"Lizard."
"Human."
A laugh escapes past my lips, and Armond gives me a funny expression.I'd almost forgotten he and I were the ones having a conversation.I shake her from my mind and mutter an apology, spinning around to face him, "what am I supposed to do?"
He sighs, and his lips frown down even further. "Start playing your part."
"Which one? Queen or wife?" I tease, but my humor falls short.
"Both." He answers, his tone firm, while he turns on his heel and disappears out of the doorway.
Begrudgingly, I drag my feet, following him out of the bathroom. By the time I’m out in my room again, he’s already halfway out the door. "Uh— Armond!" I groan, he glances over his shoulder, and chucks his chin for me tocontinuefollowing. "When did becoming queen mean I have to take orders from other people?" I grumble as I jog to catch up with him. "The plan here is…?"
"You have a meeting."
"About?"
"About what your next move is going to be."
Yes, because that clarifies so much.
Rorin
"You need to be more careful." Marjorie snaps as she guides us into her quarters. There's a trail of blood staining the stone floors as we march through the castle, her reprimands and our footsteps echoing against the walls.
"I—ugh!will try and remember that next time." I grunt, the pain lancing through my shoulder. She tosses me a sidelong glance and waves us into her rooms, Bennett whistling at the grandeur of it.
Marjorie has my men put me up in a small bed against the wall, my head dropping back onto the cool stone as she bustles around her workshop. There’s a familiar humming coming from deep inside the room, followed by the clatter and crash of things shattering on the ground.
The voice curses, and the three of us exchange a look. "Is that Murph?" Will whispers, leaning into me. My shoulders lift in a shrug, and I hiss, forgetting for a moment that I still have a hole in one of them. Marjorie comes rushing back over to me, her arms filled with jars that she lets spill out on the mattress next to me. "You're not going to use your Wield on him?"
Her piercing green eyes cut him a glare as she hovers over the jars, "I need the salve!" She shouts out, and the three of us share another look. “If I die from blood loss–”
“Quiet. You won’t die.” She barks, and thankfully, not a full minute later, Murph appears.
He stumbles out from behind her wall, his hands filled with three separate containers. When he takes notice of us, Murph’s face lights up. "The Broken Prince… back again in the kingdom shrouded in the bleakest of shadows." He muses.
Marjorie snaps her fingers at him and speeds over, dropping the jars onto the bed. She plucks the salve she wants off the mattress and smears the pungent orange balm over the wound.
I bite back my cry at the sting, and she huffs, "stop fidgeting." She barks, slathering another layer on.
"I thought that was you, Murph!" Will exclaims, extending his hand out towards the mage. He gingerly takes it before collecting the jars Marjorie didn’t use and dipping back out of the room.
"Stop fidgeting!" She snaps again, and I clench my fist, digging my nails into the soft skin of my palm. "Do you want to be healed or not?"
"I do! I don't, however, think thatyouwant me to be healed." I snarl, my teeth gnashing together. She flicks my ear for that comment and shouts for Murph to grab her dressing bandages. Once she has them, she roughly wraps the cloth around me, binding the upper half of my torso and the entirety of my right shoulder to keep the wound from reopening.
Will’s eyes narrow into slits as he stares at the massive amount of gauze. "Doesn't he need stitches?"
"Are you the healer?" She gripes.
"No…"
"Thenshush!”
His lips clamp together, and he backs away from the bed, watching her finish pinning the bandages in place. She tells me to wait a few minutes before attempting to get up, and I bob my head.
Marjorie leaves us with Murph, who stays humming at his workbench. I suck in a few more deep inhales and try to ignore the burning spreading across my skin from the salve she's applied.
