Page 55 of Path of the Dark
The Royal City was busy these days, as soldiers from every corner of the kingdom temporarily resided here. A sense of foreboding settled over Elias at this observation. All these days of peace negotiations would be for nothing after tonight. It was supposed to have been a ruse, but the further Elias had gotten into the negotiations, the more he’d wanted to believe them.
Both his father and Saul would have laughed at his naivety. He had to admit, they would have been right. He’d been a fool.
The crowd was dense. There was barely room to move in places, although Ninia didn’t seem to mind.
The girl kept stopping. She halted to play a ring toss game; one where she had to throw a metal hoop over a row of burning torches in an allotted time. Ninia threw the rings with great precision and won herself a beautiful woolen shawl. Grinning, she threw it around her shoulders and continued on her way.
A few yards on she stopped to buy herself a candied apple.
Elias halted, making sure that the press of bodies around him concealed his presence from Ninia. Nibbling at her apple, the girl’s cheeks were flushed. She looked so happy this evening.
The sight made Elias start to sweat. He would be the one to extinguish the light from her eyes.
He followed her for a while, biding his time, and when Ninia turned into a side-street where soothsayers had set up awnings and scribes penned poetry for lovers, Elias knew his chance had arrived.
Ninia had stopped before a tent where a palm-reader was telling a young man’s fortune.
“Great adventures await you.” The woman’s husky voice filtered down the street. “You will travel to every corner of The Four Kingdoms.”
The youth’s eyes gleamed. “When?” he asked impatiently. “How will I escape my Da’s workshop? He never takes his eyes off me.”
A smile curved Ninia’s lips as she looked on a few feet away.
Elias approached her. He’d already drawn his blade and held it concealed in his palm. The lane was shadowed, dimly lit by glowing orange lanterns. The haunting strains of a lyre drifted out from the street behind them.
Step by step, Elias advanced, soft-footed in his hunting boots.
The princess stood side-on to him, her smile widening while she listened to the palm-reader’s continuing predictions.
“You will be under his yoke for a wee while yet,” she advised him. “But you must be ready to seize your chance when it comes … for it will only visit you once.”
Ninia was so engrossed that she didn’t even notice the tall figure who edged along the shadowy wall toward her.
Three feet from Ninia, Elias stopped. He breathed quietly, shallowly. His shoulders had tensed, and the fingers concealing the blade flexed.
His chance was now. Like the fortune-teller’s prediction, some opportunities, once missed, never presented themselves again.
Ninia of Thûn had to die.
