“Is the sun worth this, Bran?”
I gesture toward his unkempt, greasy hair, allowing my gaze to drop to his wrinkled, stained clothes. Something red is tucked possessively beneath his arm and I squint at it. A book. With gold-embossed letters.
“The sun is wortheverything,” Bran says.
I was right. Bran has an addiction of his own. I’m bonded to a vampire who is slowly losing his mind. A vampire working with the rebels. My palms turn damp.
“Arvelle?” Maeva stands a few feet away, her nose wrinkled, eyebrows drawn together as she watches Bran.
I know that look. It’s her I’m-not-a-threat-I’m-just-confused look. And I have no doubt her left hand—currently hidden behind her back—is caressing the hilt of one of her knives.
Bran gives her a sickly smile. She sends a cool look his way, and he turns his attention back to me.
“You know what you need to do.” He strides away, and Maeva watches him go.
“Is he threatening you?”
“It’s complicated.”
“You need a new sponsor.”
“Yeah, well, not many people thought I’d get this far.”
“Tiberius did.”
Guilt stabs through me. I haven’t forgotten that Tiberius replaced my weapons before I fought Maximus. The parma he gave me saved my life. And in return, I took his from him.
Just as Bran is going to take mine from me if he manages to make me kill the emperor in public. My heart thunders against my rib cage, my ribs constricting until I’m suddenly pulling in deep, desperate breaths.
Two days. I have to find a less public way to kill the emperor within the next two days. Bran didn’t get to the last part of his threat. The part where he reminds me that he has my brothers.
He didn’t need to.
This is it. I need to warn Leon so he can get out of here.
“Yeah,” I say. “Let’s go, I think we’re late.”
Maeva sighs. “You can talk to me, you know.”
We step into the training hall, and Maeva sends me a wary look. The tension is thick and stifling, filled with hissed whispers. A group of sigilmarked novices are watching the vampires with barely disguised loathing, while the vampires sneer back, displaying their fangs.
“What’s going on?” I murmur.
Maeva chews on her lower lip. “The Vampire Council opened an investigation into a group of sigilmarked emissaries. The emissaries hated the vampires they served and conspired to serve sigilmarked interests instead. They were spying on the vampires, undercutting their deals, securing grants that benefited sigilmarked-owned businesses, and spreading rumors about vampires suffering from sun madness.”
I gape at her, and she shrugs. “It’s not the first time and it won’t be the last. Vampires are forced to trust sigilmarked to further their interests during the day.”
“They didn’t make them … bond?”
Maeva lets out a laugh. “A sigilmarked voluntarily taking a vampire bond? They wouldnever.”
I swallow. “Of course they wouldn’t. Because that would be stupid.” I resist the urge to slap my hand to the invisible mark on my own neck.
Kaeso slowly turns his head, pinning the gossiping sigilmarked across the hall with a glare. He can probably hear every word they’re saying.
I wince. He can probably hear every wordwe’resaying as well.
“What happened to the emissaries?” I whisper.
