I really should cuddle him just to freak him out. The fun thought made my lips tremble.
Instead, I rolled onto my side, wanting to face the tent flap. After what happened earlier, I’d much rather have a clear view of the entrance just in case someone tried creeping inside, though I doubted they’d dare.
As I was drifting off, I thought I felt something. A gentletugon one of my curls, maybe. Too close to the land of sleep to care, I let myself drift.
???
On waking, it took me a good few moments to realize where I was. The hard ground beneath me was the first clue. The panting of dogs was the second. The third was the dark, spicy scent coming from the material covering me.
A scent that belonged to Talon.
The events of last night rushed back to me. I felt my face harden. I hoped Klemens was dead. I really did.
As for my little encounter with Talon …Bad move.Sleeping with a person who had a position of authority over you was never the best idea. Still, I didn’t regret it.
Feeling a warm weight on my feet, I raised my head and looked down to see that Valor had settled there at some point through the night. Chief and Zinc were still sprawled on their blankets. As for Talon … he sat a few feet away, tugging on his boots.
“Morning,” I said, my voice a little raspy.
His attention settled on me. Or, to be more specific,his glowersettled on me. Nothing new there.
I couldn’t stifle a smile. Which only made his glare darken. How fun.
He curtly pointed to a nearby knapsack. It was mine, as were the boots beside it. He’d apparently grabbed my stuff for me.
“Thanks,” I told him.
His grunt was nothing short of grumpy. Without another look at me, he got up and left the tent.
Charming. And a very clear message that last night would be a one-off. As if I hadn’t already known that.
I also knew that it was for the best. Knew that I’d never get the things I wanted from Talon. And if I felt a bite of disappointment, I completely and utterly ignored it.
CHAPTER NINE
Feeling my eyelids begin to droop, I sat up straighter in my chair and focused on the text in front of me. The wooden piece of furniture wasn’t at all comfortable—none here in the library were. But I was so damn exhausted right now that I could fall asleep on even a rope. Comfortably.
As part of the hell of Xalbia, all the candidates had been kept awake for two days straight. Like we hadn’t already felt sapped of nearly all energy.
How could our superiors be sure that we didn’t have ourselves a sneaky nap?
Well, it had a lot to do with the thin cuff that had been snapped to our wrist. It somehow sensed if the wearer drifted off to sleep.
Then it zapped you with a sizzling energy that reverberated through your bones.
It had happened to me only once. I hadn’tpurposelytoppled into the land of dreams, I’d done it accidentally in the food hall after I’d eaten my dinner a few hours ago.
Soule had patted my shoulder and said, “If it makes you feel any better, the bags under your eyes aren’t that bad.”
It hadn’t made me feel better at all.
But I’d be allowed to sleep tonight. Just not until the garrison’s bell rang twice, which probably wouldn’t be foranother hour or so. I’d chosen to spend the time between now and then refreshing my memory on all I’d been taught in the two weeks that had passed since the not-so-delightful camping trip in the Pines.
Though we’d been given more lessons, we hadn’t been tested straight off . This time, we would be tested at the end of the week instead … which would make things even harder, because it meant we would have to memorize it all.
How we were expected to memorize anything when our brains were so sluggish, I had no clue.
The tests were tedious but also important. It was vital that we knew which beasts were venomous, what kind of effects said venom would cause, where these creatures could be found, and how best to handle coming face to face with them.
