Page 26 of The Prince's Captive

He meant heirloom.

Marcella gave him nothing.

Sixth night, he returned to the subject of her arranged marriage—Hypatia’s arranged marriage.

“Your promised… know him?” He blinked and shook his head. “Did you meet him before promise?”

Hypatia had. Marcella hadn’t. She’d only see Konstantin from a distance and heard all the gossip from her fellow clansmen. Well, Hypatia had talked about it once to Marcella—unfortunately Marcella remembered none of it. Or rather, thankfully she’d blocked it out. She’d just woken up with the scar.

And Hypatia telling her she wasn’t going to survive two seconds as an Inimicus captive if she didn’t toughen up.

Konstantin must be a special kind of man to still marry Hypatia even after meeting her.

“What does it matter?” Marcella snapped. “You’ll meet him for yourself if he comes for me.”

That seemed like something Hypatia would say. Impersonating a woman whom Marcella had always thought was more a force of nature than human wasn’t easy.

And frankly, Hypatia was. She was a seer.

Their blessing from Asentai made them almost a little more than human. Not even Eustathios had ever really seemed to understand his daughter.

Gavril just eyed her all over again. “Curious. Simply. Days are long. You are quiet. Trying to find something you will speak of.”

Trying to find something he could get her to spill Desero secrets about, more like. Or expose herself as a fraud.

He was an illusionist. Even though he made for a very charming illusion, she wasn’t falling for it.

The next day, as she sat in her spot in the center of the camp, solidifying her escape plan, and now on the lookout for the opportunity, she spotted Commander Gavril and the older commander arguing.

She figured it wasn’t vanity to assume they were arguing about her.

“—time—” was the only word she caught from Gavril.

“—of time—talk worse—you explain that to—” were the words she understood from the older commander.

Then she spotted the silenced Inimicus staring at her—well, outright glaring at her.

She’d noticed over the last few days him glaring at her when Commander Gavril wasn’t around. He glared at Commander Gavril when he thought he could get away with it too.

If she didn’t trust Gavril, she trusted the silenced mage even less. Staged or not.

But it didn’t matter.

Commander Gavril’s suspicion and attempts to wrest information out of her. Their ignorance of the Heart. The silenced Inimicus’ glaring.

When her opportunity arose, she was going to take it.

That was… until the eighth night. When Gavril passed her the waterskin he spoke slower than he had been in a voice that was barely audible despite the fact that she was the only one who knew the language. “You’re not Hypatia, are you?”

Chapter10

MARCELLA

Marcella choked on the water, dropping the skin as her eyes widened. He’d figured it out. Or word had reached them about Hypatia arriving at the temple.

No. It was still too soon for that. But somehow the commander had figured it out despite her silence. Attempts to stay silent, at least, in the face of his incessant badgering.

He’d figured it out despite the fact that she’d obeyed and received a real, identical scar to Hypatia’s.

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