Page 36 of Elven Lies

“Knox, hold on a second!”

Rebecca stopped in the middle of the hallway, trying to ignore Rowan’s amused stare fixed on the side of her face while Whit hurried to catch up with her. “Everything okay?”

“As far as I know.” The warlock ran a hand through his hair and caught his breath. “I just heard from Hannigan. You’re calling another meeting?”

“If Hannigan told you that, he’s doing his job,” she said. “I’m on my way up now.”

“Huh.” Whit tilted his head and frowned before scratching the side of his face. “Okay.”

“Something wrong?” Rebecca asked. Sure, the last meeting had hit a few road bumps. It was the first of its kind, after all, but she didn’t think it had beenthatbad.

“No.” He blinked and shook his head. “No, I just wanted to make sure. Not that I don’t trust Hannigan or anything. That’snot what I’m saying. I just… I mean… I wanted to ask… It’s a little…off-putting.”

Rebecca raised her eyebrows, studying him for signs of something having gone terribly wrong in the last twenty minutes and she’d somehow missed it. “You’re concerned about a meeting? Can I ask why?”

“I don’t know ifconcernedis the right word, exactly. It’s just… Well, it’s odd. I mean, as far as I know, Aldous never called meetings for anything, really.”

And the warlock on Maxwell’s security team just didn’t like change, was that it?

He wasn’t wrong, though. Aldous had done a lot of things his own way. The only meeting she remembered him calling was the private one with her—and Maxwell standing sentry, of course—in which the changeling had unsuccessfully propositioned Rebecca before assigning her a solo mission guaranteed to get her killed.

She forced herself not to laugh it off.

Whit looked seriously concerned. Then again, that was the general mood inside the compound right now, and for good reason.

“I know Aldous never called meetings,” she said. “And that’s exactly why everyone else always got screwed. I’m doing things differently.”

He gaped at her. “Yeah. I know you are.”

“Listen, Whit. I want you in on this because you’re good at what you do, and you’re usually at the helm of running intel ops when you’re not in the field. This isn’t a punishment. It’s because I value your opinion. But if I need to find someone else to fill your seat…”

“No,” he said abruptly. “No, that’s not what I meant. I guess there’s…still a lot to get used to.”

“Wewillget used to it,” she told him. “I’ll see you up there.”

“I gotta grab a few things, first, but yeah. I’ll be there.”

“Good.” She spun away from him as he hurried off and slipped around the next corner to head for the back staircase at the very end.

Rowan watched Whit scurry away, then jumped to attention and raced after Rebecca again, his footsteps hardly making a sound across the tile floors.

“Alone at last,” he said with a forced sigh. “So listen. I heard a few things, and I—”

“Rowan, I’ve got a lot on my mind right now. So unless this is seriously urgent and not just for you, then please, save it for later.”

“I’d say it’s seriously important,” he replied as they finally reached the stairwell’s bottom landing. “Important enough to make you and your loyal wolf-boy shoot out of here like the place was on fire.”

“What happened?”

“No, nothing happened.” Rowan spread his arms and chuckled. “I mean, not that you don’t already know about. I just wanna make sure I’ve got this right. You guys are all still talking about Harkennr, right?”

“We both know how perceptive you are.” Rebecca headed up the stairs. “Whatever it is, I’m sure you got it right. Now if you don’t mind, I really need to—”

“Get to your meeting,” he finished for her. “Yeah, I heard, and that’s whatthisis about. As long as youarestill talking about Harkennr, right? As inKordusHarkennr?”

Rebecca stopped on the stairs, which gave him plenty of time to catch up to her, and sighed. “Wow. I knew Leonard was pissed, but I didn’t think he’d go around spouting off about it that quickly.”

“What? Leonard didn’t say anything.”

---