Slow clapping draws my gaze up to the king, who sardonically applauds the prince.
“So gallant, Kaelen. Hopefully, you haven’t damaged my guard, or you may be forced to take his shift tonight.”
Prince Kaelen’s smile is a challenge of bared teeth and narrowed eyes. “I hate bullies. Maybe you should keep such incompetent wastrels off your guard roster and put them to work more suited for their …skills, Your Majesty,” he drawls, bowing in the king’s direction. “Perhaps cleaning the middens?”
The king stands and walks toward us. “If I needed your help to direct my people, Kaelen, I would have asked you for it.” He doesn’t hide the sarcasm dripping from his clipped words.
Since I’m already on the floor, I bow my head as deeply as I can but stop short of pressing my forehead to the marble. If I’m going to die anyway, I’ll be goddess-damned before I grovel to this man, king or not.
“Elianna!”
A crackle of whispers floats around the edges of the room after the king bellows the name, but nothing happens. I dare to peek up at him and find him staring down at me, scowling.
Does he thinkmyname is Elianna?
But no. The officer knew my name. Elianna must be someone else who’s incurred the king’s rage.
The click of delicate heels approaches from behind me, but I don’t look around. My brief surge of defiance is already gone, sinking into the grayness building at the edges of my mind. I shudder and fight the feeling. I can’t afford to fall over the edge into the abyss.
Not now, not now, not now, please.
I know from hard experience that I can exist in a state of heightened emotional or physical pain for only so long. When fear, injury, or hunger becomes too much for me to endure, my mind protects me by sinking into a fog of gray nothingness, where no sharp edges can touch me. Where I don’t hurt or hunger or feel sorrow …
Where I feel nothing at all.
The problem, of course, is that sometimes I don’t come back from the abyss for days.
Or weeks.
Or, during the worst of it—the period that earned me the Inquisitors’ judgment—multiple weeks.
I glance down at my wrist, where my dirty sleeve covers theGMGray Mind mark. The visceral memory of that burning iron branding my flesh jolts me out of the fog trying to suck me down into it. I force myself to focus on the new arrival, looking up from her silver slippers to the white-and-silver robe that marks her as one of the Air Touched.
A bizarre thought pops into my mind—one of my friend Trick’s rude jokes. I have to bite my lip against the grin that, unbelievably, tries to surface.
A king, a prince, and a sorcerer walk into a throne room …
“This can’t be what you meant,” the king says, disbelief underscoring every word. He reaches out one black boot to touch my knee, and I flinch back. “How could the oracles mean to put the fate of Altarra in the hands of the ones already in the dungeon, orthis?”
The sorcerer doesn’t cower, but I can tell by the slight tremble in her fingers that it’s a near thing. She clasps her hands together in frontof the silver links of her belt and bows her head deeply. It’s not quite a bow, not a curtsy, but nonetheless conveys respect.
“I didn’t say it had to be her. Your Majesty,youtoldmethat the Sister Superior herself recommended this person, which is why you wanted to see her now.” Her golden-eyed gaze touches on me and skitters away. “It could be the thief or the apprentice pig keeper. It could be one of the criminals your guards are retrieving in the city as we speak.”
The Sister Superior knew about this? She evenrecommendedme for whatever this is? The sour taste of betrayal fills my mouth, though I should know better after years of servitude beneath her monstrous rule.
Idoknow better … so why does it still hurt?
I guess it’s because even monsters can feel like family after they keep you in their cages for long enough.
“Thieves and pig keepers and criminals,” the king scoffs. “I must be mad to go along with your ridiculous plan.”
“I’d try the thief,” the prince drawls in a voice that turns my stomach.
I risk a glance up to see him raise one eyebrow at Flack, who was struggling to sit up but wilts beneath Kaelen’s gaze. Nobody moves to help the fallen guard, so maybe I’m not the only one who detests him.
“Why the thief?”
“Because I’d like to have a single damn chance, minuscule as it may be, to actually succeed,” Kaelen rasps, his voice almost but not quite a snarl. “YourMajesty.”
