“Ulla, come back, please. He’s got a voice worse than a badger,” Farryn laughs.
Niht stops. “Badgers can’t sing. They just bark and hiss.”
“Precisely,” her twin Elanila says.
“Enough,” I bark, almost guilty for the irritation swimming through my veins.
They quiet and look at me.
“We are here, and now we must find Estela,” I say, practically breathless. As if to soothe me, the song that has been quiet for the last month starts up. It causes my Fuegorra to vibrate and the mating mark on my neck to burn.
I stagger, clutching my stone, and whip around to look back down at Zlosa.
I see nothing.
Estela?
Silence.
Ra'Salore steps out from behind a cluster of trees.
“We have a plan, one that you agreed on last night. Soon, I will go down to collect one of the humans. We can ask him what he knows of Estela.”
Ayla scoffs.
“Where was I when that was agreed upon? We are a part of the sisterhood. Mrath already has humans that she uses for information.”
I tighten my fists, trying to ignore the hum of urgency in the song. It needs me to go to her, but I don’t know where she is.
“Then why have you not brought one of them here?” I hiss.
She raises an eyebrow and crosses her arms. “I sent Taenya a quarter hour ago.”
I grit my teeth. “I suppose it is my turn to inquire whyyoudidn’t tellme?”
“I don’t answer to you. I was called on this trip to help you, not serve you,” Ayla smirks.
“And what would’ve happened if I’d sent Ra'Salore down after you’d already sent Taenya?” I press.
She steps forward and points at me, her wavy brown hair blowing in the winter wind.
“If you want to know my plans, you ask me. I will not make the first move.” Ayla says.
I consider her words and concede. This is the fire I was expecting to deal with.
“Very well. What happens when Taenya comes back with your contact?”
She smiles. “We have fun.”
There’s a darkness in her look, one that I don’t trust. It reminds me that she is an assassin and not a paladin of some sort.
“You will not hurt the human,” I say with finality.
She raises her eyebrows. “He won’t be in pain, he’ll be dead. If we leave him alive, then he can be found and interrogated, and then he will certainly wish he had died swiftly instead of under the weight of a thousand beatings by a giant’s boot.”
I shake my head. “Let him free.”
Ayla scoffs.
