Page 90 of The Last One
He relaxes back in his chair. “Mmm.”
Nostrils flaring, I narrow my gaze. “Say what you’re thinking or stop batting me with your paws.”
The Renrian blinks at me with shiny lavender eyes. “I haven’t seen it in a long time, so I may be wrong.”
“Wrong about…?”
He lifts the mug to his lips and says, before he drinks, “Ask Ealdrehrt about the marking on his hand.”
I open my mouth to say, “So what? I’ve got markings, too,” but I remember how Jadon had wrapped his inking with gauze, hiding it from me. Even though he’d scrutinized my own markings, up close and wonderfully personal, he didn’t offer insight about his own. My clammy hands slip on the handle of my cup.
“Would you like more tea?” Veril asks innocently, as though he hasn’t just kicked a hole in the circle of trust I’ve built around Jadon and me.
I shake my head. “No thank you.” Chin cocked, I force nonchalance. “What does his marking mean?”
“Like I said,” Veril says, “I can’t be sure. It’s been a while, but markings like those demonstrate kinships or loyalties.”
“Loyalties,” I say. “To whom?”
“That’s not a question you should be askingme,” he says, eyebrow high. “I’m not the one with a tattoo on my hand.”
Do my markings mean the same? Who am I loyal to? Despite the tea, no memory has been nudged to the front of my brain.
A wedge-shaped shadow swoops past the darkened windows of the cottage.
My heart pounds, and I sit up straight. “What was…?”
“Something wrong, dearest?” Veril glances over his shoulder at the windows.
“I…think…” I want to rush over to see for myself but my injuries keep me seated.
“Did you see something?” the Renrian asks, shuffling to the window.
“A shadow,” I say, lowering my gaze to my lap, my cheeks flushed with embarrassment.
Veril chuckles. “I’m afraid shadows in the forest are ever-present no matter how enchanted they are.”
The tea in my cup is now cold.
Veril pulls a white bamboo fife from his sleeve. “Tell me more about this Elyn.”
I tell him about Elyn’s snow-and-clouds cane and the red ribbons that wrapped around her guards’ arms. Their astounding height. Her sleight of hand with potatoes. The apocalypse that followed her departure. The bloodred message she left on those chapel doors.
Veril runs his fingers over the holes of the fife. “Sounds like Elyn and her guards are Executioners.”
The teacup nearly slips from my grip as I bolt upright in my wheeled chair.“Executioners?”I bark, eyes big. “As in…‘those who kill’?”
“Correct.” Then he plays a single low note on his fife. “Executioners are a very staunch order who serve Supreme in their own way. They have specific jobs, one of which is to accompany throughout the realms high mages who are charged with finding fugitives from justice.”
My pulse pops. “Fugitives?What would their crime be?”
Veril shrugs. “For this order to be involved, it would be somehow directly disobeying the will of Supreme—and I’m not referring to Syrus Wake. I meantrueSupreme.”
“So she’s here tokillme?” Sweat bursts across my skin. “I’ve been marked for execution?” I swallow, but my throat has gone dry. Elyn’s words echo in my ears.She is a danger to you. I’ve done something wrong, and now she’s here to avenge it.
“They have other jobs as well,” Veril says, no doubt reading the look of panic in my eyes. “When one realm falters, it is the Executioners who clean up the mess. They’re not too different from vultures who clean up carcasses.”
“Is Vallendor faltering?” I ask, my scalp crawling with invisible spiders.
