Page 109 of This Monster of Mine

She barely tasted her breakfast, and her mood didn’t improve a whit upon finding Kadra absent from his study hours later, despite the storm having faded to a dull pattering.

“He was on the city battlements,” Cato explained. “The storm was a bad one, so he’ll need to recover. Gaius will accompany you to the Temple instead.”

It felt wrong to think of Kadra ever needing rest. “He always seems relentless.”

Cato gave her an appraising look over his cup of tea. “He’s been alone too long to know much else.”

It was on the tip of her tongue to ask whether the owner of the ribbon in his room had been the reason for that solitude, but she forced it down. Casting a worried glance at Kadra’s bedroom door, she left for the Grand Elsarian Temple with Gaius.

Master Cleric Linus greeted them at the doors, glower in full bloom, and huffed all the way to the library. She exchanged a weary look with Gaius at the books squeezed into every corner of the octagonal room.

“I’ll take the left wall,” she said resignedly. And they began.

It took them three days to find the first letter. Gaius fussed about, bringing plump pastries into the library, much to Linus’s outrage. He’d apologized at least fifty times for having left her vulnerable to Tullus’s abduction and seemed keen to boost the count to triple digits by the end of the week. They worked through the shelves, day after day, squinting in the dim light, and pacing the room to keep awake when nighttime fell.

Five days before the trial, she’d gathered a list of other scuta that Jovian and Livia had witnessed bursting along with the land parcels that the Metals Guild had then bought up post-disaster. While Livia’s notes had grown terse, Jovian had redoubled his efforts to amass proof. He’d been a meticulous researcher with the sort of dogged resilience that Sarai wished she could have known in person. He’d dug into her fall, suspecting that Othus had purposefully destroyed the records. But his line of deduction hadn’t taken him to Kadra.

I don’t know why everyone thinks our STG was a jilted pleasure worker. I doubt a noble would bring one to Aelius’s conviviums. Aelius would have a fit.

But even if they slipped one past, the theory still falls apart. No seasoned pleasure worker, especially oneaccompanying a powerful, well-paying noble, would throw their life away over something as inconsequential as feelings. It’s insulting that the theory’s lasted this long.

But you won’t believe who went to that function four years ago. Helvus! It was around this time that his star started to rise, after finding that iron mine. That convivium has to be when he was contracted by Aelius to manufacture scuta. None of this looks good at all.

He hasn’t suspected anything yet. He thinks I’m praying away at the Temple, but there are moments when he looks at me, and I could swear on all the Wretched that he knows.

I think we should leave. I’m as lost as you are.

Yours,

Jovian

Sarai buried her head in her heads, blinking back tears.Elsar rest their souls. Searching for Livia’s reply, she lost track of the hours, only realizing that it was near four in the morning and that Gaius was fast asleep when she accidentally dropped a book.

Groggy-eyed, he left her at Aoran Tower, promising to be back at it in a few hours. She fished out the key from around her neck. A quiet footfall sounded behind her. She stilled at the soft snick of metal sliding against metal.

Pretending to be unaware, she reached for her armilla and gotbeshazactive, just as her late-night visitor reached her. Then, she struck. Sarai seized a muscular arm, her magic reaching through their skin to locate the closest tendon and sever it. Their hand went limp, the dagger falling to the ground.

“Next time, be quieter,” she hissed.

“Bitch!” Her completely unfamiliar assailant yanked her by the braid, slamming her head against the barrier of Kadra’s wards.

Why is it always the hair?Reaching behind her to the hand on her head, she snapped three of his knuckles. Hair-Yanker let her go with a high-pitched howl. Gripping her key, she prepared to flee into the security of Aoran Tower when the whisper of a blade leaving its sheath sounded unnaturally loud in the night. The edge kissed her neck. A sliver of pain followed in its wake.Shit, two men.

“I think I’ve had more than enough of men mauling my neck,” she muttered.

“It’s the only part we need,” The second Guildsman’s eyes were greedy. “It’s worth five thousand aurei.”

What?“That’s more than my salary.” She didn’t know whether to be pleased or offended.

The men shrugged. The knife rose. She jerked back, inserting a hand between the dagger and her neck as he plunged it downward. The soft flesh between her thumb and index finger split, the point of the blade emerging through her palm. Cursing, she wrenched the dagger loose, and drove it into his shoulder.

A roar of fury rent the night. Evading both men, she palmed the head of her key, debating on how to distract them so she could run inside when another voice cut in.

“Sarai?” Anek looked mildly confused, glancing at both Guildsmen. “Well, this is something.”

Hair-Yanker nudged Dagger-Shoulder. “The neutralis is here too.”

“Two heads.” Dagger-Shoulder looked gleeful. “Eight thousand aurei.”

---