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Does he know I saw him unmasked at the initiation ceremony? Or maybe he’s simply anticipating that I’ll put the pieces together when I join him for this evening’s meeting of the bug club.
Despite my feigned friction with Stavros, I do my best to put on a supportive face with the students. Most of them have nothing to do with the mess I’ve gotten myself into.
I don’t need more enemies on top of those I already have to contend with.
Speaking of potential enemies, this is one of the classes Petra joins the military division for. I contrive to avoid facing her throughout the various exercises Stavros assigns, but the distant royal has an unfortunate stubborn streak.
When I’ve finished hauling our equipment back into the storage building at the end of the class, I emerge from the room to find Petra standing in the building’s dim hallway.
There’s no one else around. It’s obvious she’s waiting for me.
I debate going so far as to stride right past her, but such a blatant snub feels unwise. So I stop and give her my best blank expression instead. “Was there something you needed?”
Petra’s dark gaze flicks around us, as if she’s as alert to possible eavesdroppers as I am. She steps closer, pitching her voice low. “I wanted to speak with you—briefly. I won’t delay you for very long.”
I fold my arms over my chest with a conscious effort to keep them loose rather than defensively tight. “Speak to me about what?”
Petra studies me for a few seconds, her pensive gaze uncomfortably keen. “I understand why you’ve rebuffed and avoided me, and I don’t blame you for it. I shouldn’t have put you in an awkward situation to begin with.”
My stomach knots, but I knit my brow with honest confusion. “What are you talking about?”
She makes a dismissive gesture. “That’s not the important part. The main thing I wanted to say is… When someone asks too much of you, it’s reasonable to refuse. The people with the most power aren’t always right.”
A sinking sensation ripples through me from throat to gut. She can’t possibly know—surely King Konram wouldn’t have discussed his secret assassination plans with his niece however many times removed, of all people?
I’m not sure I believe he’d even tell the queen.
I can’t stop my voice from stiffening slightly. “I don’t quite follow what you mean. Ster. Stavros hasn’t asked anything all that immense of me. I’m happy to do my job.”
It’s the response she should expect from someone who hasn’t been given a different, horrible job by a figure with a lot more power than my employer, but the intensity in Petra’s smooth face doesn’t shift.
“Maybe you’re not sure you can say no outright,” she says. “But you can pick your own methods to achieve the same goal. Do it your way, the way that feels right to you. That’s all the gods want from us. I’m sorry.”
She turns on her heel and hurries out of the storage building without another word. Her last two words ring in my head.
Somehow the apology unsettles me more than anything else.
Well, Julita says in a doubtful tone.What in the realms was she getting at?
I lift my shoulders in a tiny shrug, but my stomach keeps churning.
It certainly sounded as if Petra knows what I’ve been asked to do. Even if she doesn’t—would her suggestion still apply?
Gods smite me, why should I listen to some minor royal’s opinions anyway? It isn’t her neck on the line with the scourge sorcerers or the king.
But through the rest of the day, Petra’s words keep niggling at me.
I’m already carrying out the king’s command “my way,” aren’t I? I’ll be using my stealth and my knife, the tools I’ve relied on so often in the past.
Of course, Petra has no idea who I’ve been in the past. Does she think her distant uncle instructed me on exactly how to kill Ster. Torstem, and there might be some other method of murder I’d prefer?
Or did she mean something else entirely?
And what in the realms would the god who’s kept me alive this far want, anyway? Kosmel is continuing to be frustratingly silent on that subject.
I have to push all those unsettling questions aside when I make my way to the entomology club’s room in the Quadring. This time I get to enter it through the door rather than slipping through a window.
Having experienced the space before, I’m prepared for the mix of woodsy and sour scents and the ever-present rustling of the club room’s smallest inhabitants. Still, my skin creeps as I step inside.
