Page 78 of The Champion

Silently, he made his way across the yard and into the castle with only one destination in mind. He only hoped that the Jackal would be alone so that he could confront her.

As he reached the door to her chambers, she spilled out of the room with three of her friends. Ganymede stepped back into the shadows quickly before they saw him.

Damn. He dare not approach her right now. Not while her friends could overhear them.

Kill or be killed...

Sooner or later, she was bound to be alone. Then the two of them would have a nice, long conversation.

Sick of heart and completely demoralized, Rowena and Zenobia made their way into the hall that was crowded with nobles who could still find no other topic than when Stryder would be made to pay for the lives he had taken.

Why couldn’t they find the one responsible?

But then, they were searching for a needle in a haystack. There were close to two thousand people in Hexham for the tournament.

Two thousand.

Anyone could be the murderer. A blacksmith, a knight, a marshal, a...

Rowena froze midstep as a whole new thought came to her. “Zenobia, you said to me on your arrival that your people trained women for battle. Is this not true?”

“Aye.”

Her mind reeled with a whole new speculation. “Is it possible our murderer could be a woman and not a man?”

A sick look came over Zenobia’s face. Without another word, she spun around and started back.

Rowena rushed after it. “Zenobia?”

Zenobia didn’t pause. Instead, she kept an angry, quick stride. “We are such fools! Why didn’t one of us think of that before?”

“Then, I’m right?”

“Aye, Rowena, most likely you are. In fact, it makes perfect sense. Who better to get inside a knight’s tent and cut his throat? A woman could easily fool a man. ‘Tis the last person he would suspect was out to kill him.”

Part of Rowena wanted to shout out in triumph, but another part of her was ill. They had been wasting precious time looking for the wrong person.

Not to mention she shivered at the thought of one of the women courtiers taking part in such a horrible activity.

Zenobia didn’t stop until they found the men in the list. Nassir, dressed as one of Stryder’s men, stood with Christian and Swan. They looked as if they had been practicing with swords before Christian had joined them.

“‘Tis a woman we seek,” Zenobia said, interrupting their conversation.

Christian frowned.

“What?” Swan’s expression was aghast.

Nassir said something that sounded like a curse in Arabic.

“Rowena made the connection,” Zenobia said.

Swan recovered his gaping expression to scoff at the idea. “A woman is our killer?”

“Who better to kill us in our sleep?” Christian said quietly.

“The note,” Nassir added. “Remember what it said. ‘We didn’t all go home.’ Cyril was in charge of going down the special wing of the prison. Do you remember what he said that night?”

“None of them survived,” Christian whispered.