So, he held up his hands.
And then his eyes slid back to the book, but she quickly snapped it shut, her still-bloody hands shaking. He’d never seen it before. “What are you rea?—"
“It’s none of your business,” she hissed.
“Sora,” he tried. “This isn’t like you.”
For one second, he thought she might scream at him. But then she looked at him,reallylooked at him, and seemed to remember who he was.
“I...” she swallowed. She blinked, like a spell had broken, or a veil had finally been removed from her eyes. She glanced past his shoulder, but the room was empty. They were alone. “I found this, the other day,” she said, her voice hurried. There was still a littletremblebehind it. “Or rather, I swear it found me. A feeling, maybe, but it was just there. In the library, like...like a buried treasure.”
“The book?” Arawn asked.
Soraya nodded. She was still shaking, so he dared scoot close enough that she would be able to feel his body heat.
But she slid away from him.
“What’s in it?” he asked.
She sucked in a breath. “You can’t...” she swallowed. “You wouldn’t...” She swallowed and shook her head. “Just...tell me what you see.”
Before she could stop herself, she turned thebook around.
Arawn stared at it...and lifted a pale brow.
“It’s empty,” he said.
And then he laughed, as if this had all been a joke.
But she wasn’t smiling.
“Are you alright, Soraya?” he asked. “Perhaps you should see Alaris, let her check on you. You haven’t eaten, or slept, or?—”
“I’mfine,”she snapped at him again, as if she were angry. Furious.
And then sheturned her backon him.
He felt like he’d been slapped. He was about to press in, to push further, when a voice caught his attention as two servant girls entered the small temple.
“It’s true,”whispered one to another, not noticing him and Soraya seated there together by the fire. “The prince has beenremovedfrom his duties.”
“What?” Arawn barked, at the same time Soraya finally snapped out of her stupor and echoed him. “What do you mean?”
The servants gasped at the sight of them.
And then the early morning turned into a waking nightmare, as Arawn demanded they tell him what they’d heard. Rumors spread fast, in the Citadel, but this one was far too outlandish to be false.
They trembled as they looked up at him...and he learned that Kinlear Laroux, famed Eagleminder of Lordach...had just been permanentlyremovedfrom his duties.
12
Arawn saw red after that.
He stormed out of the Aviary, down the cliffside, and into the Citadel, but his father was nowhere to be found...and the Masters?
They were mysteriouslybusy, even though he knew they’d all just returned, as he had, from the war.
He couldn’t believe they’d had a meetingwithouthim. He hadn’t been allowed to miss one in nearly twenty years of his life.
