Page 79 of Royal Guard

Something was forming at the back of my mind, huge and dark and cold, so horrific that I didn’t dare look around and see it. But there were too many loose ends. And following each one suddenly seemed to lead me in the same direction.

We never found out who was leaking information to the assassins, when we were in America.I quickly dialed FBI Director Gibson. “Did you share your information with our military?” I asked breathlessly. “With a General Novak?”

“No, Your Majesty,” said Gibson. “We sent all our information to your parents via the palace, but that’s all.”

“Viawhoat the palace?”

“Your chief advisor, Aleksander.”

I thanked him and hung up. Ahead of us, the dam came into view. My mind was racing, now. A memory came back to me: Caroline, sobbing and hysterical, unable to believe her beloved Sebastian was a traitor.

What if he wasn’t?

I called the dungeon and had them get Sebastian out of his cell. He was a quiet, slender man in his twenties with glasses, always polite, a little shy. But when he spoke now, he sounded as if he’d aged thirty years, his voice brittle with exhaustion and fear.

We were driving along the top of the dam, now. I could see a lone figure standing waiting for us, right in the middle. My knuckles went white where they gripped my phone. “Sebastian?” I asked. “Did Aleksander have access to your phone? Could he have read your messages?”

“We work in the same room,” he said. “I leave it onmy desk….”

My heart was thumping in my chest. “Did he know you were sleeping with Caroline?!”

Sebastian sighed. “I told her that no one knew, but... you know Aleksander. He knows everything that’s going on. He guessed. But he said he wouldn’t tell anyone. Your Majesty, what’s going on?”

I could hear the confusion in his voice. He hadn’t even considered the possibility that his boss, his friend, was a traitor. I couldn’t believe it either.

I thought back to that night the lights went out, in my room. Aleksander sitting there, advising me to have Sebastian tortured. Could he really have done that, knowing that he himselfwas the traitor?No. No way.Andwhywould he betray us? Money? Power? He’d never shown any interest in either.

I sighed. There hadto be some other explanation. Aleksander, a traitor? He was practically family! I thought of him as an uncle. I’d felt sorry for him: he’d seemed so lonely, since his son died—

We pulled up, right beside Aleksander. He opened my door.

Since his son died. In the war. Oh Jesus. Thatwas his reason. Not money or power. Simple revenge.

“Drive!” I yelled hysterically to Garrett. “Go!”

But Aleksander grabbed my shoulder and wrenched me out of the car. And behind him, Silvas Lukin and General Novak stepped out of the shadows.

58

GARRETT

I jumpedout of the car and raced around, but Lukin was as fast as ever. He grabbed Kristina, slid an arm around her throat and rested the muzzle of his handgun against her temple. I skidded to a stop.

Aleksander was smart: he’d lured us where no one would see. The dam was deserted apart from our little group and it was pitch black: I couldn’t see more than a hundred yards along the dam in either direction. The feeling of space all around us was unnerving: the sky high above, the valley sides far out of view on either side of us, the reservoir stretching out on one side of the dam and the sheer drop on the other.

Kristina was glaring up at Aleksander, too shocked and too mad to be scared. “Youson of a bitch!”she breathed. “How could you—I trusted you! My father trusted you!” Her mouth fell open as she pieced more and more of it together. “You put the poison in the bath oil!”

I thought back to the day the King was shot. How Aleksander had been so slow to deliver the warning. “You didn’t get stuck in the crowd that day, did you?” I growled. “You were giving them time to shoot!” I could feel the rage boil up inside me: anger at what he’d done, humiliation at being so expertly played. I took a step towards him, but Lukin pressed his gun harder against Kristina’s head. I froze.

“You leaked the story about Garmania being behind the attacks, didn’t you?” whispered Kristina. “You knew it’d cause violence and that gave the General an excuse to put troops on the streets.”

Aleksander spoke for the first time. “I did what I had to do.” The bastard sounded completely unrepentant.

“Think about what you’re doing,” begged Kristina. “This won’t bring your son back!”

“It’ll mean he didn’t die for nothing,” said Aleksander coldly. “When we wipe the bastards out.”

I exchanged terrified looks with Kristina. With them in charge, it wouldn’t be a war. It would be genocide.

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