stared at Astrid, torn between seizing her friend by the throat or begging her to explain what was happening.
“You knew?” Fi hissed.
At last, Astrid glanced at her, brow raised. Her reply was an innocent, insulting, “Hm?”
“You knew what was going to happen?” Fi’s whisper felt vastly insufficient for this much ire. “And you didn’ttell me?”
“I offered. You’re the one who didn’t want to get involved in ‘bigger things.’”
“So you sent me into a building about to explode? I could have died!”
Astrid strummed her fingers on the backrest. Shrugged. “I suppose you could have.”
“But why?” Antal snapped at Verne. His tail swatted his pillow. “You’d break the peace between us? After five decades?”
Verne clicked her tongue. “So young, Antal. Do you recall your predecessor’s age, when he vacated the territory?”
“What does that matter?”
“Over a thousand. Retired to travel the far Planes, seeking Veshri’s path.” Verne touched the highest tip of an antler, reverent. “May he find wisdom, following the First Voidwalker.”
Fi had no idea what that meant—these daeyari gestures, as foreign as the pit of the Void, leaving her on crumbled footing. Though not as unsettling as Astrid. What did she mean,I suppose you could have…
