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Chapter 6
Vahadr
“Itake it back,” the human says as she storms towards me from one of the sitting rooms branching out from the foyer. “I can’t do this job. I quit.”
I tsk as I step inside, the front door hardly even swinging shut behind me before she’s already on my case. Has she been waiting up? “Miss Martin, you haven’t even started yet.”
“Then, I pre-quit!”
“No, thank you.”
“Stop doing that; you can’t just say no to me quitting.”
I ignore her and begin walking forward, unbuttoning my ruined military jacket and unhooking my rapier and sheath from its belt before shrugging off the cloth and letting it fall on the floor. One of the maids will be along to clear it up before tomorrow.
“And why are you covered in blood?” she says in a tone of extreme exasperation as if she’s been dealing with a lifetime of bloodied overcoats and can’t bear to see one more.
“Don’t fret, female, it isn’t my own.”
“I didn’t ask if you were hurt.” I quirk a quick side-glance at her animated face as she stalks along beside me. “I just want to know why there’s so much blood going around tonight.”
“Pardon me?”
In response, she shoves a crumpled little gift-bag into my hand, and I halt at the foot of the stairs, resting my slim sword tip down along the bottom rung as I take the bag from her fingers.
“Ah,” I mutter as I peer in, catching sight of the family crest on the ring. Kuznezhen has finally been captured. I’ll have to order his transportation soon. “Excellent. Thank you for staying up to inform me.”
I hand her back the bag and begin ascending the stairs.
“Wh—that’s not why I stayed up!” she splutters as she follows. “I stayed up to quit.”
“I do not accept your resignation,” I say, as I tuck the embossed metallic sheath of my sword under one of my arms, then unbutton the cuffs of my gray shirt. “I received a message earlier from Miss Blyesh informing me of her own resignation, effective immediately, with no further explanation. Rather odd.” Miss Martin looks suddenly guilty, and I file her reaction away for future reference. “In any case, I will require you to keep an eye on Asili in addition to assisting me through my many appointments tomorrow. We have a busy schedule.”
“I don’t want to be involved in whatever illegal things you’re doing!”
My gaze flicks to her once more as I begin to roll my sleeves to my elbows, and I note the interesting way her cheeks seem to redden slightly with her temper.
“Nothing that I do can be illegal,” I say as we reach the top of the stairs, and she continues to follow me towards my bedroom. “Not if I’m the one doing it.”
“Mister President,” she enunciates, “somebody has delivered a severed finger to your door… How is that freaking okay?”
“Your moral objections, while quaint, are irrelevant.”
“Do you expect me to just live with something like this? To ignore it? Fingers don’t just fall off and innocently deliver themselves in pretty little gift bags!”
I stop by my door and turn on my heels to face her. She looks flushed, her expressive body framed by the platinum-gilded oil painting behind her. “I do not require your approval, Miss Martin. I require your assistance. And my son, who is by your standards innocent of all wrongdoing, needs you.”
I can’t help the way my lips twitch upwards at the look on her face—a mix between outrage and surprise. I fear I may quickly become addicted to her emotive responses.
“Why don’t you just leave Asili with someone else?” she grinds through clenched teeth after a moment, raking a hand through her brown curls. “Why d’you have to drag me into this? He doesn’t even like me.”
I like how her motion makes a few floating tendrils fall forward into her eyes, and instead of putting her in her place for to her continued defiance, I find myself wondering what it would be like if my own fingers were to repeat that same sweep through her hair.
“My brother has other matters to attend to tomorrow.”
“Don’t you have anyone else you can leave him with?”
I resist the urge to snort, as if trust is that easy to come by. “Asili stays where I can see him.”
