Page 40 of A Crown of Tears and Treason
I frowned. Who would visit me in this entire city? Kaya, probably. Apart from Goose, she’d been the only one to make an effort to be nice. Orappearnice.
Instead of answering, the guards crowded around me, creating a human wall that hurried me right up to the house. Blood Brotherhood apparently hated tardiness, too.
A new day, a new dress, the same old bullshit.
I was surrounded by more people than I could count, and yet I felt more alone than back in the mountains.
Another pang spread in my chest. I snuffed it out. I still couldn’t think about my parents, not when I slept with my switchblade under my pillow.
Each little surprise, good or bad, unnerved me.
The food? Amazing. I’d eaten trout maybe four or five times in my life, but here, I had a plethora of fish and seafood. Every. Single. Day. Little dimes of fat winked at me from fragrant soup bowls, and the meats sizzled underneath layers of glistening, tangy sauces. The first time Goose left me alone with delicious dishes I didn’t recognize, I devoured them so quickly that I got sick. I’d spent that night on the bathroom floor, moaning and having vivid dreams in which the huge snake came to eat me whole.
I’d forgotten what it was like to feel full. Gods, I’d missed it. No worrying I couldn’t have one more bite because mom and dad were bigger and had to eat more.
I liked it. Too much.
What I didn’t like was the way Goose had looked at me as if I’d sprouted five heads when I tried to help him clear up the table.
“Your Grace…” he’d muttered as he’d yanked the dirty plates out of my hand, eyes shifting to the door like he was afraid someone might overhear. “Iserveyou. That’s how it works here. This position helps me pay for my studies. Please.”
That was the last time I tried to do his job. I didn’t need to worry he’d be kicked out of whatever academy he went to because I was stubborn and old habits died hard.
Now I had to make sure the guards wouldn’t be punished because of me, too. I’d have to get more creative with my sneaking.
“Leaders should be the most selfless,” grandpa Constantine used to tell me during the late nights I used to watch him work in his smoky study. “We have too many lives to care for, too many responsibilities to handle. Most won’t understand or appreciate it. But you will still do it, because that’s what true rulers do.”
Perhaps the Blood Brotherhood didn’t understand it, but they appreciated it. Sort of. A constant flow of gifts had been coming to my house since I’d arrived.
Forme, someone they had never met. Vases, flowers, sweets, drawings.
“It’s tradition,” Goose had said while stacking everything into neat little piles on the veranda. “You’re a newcomer. You have to receive them, but you can never change or regift them. That’s a great slight.”
How very not-Blood-Brotherhood of them. This was the fearsome Clan I’d been taught to fear. Were they planning on killing me with kindness? “They want to make me feel welcomed?”
“It’s…required,” he’d finally admitted.
Ah. Tradition forced them to be nice. That eased some of my guilt, but not all of it. After a lifetime of wanting, it felt weird tohave.
Everything had been sent anonymously, too. I couldn’t even thank them.
Only one gift had been signed, my favorite so far. A book. A gorgeous, leather-bound book on the recent history of the BloodBrotherhood Clan. And, yes, it did wax poetically about the legendary feud with Adriana Vegheara.
Delveinto the madness before it sneaks up on you,
Kaya
That was…ominous.But considerate. If Kaya had come to visit, I could finally thank her, and get that formality done with. Trusting her was not an option. Faith in the wrong person could get me killed. Or worse, one of my cousins assassinated.
As soon as we entered the fragrant path, a strange chill raced down my spine. Despite the massive spears surrounding me, I reached for my switchblade, tucked inside my waistband. The Blood Brotherhood fabric was too precious and flimsy to bear its weight in a secret pocket, so I’d had to improvise.
But Kaya wasn’t the one waiting for me.
Right in front ofmygate, Zandyr’s presence speared the tranquility.
I gritted my teeth.Of coursethe order had come from him.
He had his long hair tied back today. His black uniform sucked in all the light. Or maybe it was Zandyr himself–he was just that compelling that even the sun couldn’t help itself.
