Page 76 of Broken Fate
As I walked the same path I’d taken with my parents the last time I’d been with them when they were alive, I stared straight ahead. My gaze didn’t wander. It was rooted on the gates to the palace, just as it had the first time. Everything was eerily similar.
Yet it had all changed.
She’s turning herself in? Just like that? Coward.
How can she be a coward by offering herself up to the Alpha without a fight?
The whispers continued. I clamped down on my emotions as the first seeds of doubt entered some of their questions. Talking more would do very little on my part. They had to come to their own conclusions. To truly see for themselves without my interference. Like Kiel, it was time I spoke not with words but with actions. Then let them judge me.
The four guards manning the gate came to attention as the last of the crowd parted, leaving a clear path for me. One of the guards on the right was the first to recognize me. He lifted a finger, and the others started forward.
My hand came up, palm outstretched toward them. They stopped on a dime. So did I, mere steps away from the closed gates.
Pausing for effect, I let my gaze sweep over the guards from left to right. Slowly, so as not to startle them, I undid the strap on my cloak, letting it fall to the ground. Arms out wide, I showed that I was unarmed. The skintight black shirt and pants left no room for weapons.
“My name is Jada Saunders,” I called, tilting my head back, speaking not to the guards but to those around me and on the other side of the gate as well. “And I believe I have an appointment with Arcadus. Will you please summon him forth?”
The guards just sort of looked at one another, unsure of what to do. The crowd reacted, some of them bemused by my claim, others denouncing me for having no respect for the Alpha.
If only they knew the truth about that.
“Arcadus. Come out, come out,” I said again, raising my voice to be heard over the walls.
Silence lingered behind me, broken only by the comments muttered under breaths and whispered into ears.
One of the guards stepped forward. I snapped my fingers at him, then wagged my index finger. “Bring forth Arcadus, and I will go peacefully. He’s the one who threatened these people if I didn’t show up. Well, here I am. Now, go get him.”
The guard hesitated, looking to his counterpart on the other side for support. But neither of them made a move. They had weapons in hand and weren’t taking their eyes off me, but there was a hint of respect in their eyes. None of them had expected me to turn myself in. So, to see me there, they were impressed.
I opened my mouth to call for Arcadus once more, but aclunkfrom the other side of the thick wooden gates stopped me. A secondclunkfollowed. I stood a little straighter. This would be it.
There was a heavythud, and then the gates opened.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The heavy panels of reinforced wood swung smoothly inward with barely a creak, the hinges oiled to perfection. Air rushed out through my lips with a heavy whoosh as I let go of the breath I’d been holding. Nervous weight descended on my shoulders, trying to force them to bow. Everything was culminating now, and the pressure was growing rapidly. Hopefully, I was up to the task.
A trio of figures appeared in the crack between gates, the middle one starting forward as soon as there was space. He glared at me with one eye of golden brown, the other a deep forest green, and a scowl etched so deep into his features it may as well be permanent.
“Arrest her!” Andracis, the Arcadian Beta, shouted. “She’s wanted by the Alpha for—”
“For sedition, treason, assault, blasphemy, and I’m sure a bunch of other fancy words you don’t actually know the meaning of!”
Andracis glowered at me, his head tilting forward slightly, fingers of his right hand automatically reaching for the whip he kept coiled at his side. He stopped short of attacking me in public, which couldn’t have been easy for the wicked puppet of Arcadus, the man I was actually there to see. A man conspicuous by his absence despite my calls.
“You!” Andracis hissed as he came to a stop a dozen feet or so away from me, stabbing the index finger of his left hand at me hard enough that it trembled.
“Yes,” I confirmed, loud enough for the crowd to see. “I am here. I came so that none of the people here would suffer. Although I’m sure you would love to whip them, as you did me, for no apparent reason.”
The Beta’s eyes darted to the crowd as a rustle of surprise ran through it. Of course, none of them would have expected that. They were still living with blinders on.
“You tried to destroy the Fate Stone,” he snarled. “We had to ensure you were working alone.”
I threw back my head and laughed. “Oh, Andracis. I was a nobody. A nothing. You didn’t interrogate me. Youbeatme, and you liked it. Your whip tore my back apart. If our kind didn’t heal so fast, I would have the proof. But I don’t need it. Not today. Your lack of denial has confirmed it.”
The fingers of his right hand twitched again. I waved him off.
“You aren’t the one I came to see,” I said, pitching my voice beyond him, into the palace courtyard. “Arcadus. I am here. Are you too much of a coward to take me in yourself?”
