Page 171 of Wolf Caged
And scented someone familiar ahead of me.
I ducked behind a tree and shifted back to my human form, and quickly untied the black robe and donned it, wishing I had something a little less flimsy to cover me. The next time I decided to lose my temper, I needed to strip before anger got the better of me and I ended up ruining another set of clothes.
Riordan was just walking past as I stepped out from the trees, and he whirled and bared fangs, his eyes crimson and pupils elliptical as his hands came up in a defensive move. He huffed when he saw it was me and lowered his hands, the ruby bleeding from his irises.
“I didn’t mean to scare you.” I checked the belt of my robe was tied tightly enough and that the garment covered all of me, feeling uneasy to be in such a state of undress in the garden. The servants were going to speak. Worse, the highborn would be talking about it for weeks if they caught sight of me.
Especially if they caught sight of me speaking with Riordan while dressed like this.
“I’m going to pretend you don’t reek of sex and be all polite. Here goes. Oh, Saphira, fancy coming across you here.” Riordan grinned at me and I barely resisted the urge to box his ears as my cheeks heated, and then he relaxed and shoved his hands into the pockets of his fitted black pants. “I heard you met Mal.”
I nodded. “I don’t think it went well.”
He shrugged, shifting his black tunic. “Don’t take it personally. Mal is a little twitchy around the whole slavery subject since he went through it himself and lost pretty much everything… including his sanity for a while there. Sometimes, still his sanity.”
“If I had known. I wouldn’t have said what I did.”
“How could you have known? Mal wasn’t meant to be back until today. Last report he filed to me had his return as this evening, and that’s what I told Kaeleron. Our royal highness probably wants my head for that. Vyr says he wanted to prepare you before you met Mal.”
“That would have been nice,” I said and fell into step beside him as we took the pale stone steps down to the main garden. “I’m on my way to the library… via my room to bathe and have breakfast. Maybe I’ll see Malachi there. He seemed rather at home there and I suspect that the chair I’ve been making my own was his all along.”
Riordan’s expression pinched and he scrubbed his neck. “No library time for Mal today. He’s with Kaeleron in the great hall, greeting our unwanted guests.”
“Unwanted guests?” My mind leaped to my pack, my heart racing even as I told myself it wouldn’t be them. It was probably just another court come to visit.
“I’d steer clear if I were you.” Riordan waved as he broke away from me. “Vyr is with them so I need to handle the training for the recruits today. I’ll catch you later.”
I hurried into the castle and up to my rooms, somehow making it there without being spotted by anyone else. I made fast work of bathing, and when I left the bathroom my breakfast was waiting, and I blushed as I saw it was almost double the usual amount, as if Kaeleron had told the cooks I would be extra hungry this morning.
Bastard.
I devoured the food anyway, not leaving a single bite, and drained the tea pot before quickly dressing in a fresh pair of black leathers, a cream blouse and a supple dark brown suede under-bust corset, and boots.
I braided my hair as I left my room.
Intending to go straight to the library.
But what Riordan had said slowed my steps and had my focus turning towards the floors below me.
What if the unwanted guestswerewolves? What if it was Lucas?
I told myself to go straight to the library, but somehow found myself on the ground floor instead, sneaking towards the arched doors of the great hall at the end of the broad entrance corridor. They were ajar and I strained to hear what was happening inside.
And flinched and reared back as someone unleashed a shrill cry of pain.
I shoved the right door open, bursting into the room, my heart in my throat as my hackles rose.
But it wasn’t anyone I recognised kneeling on the marble floor before Kaeleron.
Malachi was a deadly shadow in head-to-toe black leather, blades sheathed along his ribs and his onyx wings spread as he loomed over one of the trio of blond males, one of his small knives buried in the male’s chest as he pinned him to the floor.
All three of the males were young, the oldest looking no older than nineteen to my eyes. They were just boys.
Kaeleron turned glacial silver eyes on the middle male and growled, “Speak your reason for being in my court.”
When the young male hesitated, shadows rose around him, sharp lances poised to strike as his green eyes darted to them and he shrank into himself, his arms coming up to shield his vital organs. As if that would save him.
“Speak,” Kaeleron boomed, the command echoing around the cathedral-like chamber, ricocheting off the carved black columns that supported the vaulted ceiling.
