Sol cut her gaze to her. “Weird way to say you had no one to celebrate with, so you resorted to hallucinations.”
Zeri, Lady of Ventry and a surprisingly easy presence to be around, giggled from the seat next to Sol, but said nothing as Cattya narrowed her ruby-red lips into a smirk, her shoulders simmering with smoke. “I actually wasn’t alone in my celebratory adventures that week.”
“Cattya—” Cas pushed her smoke away with a push of his Shadows.
“Prince Xanthos here was very much in my company.” She lowered voice, placing the hand closest to him on his thigh. Although Sol tried to hide her annoyance, it was obvious her face twisted with it when the woman laughed. “No hallucinations there—all we did was very real.”
A wave of nausea tore Sol’s attention from them, from Cattya’s hand on Cas and the way he just left it??—
“Must have been so lovely, Cattya. He is quite affectionate when he wants to be.” The words were out before Sol could stop them. She thought the wretched herb was out of her system already, but then, from Cattya’s head bloomed a branch of thorns and tiger lilies, forming horns around her forehead.
Cattya turned to Cas. “Is he now? What a marvelous change to his personality”
He shrugged, removing the woman's hand from his leg with a zap of electricity.
Sol sighed, placing a hand over her chest melodramatically. “I don’t know much about you, Cattya of Stone Ledge,” Sol said. “Only that you’re quite obsessed with my Royal guard.”
“Well, we were meant to marry before he very boldly decided to go search for you instead.”
That caught Sol off guard.
Cattya’s horns vanished in a plume of smoke, the Kerproot making the carriage walls shimmer instead with each bump of the dirt road. The woman leaned forward. “I’d be careful if I were you, Princess. You’ve managed to tally up quite the number of enemies here so far.”
“Careful,” Cas warned, his voice low. “Tread carefully, Cattya.”
“Whatever would the other prospects do if they learned the Prince was helping the Princess? That’s how you managed to survive that Trial, and everyone knows it.” Sol couldn't tell if the spark of fire the woman flicked her way was another hallucination until Zeri quite literally dissolved it with a wall of air.
“Leave her alone, Cat. We are all here for an opportunity to serve her, to become her partner,” Zeri said.
Cattya huffed and leaned back in her seat as the carriage drew to a stop. “I’m not.” She motioned to Cas. “He’s not.”
The carriage lurched into a hasty stop, reviving Sol’s nausea.
Sol sat up and watched Cattya kick the door open and jump out. The woman peered over her shoulder, blue eyes wavering with an intensity that had Sol’s blood racing in alarm.
“Gods know why the rest of them are here. But I promise you, Princess, not everyone is here to help you to the end.”
Sol swore those horns broke through Cattya’s skull again as she stepped toward the Gods’ Villa.
The Death List was strung up by the entrance. So far, only two names were on it. With three trials remaining—and whatever else Semmena decided to throw in between—it was only beginning to look like the bloodshed outside of them would begin at any second.
Still embraced by the Kerproot’s effects, Zeri shyly introduced herself formally and asked Sol if she’d like to see the Villa’s libraries. The mention of them alone was enough to peak Sol’s interest, so she agreed. Perhaps it was a trap to lure her away with the promise of books and then ambush her—then again, Zeri seemed kind.
Maybe that’s the point.
Sol shook the paranoid thoughts away, and for once, decided to trust her judgment.
They walked in casual silence past the foyer and the kitchens, then past the secret wall entrance to the tunnels. Sol had to clamp her hands together to keep from becoming a fidgeting wreck as they walked right past the six-pointed star on the tile. But as soonas they stepped into the library, the subterranean world beneath them was forgotten.
It was like the Yavenharrow Archives in one room.
Rows and rows of wooden bookshelves lined each wall, and when that space ran out, they extended into the room in sections. Sol marveled at the way the shelves were filled with books. Not a single space was vacant.
Candelabras hung from the ceiling to illuminate the area in a comfortable golden light.
Although Sol hated to admit it, she could picture herself spending hours here, lounging in an armchair with whatever book piqued her interest.
Zeri ambled to one of the shelves and plucked out a book. She gave Sol a small smile. “They have things here I cannot find in Ventry.”
