Page 121 of Elven Shadow

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Rebecca asked.

“It means this fun little organization we’ve all promised our lives to doesn’t have a fucking head at the moment.” Zida scoffed and shook her head. “Unless we wanna wait around for someone else to come in and stick their own on top of the rest of this body, we gotta take care of it ourselves. From the inside.”

“Great. Pick a new leader.” Rebecca had to stop talking so she could focus on breathing and climbing steps. All three at once didn’t seem possible. “Put me in a bed. I don’t need to be there for it.”

“As fun as that would be, you’re wrong.You’rethe one who removed that head, elf. So while the rest of us figure out who we’re putting up on that pedestal next to call the shots from here on out, we also gotta figure out what to do withyou.”

Rebecca paused in the stairwell with her arm around the old woman’s shoulder, her other hand pressed against the wall beside her. “What do you mean, ‘what to do with me’? Everyone in this place wanted the same thing. I’m just the one who happened to do it, and that was only becauseheattackedme.”

“Doesn’t really matter.” Zida tugged Rebecca farther up the staircase with another grunt. “Rules is rules. Though Icansay I’ve never seen the rules play out into something quite like this before.”

“So I acted in self-defense, and I get a ruling for my troubles?”

“More or less,” Zida said with a shrug.

“As in, like, deciding on my punishment?”

“Punishment, reward.” Zida dismissed it all with a careless wave of her claw-hand, which was made particularly awkward and cumbersome with Rebecca’s arm wrapped around her shoulders. “Trust me, if you stick around as long as I have, you’ll see they eventually turn out to be the same thing in the end.”

“Cut off the head, and nowI’mon the chopping block for it?” Rebecca muttered, her voice rasping with exhaustion. “Perfect.”

Zida stopped short to look up at her, dark eyes glittering and unreadable. “Right now? I’d say it’s a fifty-fifty split for you, elf. Maybe you get lucky. Or maybe…you don’t.”

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Another knot of guilt and disappointment mixed with the heavy weight of what she might have to do if thisdidn’tturn out in her favor. The concoction settled heavily in Rebecca’s gut as she struggled up the stairs, joined by her growing dread and the utter uselessness creeping through her awareness like a growing bruise.

Maybeshe gotlucky? Was that really what it had come to now?

Rebecca had just gotten rid ofthebiggest obstacle Shade had faced for the last decade or longer. In self-defense. And this old daraku beside her thought she only had a halfway decent chance of being thanked for it instead of punished?

Luck itself had never been in Rebecca Bloodshadow’s cards. She’d never depended on luck alone, and she certainly couldn’t start now.

“So how is this supposed to work, exactly?” she asked, her arm still around Zida’s shoulders.. “I sit in on some kinda trial or something? Because everyone alreadysawwhat happened…”

“It’s not about what happened, elf,” Zida replied, lugging Rebecca forward with renewed energy to reach the top of the stairs. “Nobody’s arguing that part. All that matters now is what’sgoingto happen.”

“You can’t just”—Rebecca paused at the last step to suck in a raw gasp of air before forcing herself to continue—“tell me what’s gonna happen?”

“Wish I knew. But for your sake, I sincerely hope these knuckleheads who’ve been taking orders from the wrong guy this whole time haven’t completely lost all sense of who they are and to whom they’re truly responsible.”

They emerged from the staircase with a stumbling shuffle before Rebecca barked out a weak laugh. “Is that your euphemism for saying you hope Aldous hasn’t rubbed off on anyone?”

The old woman studied Rebecca’s profile and let out a sharp, terse cackle. “We’re about to find out, aren’t we?”

Rebecca shook her head. “I can’t…sit in on something like that. If everyone else wants a trial, that’s fine, but…I mean, look at me. I’m—”

Another wave of dizziness overwhelmed her. Rebecca swayed on her feet with her arm still around the old healer’s shoulders.

Zida twisted halfway around to look down the staircase behind them and sighed. “Putsmein one hell of a position…”

“Sure,” Rebecca murmured and rolled her eyes. “What an inconvenience foryou.”

“We don’t have a whole lot of time before the others get up here to get things rolling. Certainly not enough time for me to tend to you the way I’d like, especially after what you just got yourself into today.”

“So this trial supersedes making sure I don’t die?” Rebecca grumbled.

Zida snorted as she ushered Rebecca through the compound’s ground floor as quickly as both their shuffling footsteps could manage. “You’re not dying, elf. At least, not right now, anyway. I can’t give you a guarantee one way or the other, but something tells me you’d rather not have me take a look at you where everyone and their mama can see it.”

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