Page 23 of This Monster of Mine

Ignoring Harion’s jibes, she wove past throngs of students to the hall’s main doors, breaking into a run once outside. Preoccupied with steadying her breathing, she barely noticed at first when the cobblestones below her boots grew speckled. Then, she did.

She raised her head. Silhouetted against the night sky, Sidran Tower’s spire leered in greeting.

No. Backing away like it was a blackstripe bear, she took off toward Lisran Tower, not stopping until she’d raced up the spiral staircase and bolted the door to her room. Tearing off Kadra’s robes, she collapsed on the carpet. Ugly sounds tore from her, sobs mingled with stifled screams. Pulling her knees to her chest, she rocked back and forth, wiping at her cheeks.

Anyone who sees her. Can be bought.When the vigiles had abruptly ended their investigation and thrown her out of Edessa, she’d guessed that her assailant must have been someone powerful. But plotting revenge had kept her sane, and after a couple years, she’d started to believe the mad consolatory tale she’d spun. Where she saved up for tuition, attended the Academiae, and became such an exceptional Petitor that when she inevitably found her assailant, no one doubted her word.

Sarai laughed bitterly.I’ve been a fool.How was she to take down a Tetrarch? This was Marus all over again. Wealthy men who sat above the law, spilling blood because theycould. What chance did she have against a monster?

“The law needs to change,”she’d once bitterly told Cisuré before the Fall, when they’d witnessed Marus drunkenly beat a tunnel rat to death in the tavern. Frozen behind the counter, she’d clutched the cup she was polishing like a shield as Marus had pounded him into the table. Cisuré had stared at her plate, eyes glazed over as she retreated into an inner world that violence couldn’t touch. The man’s neck had snapped like a twig. He’d slid off the table onto the floor. Marus hadn’t even remembered doing it the next day, but everyone had immediately and fearfully agreed that the tunnel rat deserved it.

“Why does the Corpus even exist?”she’d spat, scouring the man’s blood off the tiles.“Why not have Marus write his own laws at this rate?”

Dead-eyed, Cisuré had shrugged.“Without established order, people have no incentive to behave.”

“Then what incentive does Marus need?”

“There’s no changing him.”Cisuré had looked defeated.“This man should’ve just gotten himself out of poverty. You did. He had the chance for a good life too. If he hadn’t been a tunnel rat, he’d be alive.”

At the time, Sarai had thought it ungrateful to argue that a good life shouldn’t involve her risking her neck on snowgrape vines, so she’d simply accepted a teary-eyed Cisuré’s hug. But something within her had gained consciousness that day, morphing over the years into a force she’d caged and shoved into slumber. But now, she wanted nothing more than to allow it free rein. To hold a blade against the column of Kadra’s throat and ask himwhy.

Because there was more than one explanation for what he could have done. She’d considered an alternate theory over the years—that the voice’s owner had been trying to protect her by healing her, giving her a new identity, a new face. Yet, he still hadn’t intervened when she’d been hastily thrown out of the city.

Sarai breathed into her cupped hands as her body calmed.Friend or foe, he was there that night.And she would extract what he knew if it meant tunneling into his head and shattering it.

Someone knocked on her door. Tottering to her feet, she glanced in the mirror, wincing at the puffy-eyed creature within.Havïd.Opening the door, she feigned a lengthy yawn.

On the other side, a familiar face waved. “I expected you to make a splash, barmaid,” he slurred. “But I didn’t think you’d go that far.”

“Magus Telmar?” Sarai gaped. “Are you drunk?”

“Not really.” He attempted a bow and nearly face-planted into the doorjamb.

Sarai took in the wineskin in one hand, the other on the banister to prevent a tumble down the stairs.

He looked about shiftily, then dropped his voice. “Ibez.” He held out the wineskin in encouragement. “Nine-tenths pure.”

By Ruin. Aside from her parents having met their end smuggling the stuff, she’d heard enough of the potent brew of fruit, spice, and wheat to know that it was a bad idea diluted, let alone pure.

“Telmar, I’m pretty sure that’s illegal.”

He chortled. “Mighty fine, though.”

Right.She darted a glance at the landings below, rife with students. The last thing she needed was for a gossip like Harion to see her with a drunk magus.

She stepped out of the doorway. “Is there a reason you’re here?”

“Yes, yes.” He patted himself and fished out a crumpled scroll. “Brought you a present.” His features went eerily blank. “Not sure it’s a present. There’s a raeda downstairs for you. The … coachman told me to give you this.”

Frowning, she took the scroll. “Thank you. Did the coachman mention the sender?”

Something flickered in his glazed eyes. “Oh, you’ll know.”

Foreboding skittered down Sarai’s spine. Her gaze dropped to the seal, and she nearly slid to the floor at the “K” imprinted in black wax. Snapping the seal, she scanned the sharp, bold handwriting.

Stay at my tower until you purchase a domus in my Quarter.

At least he got straight to the point.

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