“Careful,” he grunted, his grip still unyielding.
“Thank you, General,” I said. “I’m steady now.”
The General said nothing, simply peered at me from under dark brows, his eyes canvassing my face and body. I stared back as equally unabashedly, my quizzical brown eyes meeting his hard green ones.
We stared at each other for a moment, and I felt my heartbeat quicken under his intense gaze.
The General opened his mouth and took a breath, his eyes softening for a moment.
“Lex—” But he was cut short by the abrupt opening of the door he just knocked on.
“General d’Alvey,” a gravely voice punctured through the silence of the hallway, bouncing off the walls down, echoing in the empty space. “You’re late.”
I watched as the curtain fell over the General’s eyes again, fully composed as all previous traces of warmth and sentiment bled away.
General d’Alvey slowly pulled his eyes from my own, turning his dark head to face the new voice. He said nothing, simply stared at the doorway, and I felt rather than saw the man grow uncomfortable under the General’s silent anger.
I refused to look at the man in the door, my eyes and mind still hopelessly cued into the enigmatic man gripping my arm like a lifeline.
There was a slight creak of leather as the man shifted in his boots, as he quietly cleared his throat.
“Y-yes. Well. Uhm. Please bring the soldier inside,” he finally stuttered when he realized the General wasn’t going to offer any sort of response for our apparent tardiness.
I scoffed slightly under my breath after I heard his boots shuffle back behind the door, and the General whipped his head back to me with a slight raise in his eyebrow.
“What?” I deadpanned. “If he thinks your blank stare is terrifying, then the man doesn’t really know fear, does he?” I smiled.
The General’s face slackened, his normal tan complexion paling slightly as his grip on me loosened. There was a deep sadness in his eyes, and I couldn’t help but retract my previous statement.
“Not that you’re terrifying, General. Just that you know how to command people. That’s all. I meant no disrespect,” I rambled, and the General’s mouth ticked up slightly at the corners. But his elusive smile was gone as soon as it appeared, making me think I had imagined it completely.
“Call me Rohak, Lex,” was his only response as he tightened his grip on my arm once more, leading me through the open doorway.
The roombehind was completely bare; no furniture, no signs of life. Just the glittering obsidian stone that comprised the entirety of the Academy. On each of the walls was another door; unnervingly, there was no sound emanating from any. What we were left with was almost pure silence, apart from the soft scrape of our boots against the stone floor. General d’Alvey—Rohak—seemed to know exactly which door we were supposed to enter, though, as he led me quickly across the space and through the door directly across from our entry point.
The sight that greeted me behind this second door was . . . not what I expected.
Though, to be honest, I wasn’t entirely surewhatI expected when I was summoned by Lord d’Refan.
Another training room, perhaps?
A library?
His study or office?
None of those would have surprised me.
Instead, I was standing in the middle of a medium-sized room with four more doors. But the labyrinth of doors and rooms was not what occupied my mind. The fact that I even noticed the exit points with the room’s contents in front of me was shocking.
Rohak gripped my arm impossibly tighter as he shut the door behind us. We paused in the entryway, and I let my eyes wander over everything in the open space.
There were three bare beds lined up in the middle of the room with enough space between each for two people to walk side-by-side. Next to each bed was a metal table containing a variety of instruments I’d never seen before. The first two beds were occupied, but I could only see feet as men in black robes bent over each, muttering quietly to each other.
I couldn’t even tell if the people lying in the beds were alive.
The thought sent a fresh chill down my spine and caused sweat to break out across my temples and neck.
Rohak tugged gently on my arm, and I whipped my head to see the direction he was pulling us. There was a desk shoved into the corner of the space, behind it sat an elderly man, his hooked nose nearly brushing the paper he scribbled on as he bent overthe desk. He continued as we approached, either unaware or uncaring of our presence.
