Page 40 of Kingdom of Rot & Ruin
And I might have sneaked a peek here and there, slowing my run just enough to appreciate the round plumpness of a breast here, and the swell of a hip there. The women were still all the same; scared and delicate little creatures who would break and cry at the smallest bit of trouble.
I didn’t have the patience for them.
My pace picked up, and I didn’t slow it again until I crossed the threshold of my tiny little room.
Chapter
Eleven
Ikept my head down for months after that, anxious the queen would realize I wasn’t dead and forcing her Fireguards to drag me out of my bed and finish the job.
I couldn’t face her again until I was ready, and had learned how to channel the magick in my veins.
I didn’t see L again. I wasn’t sure why, and didn’t seek answers. Perhaps I was afraid to know. I didn’t feelguilty;that would be a weakness. But it made my stomach flip uncomfortably thinking that he might have gotten in trouble for helping me.
Oh well. His fault.
I hid in my room and in the archives. The first time B saw me after his beating, his face went white, and neither he nor his cronies troubled me again. I didn’t seek Zariah, and I didn’t try any more rituals despite furiously sketching out more. I swiped meals from the dining hall, then took them back to my room to be eaten in peace. Everyone preferred it this way.
Months passed before Vession even acknowledged me,his shadow passing by my doorway on his way to his own quarters one night and hovering.
I paused in my scribbles, my quill hovering over the parchment as I held my breath.
“Yes?” I grit out, unable to stand the tension.
A sigh escaped him from the other side of the door, and he kept going.
Tension bled out of my body, exhaustion settling in immediately behind it. The quill fell from my fingers to the desk; the tip blotting black ink over the wooden surface.
My head fell into my hands.
I hated the fear. I hated the unknown. I wasn’t living my life the way I wanted to, and it showed. And Vession felt it.
More than anything, I couldn’t stand anyone being disappointed in me. I couldn’t live knowing someone thought I wasn’t living up to my potential.
Hell, I felt it.
I would show him, though. I would showeveryone. If I could continue my research but incorporate the healing magick of dragon’s blood, no one could stop me.
If the queen was going to kill me upon finding out I still lived, then it didn’t matter if it happened ten days from now, or ten years. I couldn’t take another month living like this in the shadows, like the rat she was so fond of calling me.
It was decided, then.
I returned to the pattern on the parchment before me, the next stage in my heat-resistance ritual with renewed purpose. If I finished it tonight, I could perform it tomorrow after my studies and chores with the other scribes.
And then I’d reveal myself to the queen, and perhaps pop in to say hello to a certain gold dragon.
A smirk stretched across my lips.
It was a much more dangerous way to live, but so much more fun.
The first thing I did was sit down for breakfast in the dining hall with the others. Not giving a shit where I sat, I plopped down on the end of the bench on the closest table to me, intent on gathering sausages and a large hunk of sweet bread with syrup poured over the top. I had a big day ahead of me and needed to eat for it.
“What the fuck are you doing? Freaks don’t sit here.”
I expected B to get in my face almost immediately. That’s why I had a plan.
B had grown upward like most of us, but also outward. He was stout and short, and liked literally throwing his weight around. Yet bullies and idiots were all the same: simple, stupid, and they loved attention.
