Page 112 of The Prince's Mage

“Alright,” Hypatia said. “You have my attention.”

Gavril’s hands were on Marcella’s shoulders, holding her steady. He whispered, “You can do this.”

She took a deep breath and lifted her left hand, banishing the rune. The band and lines were still hidden beneath Gavril’s illusion, but the leather and metal against her skin steadied her. “Hypatia, Prince Gavril is here as our willing hostage because he believes in peace. Forget whatever you’ve been told by a mage who hated him. He believes we can have real peace because we aren’t what we thought. We aren’t like the Elemens, we are all the same Runai. That his people are wrong in their belief in our corrupted vitae, and the fact that I can cast his people’s runes proves it. If we can eliminate the reason this senseless war started, then we can have a peace that will last so long we will forget why we ever spilt blood to begin with.”

Hypatia took her seat, leaning back and resting her arms on the armrests and gesturing for the men beside her to follow suit. Konstantin did so, sitting at her right while the High Priest retook his seat.

Hypatia said, “I will be the judge of what I will do, little Marcella, but if you think you have a plan for peace and the prince is our willing hostage, then I will hear you out. Tell me what you want.”

“First off, you’re going to send word to the Inimicus you have Gavril and you want to negotiate peace.”

Gavril leaned forward. “This might entice you. You’ll be addressing it to Nikias. My father is… not up for the task.”

Hypatia’s wicked grin grew. “Oh? Now that’s interesting. I’ll play along.” She snapped her fingers at the lieutenant who was finally getting off the ground and said, “Get me a raven. I can’t wait to see Prince Nikias again.”

Chapter40

MARCELLA

It was a strange thing to sit at the same table as Hypatia, Konstantin—who was essentially a chief in his own right—and High Priest Panagiotis. Marcella wouldn’t have believed this was where she would end up even if Hypatia had claimed to see it in a vision. Not before the ambush.

She especially would have laughed at the thought there would be an Inimicus prince sitting to her right helping them. And if she’d been told she would be in love with and married to said prince… well, she couldn’t imagine what her reaction would have been.

Her chair was a respectable distance from Gavril’s, and it was for the best since Hypatia was already suspicious there was more to her relationship with Gavril than they were letting on. Not to mention neither of them knew exactly what Hirtus had told her about Gavril—lied to her about—before she’d killed him.

As they planned out the message to Nikias, Marcella tried to rein herself in and let Gavril handle himself against Hypatia so she didn’t seem overly attached. She was a little surprised Hypatia hadn’t sniffed the whole truth out already, but maybe Hypatia didn’t know Marcella as well as the chiefess thought she did.

Hypatia’s fingers flew through the air once the wording had been finalized and translated into the Inimicus language by Gavril. She paused halfway through casting the rune that would carry the message and direct the raven the lieutenant had brought and said, “If your brother finds out you were a willing participant, they’ll label you a traitor. You’ll spend the rest of your life waiting for the truth to come out.”

Gavril snorted. “This message is a formality, Chiefess. The second my disappearance was discovered, my brother knew exactly what had happened.”

Hypatia glanced over at Marcella. “Should I expect he’s going to want to punish my little lookalike for her role in all of this?”

“He is going to be more concerned with you, chiefess.”

It was the right thing to say as Hypatia grinned wider and returned to casting. Marcella gave Gavril a short, approving nod. Hypatia continued, and Konstantin leaned his arms on the table to take a closer look at the two of them. “While she finishes that, I’d like to discuss more about what exactly it was we saw not long ago. What you—Marcella, was it?—did? I’m still not quite certain I believe my own eyes.”

Marcella nodded. “It’s a rather long story. Suffice it to say that while I was in Areator, Prince Gavril—as you can tell he’s a bit of a visionary—wanted to better understand our people’s magic, which led to his theory that they weren’t really different magics, just different styles. And that if one applied themselves, they could learn the other style. I proved his theory. You could learn how to do it with a little bit of time.”

Hypatia scoffed. “What need do we have for their runes? Why should I want their illusions or to defile my vitae with their heretic’s runes they’ve achieved only through committing their blasphemous atrocities against us?”

Konstantin ignored her and looked at Gavril. “So then, it would be possible for you to learn our runes as well?”

Marcella’s breath caught. Hypatia finished the rune and stilled, immediately narrowing her eyes at them. If they found out Gavril had started to learn how to cast with one hand—

“Theoretically yes, but we haven’t proven that yet,” she said.

Hypatia narrowed her eyes. Did she know that was a lie?

“The last thing those heretics need is the ability to cast multiple runes at the same time,” Hypatia said, lowering her hands. She hadn’t yet cast the rune that would send the raven. She abruptly said, “Your brother will think I’m lying without proof. How do I prove I have you?”

Marcella tensed, ready to leap to her feet to protect him again while he could not protect himself.

“Your hair? No.” Hypatia shook her head. Her eyes landed on his cloak. Then she snapped her fingers at the lieutenant and said, “His cloak. That’s a pattern I’ve seen before, on Nikias himself.”

Gavril stiffened and went ashen. Marcella wasn’t sure if this might be some kind of taboo he hadn’t told her about, but she did know if they took the cloak, they’d likely see the marks peeking out of his cuff. Just in case Hypatia knew what they meant, she shot up and said, “Chiefess, I’ll tear off some of the trim and you can attach it to the raven. We don’t want to give the bird so much that it would be too heavy and slow it down.”

The lieutenant froze. Hypatia raised an eyebrow, but gestured for her to go ahead.

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