Sometime in the past few hours, he’d changed out of the royal robe and formal uniform he’d worn for court. His current outfit was much simpler. Not the sort of thing you’d expect to see an emperor wearing. It was one of the reasons Tate hadn’t immediately noticed his presence.
There were faint lines around the corners of his eyes, and the creases in his forehead were more pronounced. He looked tired. Not the sort that a good night’s sleep could remedy, but something deeper.
Despite the exhaustion she could see weighing on him, amusement twinkled in his eyes at her surprise, almost making her forget the fatigue she’d glimpsed seconds before.
“Yet you made it a point to announce the name at court.” Archie studied her like she was a bug he was trying to classify. “Almost like you hoped it would generate a reaction from someone.”
Oh ho. Someone was more intelligent than his predecessor.
Tate could now see why Ryu wanted to play with him. It would be fun to scheme against someone as observant as the Obsidian Lord—even if it was also extremely dangerous.
That’s why it’s fun, Ilith whispered.
“Did you manage to catch the man you were chasing?” Thaddeus asked, interrupting Tate’s thoughts.
“No. I lost him near Cliff’s Shadow.”
“Do you think he’s somehow connected to the events of the night?”
Tate hesitated, glancing in Ryu’s direction before returning her attention to the emperor. “It’s a possibility.”
Just how much of one, Tate had no way of knowing.
“What makes you think that?”
The seconds ticked by as Tate considered her answer, carefully ignoring the misshapen lump on the ground that she was beginning to suspect was a body.
“Instinct and the fact that he was one of the men who kidnapped me in Silvain,” Tate answered reluctantly.
The emperor looked sharply at Ryu. “The man who escaped. Peter, I think you called him.”
“Yes.” Tate waited as the emperor’s expression sank into thought.
“Is it possible he’s working with this other ancient? Nathan?”
This time it was Ryu who answered. “We don’t know yet. His goals and motivations are unclear.”
The Lord Provost stirred. “And his companion has been reluctant to talk.”
Tate bit down on what she wanted to say. Now wasn’t the time. She didn’t think the emperor summoned her so she could revisit arguments she’d already lost.
“Why am I here?”
The emperor pointed, drawing Tate’s attention to the figure she’d been doing her utmost not to look at. “I wanted your opinion on this.”
Tate steeled herself before looking at the thing on the ground. At first, it was difficult to delineate between the details. It was as if even her mind was determined not to see, painting the scene in such a way that understanding was late to arrive.
Then, like a window into the macabre, her brain picked out one detail after another. First, the carefully trimmed nails of a hand. Shoelaces that belonged to a pair of boots. Hair matted with blood and other matter.
Each piece adding up to a puzzle that she couldn’t unsee even if she wanted to. That lump of meat had once been a living, breathing person. Someone who had dreams. People who cared about them.
Numbness spread through Tate. Death wasn’t an old friend of hers, but it also wasn’t a stranger. Too many of her dreams involved long forgotten battlefields and those who’d never made it off of them.
That being said, she couldn’t escape the horror of such a scene. This would haunt her nightmares for months, if not years to come.
The body lay on its back, what was left of the face tilted toward the sky. Most of the soft tissue in his face was missing, leaving only a ragged wound and pieces of shredded skin behind. Almost as if someone had ripped most of his face right off.
That wasn’t even the worst of it.
