Page 141 of Wings of Destruction

Not to mention there is a decisive lack of hiding places in this place unless you know where to look for them and she does not.

Heart leaping in my throat, I cut a corner and catch the tail end of her gray dress disappearing down a side hall.

Okay, maybe she isn’t as smart as I’d given her credit for being. “Morgan!”

She’s got to be out of her mind to say no to the deal. It’s a chance for an education, a chance to be chosen by a superior mount and to distinguish herself among her peers. Not to mention there won’t be any more need for her late-night training sessions alone in my private gym.

She’ll have the best trainers and tutors. The best educators.

Is her ego really so large that she’d throw it all away? If she knew I’d cast my lot in with hers, that I’d tied our fates together the way I did⁠—

Then I’d definitely say she answered to spite me and force me to follow her to the pit. But Morgan has no clue. This isn’t about me. This is so much bigger than either one of us. We’re cogs in a wheel.

I hustle forward and lose her around the next bend. She’s ducked into the servant’s quarters.

“Kieran, what in the Void?”

Astrid’s blustering tone catches me unaware and I lose precious seconds in catching Morgan. My second in command stalks forward and I look up, the details of the hall lost as she comes into sharp focus.

She’s gotten anxious and mistrusting lately. More than usual. No doubt she’d skulked around the office waiting for the perfect time to ambush me.

“I thought you were only going to be in Harbi’s office for a few minutes? Thirty of them are about twenty-five too many. Your future wife is practically bleeding to death from her broken nose. And you’re stalking in the opposite direction from the healer’s quarters.”

Astrid’s hands go to her hips, fisting there.

It isn’t about Evie. It’s about control. It’s about feeling the lack of it when we need every precious bit.

My nostrils flare. “Do we have to do this now?”

“Sometimes I feel like the only time I have to speak to you is when you’re running in the opposite direction.”

Ignoring Astrid, I trail Morgan into one of the neatly tucked away service corridors running through the walls of the castle like an invisible hive. Only the maids know their way around.

The paneling swings shut behind Morgan by the time I make it and I catch the end with my boot, prying it wider. A yawning mouth of gloom waits ahead. There’s no indecision as I step into the domain of the housekeepers keeping this castle running.

“Hey, Kieran.” Astrid stands at the doorway but won’t join me. “You’re not going to be able to outrun responsibility forever.”

I don’t need forever, I think as her voice echoes back to me. I only need a few of those minutes she’s begrudging me to figure out what to do about Morgan.

She said no. My head spins and an unsteady sickness lights in my chest.

Fools make plans and the Ether laughs.

Mother used to say that to me when I told her about all my grand ideas for the future. She was a person who lived in the moment. Even when she’d been stolen from her village and forced into a nobleman’s house as his war prize. She found joy in the small moments.

Until Roman tired of her and booted her back to her present, used and very pregnant. What I wouldn’t give for his benign neglect now.

Mother showed me the truth of the world, a truth that Morgan already knew. So why throw away a chance to make a difference?

My steps skip a beat along the well-trod path of the corridor and the slight dip where stone has been worn away by marching feet.

“You’re really going to make me do this.” Astrid stomps behind and the panel hiding the hall slides shut behind us. “You dreg-heap.”

“No one asked you to come.”

“You did, when you locked me into place at your side,” she gripes.

Potentially, but I certainly haven’t asked her to join me now. I search for signs of Morgan but the claustrophobic press of the stone walls, much closer here than in the main spaces, does something strange to my chest. My heart ticks rather than beats and I swallow compulsively but never manage to clear my throat.