Page 43 of Secrets of Graves and Gold

By the time they find the horse and realize it’s riderless, I should be well out of easy tracking range. And I know all the techniques to ensure they can’t follow my path by more complex means either.

But as I swing into the saddle and set off, all I can feel is the weight on my shoulders.

The Order of the Wild is claiming our kingdom, including the county Julita once expected to rule. Even so, King Konram wants Ivy’s head—and the rest of ours too—on a platter.

There’s truly no one we can count on across the entire kingdom except ourselves.

Thirteen

Ivy

An unexpectedly homey atmosphere has developed in the Haven’s dining room. As the five of us gather around the table, I try to let the warmth of the company I have distract me from worries about the man who’s not currently with us.

Even if all went well, Stavros wasn’t sure he’d return before noon. There’s no reason to fret.

As Sulla sets the dishes she prepped last night on the table, Casimir reaches for the tea pot. He’s gotten into the habit of pouring out the tea for all of us—remembering that Alek likes just sugar in his, I prefer only cream in mine, Rheave wants both, and Sulla takes neither.

As the pale cream swirls with the darker tea, the daimon-man leans over next to me and tips the end of his spoon into it.

“Watch,” he says eagerly, and gives the metal handle a little wiggle. Somehow he creates an image like a spinning leaf in the tea’s surface for a few seconds before it wisps away.

The playful gesture distracts me a little more. I smile at him gratefully and tune out the skip of my pulse when his face turns even more stunning with his smile in response.

I pluck up an egg and pass the platter to Alek, because I know he’ll want at least two. As I gulp down my own, Casimir nudges the basket of biscuits toward me.

I’ve just taken my first bite of the rich, nutty dough when footsteps thump into the hall. Before I can do more than swallow, Stavros appears in the doorway, hair windblown and expression fraught.

His voice comes out rough. “The scourge sorcerers have already struck again.”

Alek’s eyes widen. “What? How?”

With a grimace, Stavros launches into a recounting of his conversation with his former colleague.

By the time he’s finished, the biscuit I was eating has crumbled between my clutching fingers. I can feel it disintegrating in my hand, but all I can do is stare at Stavros.

My voice rasps on its way up my throat. “They’ve taken over an entire province?”

Stavros bows his head in acknowledgment. He must be exhausted—I don’t think he could have slept at all since he left yesterday morning, expecting to reach the fort where a friend was stationed by the evening.

But all I see on his handsome face is horrified determination.

“The better part of Eppun, at least,” he says. “And the major’s information would be at least a couple of days behind.”

Julita speaks in a strained murmur. They took Nikodi… What have they done to my parents?

It’s obvious that Stavros doesn’t know more than he’s already told us—and that his uncertainties are gnawing at him.

Casimir reaches along the table to squeeze my forearm. At his reassuring touch, I finally drop the chunks of decimated biscuit, brush the crumbs from my fingers in a daze, and turn my hand to clasp his.

The courtesan manages to keep his voice calm, though the grip of his fingers betrays the tension he’s holding back. “It sounds like their goal is the same as it’s always been: destroy Silana’s rulership and establish their own.”

Alek’s lips have tightened. “The heir who’s taken over Coliz—who murdered his parents to do it—he was an entomology club member under Ster. Torstem before he graduated three years ago.”

He glances at Rheave. “Does this uprising line up with anything you remember hearing or orders you were given?”

The daimon-man shakes his head, his forehead furrowed beneath the fall of his dark curls. “I don’t think so. That could be where most of the others like me were sent—to the north. But I never paid attention to names of things like counties and provinces in my natural form.”

Why would it matter to a spirit-creature what lines humans drew on a map or what they called the territories on either side?

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