Page 95 of Captive of the Stolen Empire

Zurina entered, accompanied by another captain. The last two to arrive. “What’s going on here?” she called.

I met her gaze, conveying all the worry simmering under my skin with a single look. Her head tilted to the side, her eyes flickering over me briefly before taking in the rest of the room.

No one stepped in to arrest or accuse her. Nor did anyone attack her with questions as she joined us in front of the emperor.

A tendril of unease wrapped around my throat, pulling my attention back to the paper. This time, I read the words on the page. Zurina’s handwriting, but the letter wasn’t sent to the rebels or our honored guests. It was sent to me.

My name jumped out at the top, bold and accusing. The paper contained a summary of what we’d learned of the rebels from a few weeks back, the same type Zurina often wrote up and gave to any of us when we missed a meeting.

I kept these pages locked in my desk. But no one entered my room. Had one of my guards—

“Interesting that one of our honored guests tried to pass off information again,” the emperor commented, drawing my attention. “Especially information with your name on it.”

Zurina flinched before turning to face me, a warning in her eyes, though I didn’t know which threat she tried to convey. Warren’s connection was silent, offering nothing.

I crossed to the man on the ground and crouched on my heels, metal armor clinking, until I was eye level with the top of his head. “How did you get into my quarters?”

“I didn’t,” he mumbled.

I jerked his head up by his hair, wrenching a cry from his lips. The emperor wouldn’t expect me to be careful, not with a traitor. Besides, I needed answers. This was a wrinkle I hadn’t counted on and couldn’t afford. “What did you say?”

“I didn’t take it.”

My grip tightened.

He cried out again. More blood dripped off his face to splatter on the stones.

“And yet you have it, and tried to what? Pass it off?” I flicked my gaze to Emperor Ryszard, who watched me carefully, a small smile on his lips. The emperor wasn’t surprised by that comment—he’d already told him.

Fingers of dread tickled the back of my neck as I fixed my attention on the man before me. “If you didn’t take it, how did you get it?”

“It was given to me,” he groaned.

“By whom?”Which of my guards had dared—

“Ilya.”

Breath fled my lungs.

Color bled from the world.

My heart twisted so tight it might burst. Voices rose around me, but I didn’t hear them. I didn’t even see the man who jerked from my slacked grip.

Ilya.

Her name echoed in every recess of my mind.

Ilya.

She’d betrayed me.

I stiffened. No, she couldn’t have. She wouldn’t. Not after our night together, after what we’d shared.

“Lucien.” Warren’s calming voice slipped into my mind, barely penetrating the dark pool of betrayal clouding my world. “The emperor asked, ‘Isn’t that the woman under your watch?’”

The magical tingle faded away as I turned to the man whose question I’d never heard. His brows rose skyward as he drummed his fingers on the desk. No fury, no barks of outrage. He knew the answer but expected me to give it to him anyway.

“Yes,” I bit out. “She is.”

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