Page 138 of Elven Shadow

Worst of all was that fucking green leather armchair Aldous had used as a throne.

It still faced the enormous window on the opposite side of the office, overlooking the common room. If someone had rifled through Aldous’s things, they’d left that chair and the space around it alone.

She couldn’t help but think of the last time she’d stepped foot in this office and Aldous had made his unwanted advances before flying into an infantile rage when she’d said no.

“I don’t want anything to do with this place,” she muttered.

“Just one of the many things you don’t get to choose,” Zida said as she hobbled past Rebecca into the room. “I suggest you get used to that pretty damn quickly.”

Pulling the door shut behind her, Rebecca took her time perusing the remnants of what had once been Aldous Corriger’s adulterated throne room.

The rest of this stuff could be repurposed, handed out to various Shade teams or Maxwell’s security unit, but that armchair?

As soon as she had a bit of free time to herself, that armchair would be the first thing to go.

“Not too shabby, eh?” Zida hobbled in a slow circle, peering up at the corners of the room as if it had particularly valuable or interesting molding or frescoed paintings along the walls.

“It’s not the worst place I’ve stepped into,” Rebecca muttered. “But if I make a few changes, I can probably get it to feel more like home.”

The healer shot her a sidelong glance and snorted. “More like home? You’re gonna have to go a lot further than redecorating this shitty office to make it feel like home for an elf.”

Rebecca stopped walking and turned to fix the daraku with a deadpan stare. “I thought youwantedme to find some kinda silver lining, here.”

“And I commend your efforts, really.” Zida clapped her clawed and gnarled hands with less than appropriate enthusiasm. “They’ll be coming up here any minute, so the only real order of business we have to get in the bag first is to make sure you’re sitting in that chair. And that you can keep your eyes open and at least appear lucid while your organization steps in to swear fealty and start making requests.”

“Requests?” Rebecca’s face pinched, and she couldn’t even tell what kind of expression it formed. “No one said anything about taking requests.”

“Doesn’t mean you have to fulfill them. But you gottalistento them. That’s part of the deal.”

Rolling her eyes, Rebecca headed toward the tall straight back of the green leather armchair looking out over the entire common room. The idea of sitting in this thing, beyond the fact that Aldous had been sitting in it for years, rubbed her entirely the wrong way.

She’d done everything in her power for over a century to specifically keep herself out of a chair like this—or a throne. This was the last thing she wanted.

Out of all the things she didn’t want, this was also the easiest to deal with, once she finally decided to suck it up and play along until a better plan and a better opportunity presented themselves.

Right now, she had to pick her poison, choosing the best of two horrible choices until she either found or manufactured a better one.

At least she had plenty of practice with that already.

“We’re running out of time here,” Zida reminded her.

“Fine.” Wondering exactly how much longer this next little blast of invisible-energy potion would sustain her this time, Rebecca hurried across the office toward the armchair. “I’ll sit in the fucking chair.”

“That’s what I like to hear.”

But Rebecca refused to keep it facing the protruding windows overlooking the common room. She gripped the top corner of the chair’s back with both hands and turned the chair so it faced the office door.

The air filled with a mind-numbing screech of those old sturdy legs scooting across a poorly laid wooden floor that probably hadn’t been updated or renovated since Shade had taken over this old factory.

Zida hunched farther into her already hunched shoulders, scrunching up her face in a wrinkled wince as she glared at Rebecca’s first official act of redecorating. When the chair stopped squealing, she thrust a pinky into her enormous ear and wiggled it around. “You’re doing that on purpose.”

“I’m doing what has to be done,” Rebecca said. “And if this is it, fine.”

She braced herself for discomfort and dizziness before lowering herself into the armchair, but neither appeared. So she dropped the rest of the way, leaned back like she’d just sat in a patio lounger instead, and crossed one leg over the other. “Before they show up and we get this thing started, I just have one question for you.”

“Well it’s never justone.” Zida waved a dismissive hand and shuffled across the office to grab a small, round stool on wheels before she squatted onto it. Her old bones creaked more than the furniture. “But we might as well get it over with now. Go ahead.”

Rebecca propped an elbow on the armrest and tilted her head to rest her fingers beneath her chin, “I just wanna know if you had anything to do with this huur-akíl business.”

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