Bird signs and unanswered questions haunt my dreams, but I’m not down for long before someone knocks loudly on a door. An inexperienced sentry must’ve accidentally locked the barracks’ entrance. The watchman will get it.
Groggy, I roll over to return to slumber. My hand spreads over the rough bedsheet, yet I’m not thinking about cotton but a liquid-gold dress. I curl my hand in a fist, pulling.
Two more knocks. I open my eyes. That’s not the front door. Someone is atmydoor. Sweet divine, what time is it?
“Praetorian!” a deep voice calls.
I return to reality and release the sheets from my fist, shaking my head. What was I just thinking?
My body aches, but I roll out of bed and toss on a shirt. It’s barely dawn, but duty comes first.
Someone bangs on the door again, insistent, as I pad over the cold, tiled floor. I can’t imagine anything that could be this urgent, but I answer.
“Yes?” I rub the sleep from my eyes.
Two sentries stand at attention. They salute me together. I give them a half-hearted salute back. It’s too early for this.
The hall lamps are still lit, the flames reflecting off the bald heads of the men. They’re brothers, twin sons of an olive oil merchant, but between thousands of sentries in the capital and the early hour, I can’t recall their names.
The mouser of the barracks hisses at us as he goes by. I have snuck chicken gizzards to that black cat for years now, and he still doesn’t like a single soul here. Myself included.
I smile as he slinks down the hallway. I suppose I like that he can’t be bought.
“Praetorian, we are sorry to disturb you, but you are needed in the Forum,” one of the sentries says.
I return my focus to them. “Why is that?”
“Senator Verhardt may have been found.”
I yawn. Julian and a cadre of sentries escorted the Senate Leader back to his villa at the end of the Revelry. “I was unaware he was missing.”
The brothers exchange glances. They’re not identical, but they have the same mannerisms and the same large, slightly vacant brown eyes.
“Found dead, sir,” one explains. “Murdered in the Forum.”
His words wake me like falling into a cold plunge pool.
“I’ll be with you shortly.”
I hurry into my bathroom, splash water on my face, and don the armor of the Praetorian. As I dress, my heart pounds, but I hold out hope they’re wrong. It’s not possible that the Senate Leader was murdered. No senator has been killed in Pryor in twenty years, and I just saw him a few hours ago. Verhardt has constant security around him—but then again, so had the Elusian king. Andhewas capable of great magic.
No one is untouchable. I know that for a fact.
But the conclave is set to begin at midnight. The seven senators will sequester for a week in the palace on Mount Ara. If Verhardt was murdered or even missing, the timing can’t be a coincidence. Someone wanted to affect the laws of our land—to strike at the heart of the republic.
Someone succeeded.
And that means I failed.
My stomach turns as the implications swirl inside my head. But the sentries said “may have been found.” Why?
“Where is the body?” I ask as I step out of my quarters.
“On the altar of peace,” one of them replies before clearing his throat. “Mostly.”
I stride out of the barracks with the twins in tow. It’s dawn, but just barely; the sky is lit up in streaks of pinks and purples.
I furrow my brow at the word “mostly.” I want clarification, but we’re well on our way there, heading through the quiet Forum.
