Not a paltry sum, but not one which could have led to riches. But a handful here, a coin purse there, a house loan there added up–enough that nobody would notice.
“This.” I tapped onto his name, besmirched in such a small way. But someone had used such a small joy of his to craft a plot to kill him.
My blood boiled.
A sinister heat pulsed in my chest. I only became aware my power began twisting around my wrists when Dax pulled the papers away.
“Careful,” he admonished. “Don’t want to have to rewrite any of these.”
“You won’t.” I rested my hands on the table, face contorting. “That’s how they stole money. Through expenses in someone else’s name. That’s how he’d figured it out.”
And then sent me on a wild chase for a pebble in a rocky river bed. Why not tell me outright? Why not launch an investigation while he’d still been alive? A real one, instead of asking me to figure it out.
My father, bless his soul, had been peculiar. But he was a smart man. He’d had his reasons–but would never be able to reveal them. Not anymore.
Whoever had done this knew my father’s predilections, but not his spirit. Not enough.
The list was long.
The task now edging on impossible.
“So someone was forging expenses in our names. We’ll never be able to tell which is which. Some of these people are on the run. Others dead,” Dax said, voice filled with dread.
“We’ll focus on the ones weknoware out of the ordinary.”
“Like Bia and her house?” He tilted his head at the pages. “She might have known those large sums would attract attention and tried to syphon as much as she could.”
“Or someone framed her.” I righted myself, tall above my Clan’s crimes hidden between the lines. “Someone who must have hated her.”
Chapter 63
Ryker
The sky rumbled, turning against us.
We needed warmth. The sun roasting us and everything in its path.
Instead, we got bolts of lightning in the distance, angry clouds, and icy wind that bit harder than the currents at home.
Like it sensed what we wanted to do and had deemed our plan an abomination that needed to be stopped.
The only warmth came from the pulse of Allie in my mind, a flutter of energy that kept me grounded against the massive expanse of the Serpent army marching toward us, their snakes winding between the troops with flicking tongues and hunger in their eyes.
The Butcher grinned at us from atop his brown mare. He didn’t want to dirty that golden and jade armor of his for nothing in this world.
But even his bottomless arrogance wasn’t immune to the funeral pyres we had raised on their side of the river.
Our side, actually. Invaded by these soldiers who fought because their leaders told them to. Perhaps some had marched for greed and glory. Others to enact as much violence and torture as their sick minds could conjure.
I prayed the fates would differentiate between them.
The Serpent troops shivered, only partly out of terror. My warriors stood unbothered against the cold and Zandyr’s had been trained in the unforgiving mountains by Adara, but the Serpents came from much calmer, warmer shores, and their jade armor shielded them less from the wind than our leathers.
All of the soldiers avoided the pyres with a wide berth, probably thinking about their own mortality. Elysia’s funeral oils had masked the smell, but the horrific sight was enough to send a wave of revulsion through their ranks.
Prayers.
Muttered pleas.
