Page 98 of The Prison Healer

But he said nothing, oblivious to all she was thinking and feeling. All he did was turn away and gesture for her to follow. “Come. We’ve a walk ahead of us.”

“Wait!” she cried, unable to stop herself. “Can I have a quick word? Alone?”

Rooke’s strides didn’t even slow as he called over his shoulder, “We’re running late. Whatever it is, it can wait until after your Trial.”

“If you’re still alive,” snickered the guard who had walked in with him, stepping closer and giving Kiva a hearty shove forward. “Move, healer.”

“But—”

“Walk, or I’ll carry you.” The guard shoved her again. “Your choice.”

Kiva ground her teeth together but stomped obediently toward the door, silently cursing Rooke for not seeing how desperate she was to speak with him.

Her thoughts spiraled as she stepped outside, the still-snickering guard speeding up to flank the Warden alongside two others. A further three joined them on the path, but none were Naari. Kiva was desperate to see her and share what she’d learned, certain that Naari, unlike the Warden, would listen, and confident that the guard would know what action to take. People were dying because of a poison.Someoneneeded to know, needed to figure out who was behind it and bring them to justice.

Kiva’s first thought was Cresta. If inmates were able to get their hands on smuggled angeldust, then other items could be obtained, too. Especially by the leader of the prison rebels. But ... Cresta had seemed so enraged when she’d confronted Kiva yesterday, claiming that her friends were getting sick and dying. If she was the one supplying the poison, then surely she’d have kept it from harming those she cared about.

It had to be someone else, some motive other than to spread fear and animosity, which Cresta didn’t need a poison to do. But,who—

Kiva’s concentration unraveled when a voice called out for the Warden, prompting their small group to pause. She was so relieved to turn and find Naari striding toward them that her knees nearly gave out.

“Arell,” Rooke grunted. “I wondered where you were. Did you know the infirmary was left unguarded?”

“A wagon came in this morning,” Naari said. “I was told it was covered.”

The Warden’s lips tightened, but her answer must have satisfied him, since he continued walking.

Kiva didn’t follow until Naari nudged her forward, and even then, she trailed as far back from the Warden and his entourage as possible.

“I need to talk to you,” Kiva whispered from the corner of her mouth.

“You need to focus,” Naari whispered back.

Kiva’s eyes flicked sidelong toward the guard, noting her pallid expression, her tense features, the anxious way she was holding herself.

“It’s urgent,” Kiva whispered. “It’s about—”

But Kiva cut herself off when she realized that something was wrong.

They weren’t walking toward the tunnel entrance, toward the aquifer.

They were walking toward Zalindov’s gates.

Suddenly, all thoughts of the poison fled her mind, fear overtaking her as she remembered she was about to face her third Ordeal, and it could very well end in her death. She’d been nervously confident while thinking she would have to swim across the aquifer, especially with Mot’s energy potion flooding her veins, but now ...

Now she had no idea what was happening.

“Where are we going?” Kiva whispered.

Naari’s tone was as grim as her face when she replied, “I don’t know, but I don’t like this.”

Kiva didn’t like it either. But as they walked through the gates behind Rooke, followed the rail tracks past the farms, and continued on, she began to get an inkling of where they might be headed.

Saliva pooled in her mouth, and more than ever, she felt a frantic need to share what she’d learned, so she reached for Naari’s leather sleeve and leaned in to whisper, “It’s poison.”

“What?” the guard asked, before giving a swift hand gesture indicating silence, just as Rooke turned around to look at them.

“Keep up,” the Warden said. “Everyone’s waiting for us.”

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