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“Someone send for the King right away,” I ordered the guards. “I need to speak with him.”
“He’ll return soon,” Jasper tried to placate me, and I whipped my head around to glare at him.
“Send for him now.” I was tired of his shit, too.
I was the queen, and I was tired of not standing up for myself.
“Y-yes, Luna.”
I made it the rest of the way up the steps without incident, but a plan was forming in my mind. With the guards distracted, I intended to return to the basement later that evening and catch the being hiding down there. I knew in my soul that someone was responsible for the darkness that enshrouded the palace, whoever they were.
Now to find a way to evade my litany of nursemaids.
Chapter17
Zephy
This section of the palace consisted of four adjoining suites: the main for Cade and me, and three for our servants at hand.
Ryland took one, and Maywin had since been moved into another. Rufus, my personal driver from Carrottrove, remained in the adjoining suite from my original room, leaving one of the adjacent rooms empty. This was my best plan to escape, reminiscent of the time that I had last dodged my security team… and found myself endangered as a result.
It would be different this time. I was more cautious and would take proper note of my surroundings. I only needed to be in and out to get the information I needed.
I peeked outside the door to see how many guards stood in the hall beyond my door now. If they had taken my request to find Cade seriously, I couldn’t say, but Jasper stood alongside the recruit and two others, their spines straight and eyes vigilant, as if they, too, could smell the danger that I could.
More the reason for me to investigate whatever is happening underneath us. Someone is doing something nefarious there. But who and why?
Content that the guards were not coming inside the room, I silently closed the door.
“Luna?”
I whirled and gasped, paling at the sight of Aradia and Shay standing in my bedroom, anger overcoming me.
“You can’t do that! Maybe Cade puts up with you coming and going like this, but I definitely will not!”
Aradia was unfazed, as always, but Shay waned at my tone, lowering her eyes.
“I’m sorry, Luna,” she said.
“You should be sorry that you haven’t come to see me since Aradia has taken you under her wing,” I challenged, hoping to steer them away from the fact that I was planning another escape.
“We just came to make sure that you’re all right,” Aradia told me, studying my face with too much interest, and shame flooded me. I was only snapping at her out of guilt. The damn enchantress and her astute senses. I’d have to be more careful if I wanted to be sneaky. She was very good at her job.
“I was about to retire for the night,” I lied.
“Were you now?”
“Has Cade returned?” I asked, changing the subject abruptly. “I think he’s going into the city to find the warlock, and I would like to speak with him.”
The comment made Aradia pale, as I had suspected it might. “What?”
I nodded. “No one told you?” I asked innocently. “He’s been gone a long while now.”
She gritted her fine, white teeth and glanced at her stolen protégé. “Come along, Shay. I’ll teach you how to deal with a king who doesn’t listen well.”
Smothering a smile, I turned away as the pair vanished into a puff of smoke and again ensured that I was alone. Padding across the room in my slippers, I tried the door to the empty room and winced when it groaned under my touch. It had clearly not been opened in a long time.
I paused, waiting for someone to react to the sound, but when no one came, I exhaled the breath I’d been holding and continued onward. Again, I pushed the door, ignoring the moaning creak that it made when it opened, and stepped into the dusty, unused servant’s room.
