Aiden’s face darkened, and a thought struck me.
“You said you and Maz have been in Aquinon for years,” I breathed. “Did you know of Queen Brielle?”
“Yes, I’d heard of her kindness,” he said stiffly, his gaze dropping to where his long, callused fingers tightened around his mug. “The death of another innocent Weylin and Renwell should’ve protected is always tragic.”
I gulped more water to soothe my aching throat, trying to read the contempt that pulsed in every muscle of Aiden’s face. “Did you see anything that night? Hear anything?”
One pounding heartbeat. Two. Then three, and he finally looked up at me as if coming out of a daze. “Maz and I were working elsewhere that night. Ruru told us about it in the morning.”
“What did he say?” I asked desperately. Almost too desperately.
Renwell had told me what he’d seen, but perhaps Ruru had gleaned something more. My mentor would despise me asking, wouldn’t want me to risk exposing my personal stake in the matter. But he wasn’t here.
Aiden’s mouth twisted to the side, as if he were trying to remember. “He saw the burning building near the Temple. Hecouldn’t get too close because of the many Wolves, but he watched them carry the queen’s body out of one of the rooms.”
Tears pricked my eyes, and I had to stare down at the cluttered tiles. Renwell had told us the assassin killed my mother and somehow burnt a hole in the roof to climb out and escape when the Wolves surrounded the building. I’d wanted to see for myself where she was murdered, but Renwell said the building was destroyed. That there was nothing left.
“Is it gone now?” I asked, not daring to meet his eyes yet. “The building?”
“Yes. The fire consumed it, and the rubble was cleared out. Thank the gods it was an old, abandoned building, so no one else died.”
Then Renwell had told the truth. Even if I went looking, I would find nothing new. I would never know who killed her or why.
A familiar frustration coupled with helplessness roared to life like a ravenous beast. It had nearly devoured me many times, but Renwell had encouraged me to keep training, to keep fighting, to keep honing myself into a weapon that could defend my family. Which usually kept the beast quiet, but never satisfied.
Aiden cleared his throat, bringing my gaze back to him. “You haven’t answered the rest of my question.”
“Your question was layered with many others. That is not a fair question.”
“Yet I have also answered many of yours that weren’t part of our wager.”
The questions about my mother. Anger dug its claws into my gut. Those answers had cost him nothing and hadn’t given me any new information.
What Ihadlearned was of his hatred for Weylin and Renwell, of his disgust over the sunstone mine that he clearly knew muchmore about than I did. Which only sparked more questions like, why hadn’t my father continued the same treatment of the miners as the Falcryns had before him? It seemed a prudent way to avoid another uprising.
Aiden also didn’t want to speak of the People’s Council. It sounded as though he didn’t want to repeat the Pravaran rebellion, which was good news, butit made me wonder all the more what he was really after.
In return for these paltry details, he wanted information on my family like they were nothing but tiles in our game. Things he could use or discard. And I had to play along.
I would make a poor High Enforcer if I couldn’t even stomach this task.
“The royals eat, sleep, and shit like everyone else, except they do it in a palace,” I spat out. “The prince and princesses are kind but have few friends and innumerable, unknowable enemies because of who their father is. Weylin is quick to punish and never forgives. Why else do you think I’m here?”
Aiden was staring at my fingers again. Fingers I hadn’t realized I was drumming against the table to the frantic pace of my heart. I crushed them into a fist.
When he looked up at me, his green eyes flickered with sympathy. “You must have cared for him a great deal.”
Him... Julian. His memory would never stop haunting me either, it seemed. “I do,” I said tightly. “I did.” But I cared more for who I’d left behind in that palace.
“Let us call a ceasefire on Death and Four.” Aiden jabbed his thumb at the knife target. “How about a different game instead?”
Savage relief flooded my veins. “Yes.”
Aiden swept the tiles back into the bag while I rose from the table.
A heavy hand clamped on my shoulder. Without thinking, I threw my elbow backward into a taut stomach, eliciting an “oof!” Then I wrenched the thick wrist away from me.
“Whoa, easy there, lovely,” a familiar, deep voice rumbled over my head.
