Page 80 of Warlord's Plaything

Not mocking.

Not taunting.

Something else.

Something dangerous.

I step back, dropping the blade.

"I don’t know."

I fucking mean it.

Something is happening to me.

Something I can’t control.

And I have no idea what it means.

Xyron doesn’t press.

Doesn’t push.

He just tilts his head, studying me.

Then, after a long, tense beat—he smiles.

"We’ll find out soon enough."

And the worst fucking part?

I think he’s right.

27

XYRON

The High Council chambers reek of rot and old power.

The kind that seeps into the stone, into the fucking bones of this place, lingering long after the bodies have been buried.

I take my seat, back straight, posture unshaken.

Twelve eyes watch me.

Waiting.

Measuring.

Plotting.

They think I don’t see the knives behind their smiles.

They forget—I am the blade in the dark.

And I do not fucking bow.

"You’ve been summoned,"Kaelith says smoothly, his voice a slow coil of silk and steel.

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