Page 49 of The Prince's Mage

“I do not mean to be ungrateful. I just… For months now, I am grateful for the miracle that you are alive… I believe, but…”

Miracle? She supposed it was a miracle she’d lasted so long on those tables when no one else had. It wasn’t through any strength or power of her own, that was certain.

“Why…” Gavril’s hand on her back, his arm loosely wrapped around her, clenched into the fabric. “Why didn’t mine work?”

Marcella’s tongue was heavy in her mouth, but somehow she managed to move it. “You… prayed for my safety?”

He nodded, shifting so his voice was no longer muffled as he looked up at her.

She licked her dry lips and whispered, “Well… It was not a matter of working. In the end… I was safe. I just was not as safe as either of us would have chosen. But just because we pray for something does not mean we are promised to get it. A prayer can be answered with a no.”

“Then why do you still do it if it doesn’t matter?”

Marcella startled. “I did not say it doesn’t matter. Besides, it is not faith if it is conditional upon getting what I want. Sometimes, faith means persisting even when my prayers are not answered. Do you think my faith is an easy thing? Belief is the hardest thing I do most days.” She shook her head. “You are Inimicus. I do not expect you to understand.”

“I’d like to.”

She did not know what to say to that. That an Inimicus could be genuine in a pursuit of faith.

He stared up at her with those brilliant green eyes.

“I… Can you teach me those prayers of this High Priestess?”

Marcella shouldn’t. She really shouldn’t. She was going to betray him.

Whatever faith he thought he might have would be destroyed when she did. He would have no desire to persist in it when she spat in his face.

But she could not think of an excuse, so instead she said, “Alright. I’ll start at the beginning. Prayer One…”

As she went through the prayer, Gavril’s eyes stayed on her face, and the weight of his head in her lap was more condemning than any leather strap she’d had wrapped around her wrists.

Chapter18

MARCELLA

Marcella wasn’t sure exactly how much time Hypatia was willing to give her before she decided her lookalike was a failure and would start to march her army against the Inimicus.

And spill an ocean of blood that could fill even the Abyss.

Her lessons and walks with Aimilia were yielding slow results. Both in Marcella trying to find Nikias’ study and memorize the palace layout as well as her learning the Inimicus language. She was not as quick a study at it as Gavril had been at hers.

But to be fair, she’d only been taking walks with Aimilia for three and a half weeks.

At least at three and a half weeks they finally paid off.

Marcella was trying to simultaneously place the hallway she and Aimilia were walking down to the map in her head and also accurately answer the rapid-fire questions Aimilia threw at her in the Inimicus tongue, testing her vocabulary.

“Pax?”

Was the left turn they hadn’t taken the path to a stairwell?

“Peace.”

Or was it to a guest wing?

“Nihilum?”

“Nothing.”

---