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Cecilia immediately bristled. “You damn—”
Denham held out an arm, physically cutting her off, but never looked away from Rochelle. “You’re clearly under the wrong impression.” He stepped forward, into Rochelle’s space, and took hold of her chin roughly. His voice lowered in a deadly snarl that overrode the sting in Rochelle’s bloodied cheek. “This is not a negotiation.”
****
“I still think you’re wrong,” Viveca said as their group’s rented hovair trotted away, leaving them just shy of their destination. They were outside the central patrol post for one of Yafae’s most populated, and diverse, cities. Caram.
Aric swept his gaze over the ambling foot traffic, unsurprised by the widening eyes of passerby. Or the retreating. “In what way?” It had taken nearly an hour for the trio of his friends to gather together and ready themselves for travel—a journey that, in itself, he hadn’t wholly expected them to agree to.
“All that stuff about Cecilia,” Viveca said. “Obviously something went wrong in her head, I’m not arguing that, but losing her temper and attacking one person doesn’t make her the source of some big conspiracy. No way we could’ve lived with her for so many years and never noticed.”
That was the argument he’d assumed she would lead with. She’d made essentially the same one no less than three times in the previous months.
Aric turned toward the two-story building with the royal crest emblazoned on the side. “Whether I’m right or wrong, we won’t know until we find her and actually speak to her. Which means locating Cecilia is as important as locating Prince Denham.” He wouldn’t, in public, articulate the reason they needed to find Denham. He’d explained everything already. They knew.
Mitzi moved up to Viveca’s side and laid a hand on her shoulder. “The search is what matters now.”
Viveca shifted her weight, cocking a hip and folding her arms across her chest. Her long hair, in its usual ponytail, obscured the sheath of the sword she wore strapped at an angle across her back. “Well, when we find her, you’ll see I’m right.”
“I for one hope this has all been some strange misunderstanding,” Darnel said.
Aric glanced back at the three of them. He hoped bringing them—as he always did on missions—hadn’t been a mistake. “Keep an open mind.”
The door to the patrol post opened as he stepped up to it and an armored guardsman held position in the doorway. The guard was tense, nerves dancing in his eyes, but he met Aric’s gaze. “Sentry?”
Aric inclined his head. “I am.”
The guard swallowed hard. “We’ve not called for you.”
“I’m aware,” Aric said. The edges of his lips tipped into a frown at the unreceptive greeting. There was no doubt in his mind that the wild, hate-fueled rumors the Lamonts had started were another piece of Denham’s mysterious plot. A piece that didn’t yet make sense. “I’m searching for—”
“Please leave,” the guard interrupted, raising his voice as if to hide the way it shook. “Your presence is both unnecessary and unwelcome in Caram.”
Aric narrowed his eyes. “Are you telling me that every guard responsible for protecting this city, in the name of the King, has fallen victim to unfounded rumor?”
The guard drew an unsteady breath and visibly squared his shoulders. “We are the guardians of Caram. We will not cow before a power-hungry sorcerer.”
Darnel stepped up to Aric’s side. “You wear the King’s crest,” he said. “Either respect the title and position bestowed by His Majesty, King Jensen, or kneel in sublimation. As a Royal Knight, I will not tolerate to hear this disrespect.”
Another guard came up behind the first. This one was shorter and broader, and his face was sterner. “You’re the knight who’s made his career following after this rabid beast. You’re as unwelcome here as he is. Get lost.” This one followed up his instruction with an outstretched arm and a burst of power. A wave of energy-charged air rushed from the glowing circle in front of his palm, accompanied by the deliberate bucking of the stone walkway beneath their feet.
Darnel gripped the hilt of his sword.
Aric snapped his fingers, letting the outward ripple of his own irritated magic crash into and snuff out the inferior attack spells. Both guards gaped at him, but he ignored them. “Clearly, you don’t have the objectivity necessary to police civilians. I’ll be back to deal with all of you when my mission is over.” He wove his magic into the walls of the building and snapped the doorway shut, making sure to miss the forwardmost guard’s booted toes by a hair. Then he projected his voice into the walls as he sealed the windows and not-so-hidden underground passage, leaving only the air vents flowing. “Guardsmen of Caram, you’re under house arrest until my business in your city is concluded. Try to flee the area once you’re released, and I or my team will hunt you down and drag you back to the palace to face the punishment you’re due for your disloyalty. Use this time to reflect on what you truly believe.”
“You don’t think that was a little extreme?” Mitzi asked as Aric turned his back on the building.
“It wasn’t my first choice,” he said, “but they made it clear we won’t get anything useful out of them. There isn’t time to waste on that sort of interrogation.” And it wasn’t like anyone would die unless someone inside deliberately assaulted someone else.
Mitzi sighed as if she were displeased.
Viveca made a sound as though she intended to say something, but huffed instead. They walked several feet before she ultimately said, “It’s awfully smokey here…”
Aric lifted his gaze toward the skyline. He’d noted the presence of a thicker, dark gray smoke along the edge of the business district when they’d arrived, but the lack of wafting plumes or distressed cries had allowed him to lose focus. Arguably, even worrying about the oddity of the smoke was a loss of focus in itself. He wasn’t in the city to investigate any fires. Just to be safe, however, he let his awareness sweep outward in the given direction, searching mostly for signs of conflict or injury, something that would require action.
The most he found were men and women in a scattered few locations, in the process of mopping up after or finishing subduing fires. They were building fires, none that looked to have gotten terribly out of hand, all within the confines of the business district.Odd.
“Um, excuse me?”
