Page 4 of The Sundered Realms

Well, she’d had a lot of practice pretending not to be a threat, too.

Liris accepted the pen and quickly wrote out a simple sentence as she explained, “Thyrasel is a language from one of the lost realms that once shared borders with the realms now known as Otaryl and Periannolu.”

Jadrhun looked at her sharply. “Yet the language was lost before the realm?”

“Yes. The language had never been particularly widespread and fell out of use even within the realm centuries before the Sundering. Few original written records survive today—less than a bookshelf’s worth—and since most scholars had long since given up hope of translating them, Serenthuar now owns most of them.”

“And you the lone expert. Convenient.”

His tone was mocking; his eyes anything but.

A chill ran through her. “Not for learning purposes. It’s enormously complicated, and I’m afraid you’ll have no one else to help you.”

You can’t kill me yet.

Because he would, of course he would: the elders had bargained to a demon servant a language no other caster would be able to translate and thus dispel. As soon as she taught him the language, he could open portals for demons no one would be able to close.

“I won’t need help for long,” Jadrhun told her, and it didn’t sound like a boast, even though he knew nothing about the language yet.

It sounded like a warning.

Maybe if she were a better person, she’d let them kill her right now and prevent even the possibility.

But Liris had sacrificed enough of her life to people who would discard her, and as long as she was alive, she could thwart him.

And her despair had morphed very, very quickly into towering rage.

Rage, she could use.

Thyrasel wasn’t the only lost language in Serenthuar’s libraries, but it was the most difficult. That was why she’d chosen it.

Fatalism would be giving up, when instead teaching Jadrhun the hardest languages she knew of would buy her time to win this rigged game the elders had placed her in as a pawn—as long as he committed to learning it.

As long as she was clever enough to overcome her lack of experience, with only one shot at survival.

The most important test of her life.

Liris smiled and arched her eyebrows. “We’ll see if you’re up to the challenge.”

Jadrhun’s eyes flashed with genuine humor. “Oh, you are good, aren’t you? I dare you to dazzle me.”

Watch me. “You casters and your spell languages are all about complexity, as I understand, and spells use patterns?”

Jadrhun tilted his head. “If that’s all you know about spells, I’m curious how you’re so certain your Thyrasel will be worth my time.”

Liris mimicked him. “I’m surprised you didn’t know Serenthuar ambassadors never study magic. If we did, given our many other accomplishments, no realm in the universe would believe we weren’t set on infiltration.”

“Very different from spying, of course.”

“Oh, quite. One takes over a Gate’s security personally; the other has people for that.”

Jadrhun grinned at her—until Elder Omaqil cleared his throat, his gaze narrow, and then Jadrhun’s expression took on a vicious edge.

“What,” he said, “is it not enough for her to do her duty, she’s not allowed to enjoy her time, either?”

Disdain for the elders, or anger at his position—or hers? It didn’t matter.

She should not have been enjoying verbal fencing with a man who served demons and would definitely kill her as soon as was practical. But she was, and if it was sanctioned, that was somehow worse.

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