“If you’re up for it?”
She cocked a hip.Despite her unremarkable frock and knobby knees, she pulled off the attitude.
“I have many good years in me yet,” her words said.The spark in her dark eyes said,Treat me like I’m old, girl, and I’ll make you regret it.Perhaps like the time she swapped my sugar for salt.Or when she served me fox blood instead of human, which was just as bitter an experience.
Alwayspranks.Never the cage.
As if she sensed the shift in my thoughts, her smile faltered.She couldn’t read me quite like Teo could, but she was more astute than Rafaela realized or she never would have chosen the goblin for my servant.
Her bare brow arched in silent question.“I’m here to accompany you wherever you must go, milady.”
Milady.
Before the abduction—before Alobaz—I’d only ever beenPrincesa.
“I’m ready to travel now,” Marina added, though she carried no visible supplies.
I’d long ago learned not to ask.Even after all the years of her service to me, she still kept secrets.
“Is there anything I should do to prepare you?”she asked.
“No, I’m also ready to go.”I gestured to two travel satchels on the steps behind me.
Her bald brow arched more.“You do realize you are dressed like aharlot?”
A chuckle escaped me.“Unfortunately.”
“Where exactly are we going, milady?”
I stalked past her, bending the hand at my side just enough so I could graze her shoulder as I passed.
“Come on,” I called back to her.“I’ll update you on the way.I’m in a hurry.”
“So, not much has changed, then?”
I chortled while she padded behind me.
When I entered the grand foyer, Alonso and Rafaela waited for me.
Anddammit, they weren’t the only ones.
Chapter17
Champion of Zaraga, Do What You Were Born to Do
My jaw jutted out, my nostrils flared.My power pulsed in my veins.
“No.”
Rafaela frowned.“I already tried that.”
She and Alonso joined me in glowering at the parvnit, who apparently justwouldn’t leave me the fuck alone.Marina eyed the little pest curiously, warily, as she stood meekly several steps behind me.Now in the presence of the former king and queen, she could be no more than a servant aware of her place.
Cosette perched atop an exquisite sidebar that had lined the entryway for a thousand years B.A.—before abduction.Alonso’s ancestor commissioned the piece specifically from a renowned woodworker, who’d carved the table from a single piece of wood.For its size, that alone was an incredible feat.Add to that the intricate, lifelike carvings of a forest and its creatures peeking from every angle, and it was a priceless creation that represented the pinnacle of Zaragan arts.
The parvnit sat with her legs crossed, the top leg swinging, slapping the historical artwork.She leaned back into her hands as if she owned the table.As if she owned the whole scorching palace.
“She is set on accompanying you,” Rafaela said.
