Page 29 of Season Warriors & Wolves

Chapter eight

Black Knight to F6

Snowlin

The air was colder today, silent and almost careful. As if it expected something to happen. As if it was silently waiting. Just as it had been silently waiting for the past most uneventful week of my life.

I had trained with only Moregan who was like a cracked crock pot, leaking a few truths here and there each time her anger steamed.

Demir was nowhere to be seen.

Father had only joined dinner twice.

And I had not seen Melanthe since Eldmoor.

It meant only one thing. Melanthe was about to give birth.

The two Adriatian oafs that guarded me every morning had taken space on my right and left, and stared ahead onto the grey walls as I ate my breakfast down in the servant halls where I’d come these past couple of days seeing I’d become part of the landscape and no longer a portrait.

The only sound in the room was the steam leaking out of the pots that boiled my father’s dinner, the slow and almost careful steps of servants that stirred and salted the food, and the sound of my knife cutting through whatever vegetable quiche the cook had managed to cook separately from the meaty main dishes.

To my unfortunate luck, it was too quiet. I had to be fast.

After a quick glance toward all entrances, I flipped the cutlery in my hold and plunged them as hard as I could into the two men guarding me, piercing their throats through and through. But not enough to kill them immediately.

“Shhhh,” I cooed, glancing over my shoulder at the servants who had still not noticed me twisting the silverware deeper into their flesh and the blood slowly dripping into the jagged tiles.

The men choked and twisted for a little while before their bodies turned limp and threatened to topple over. Grabbing onto their clothes, I pulled them upright. Once their limp corpses were staying somewhat still, I gently pushed my chair back and stood, wiping some small specks of blood away and righting my long jacket.

A girl gasped from my left and dropped a basket stuffed with corn onto the floor, causing the indigestible vegetable to roll out everywhere.

I put a finger to my lips, and she completely stilled, even breathing.

Everyone in the kitchen had stopped moving and caused the silence to grow even louder. I met all of their stares and when no one made a single move, my smile turned uncontainable. “I beg a favour,” I said quietly, putting my gloves back on.

Not a fruit fly moved. Or buzzed.

An elderly cook stepped forward and gulped before asking, “Of what sort?”

There we go. “Take the bodies out to the waste piles.”

Her mouth dropped open. “If…what if the guards see?”

“Why would they see what you throw out?” I had worked in the kitchens for years and that had never happened. The order of things was drilled on my forehead, hence why I had chosen to act at his time of day.

She shot everyone in the room a look before nodding. “We will see to it, princess.”

I nodded and before leaving, I bent down and grabbed a corn cob, handing it to the shaking servant who couldn’t look away from the two dead men. “We take what we want by fire or by blood. Remember,” I said, taking her clammy hand and wrapping it around the cob. “Fire makes smoke and smells.”

She nodded shakily. “Will you really be queen as they say?”

“We will see. If the blood will stain or not.”

I poked my head out of the back entrance leading to the corridors overlooking the back winter garden that no one used besides servants. No guards were in sight. I suppose that today I was not my father’s biggest worry. If that child died, he was doomed. If Melanthe died, he was twice doomed.

And I wished the witch nothing but a healthy, long, painful, and overdrawn birth.

Clutching the stolen daggers tightly, I moved down the corridor, heading the opposite way from where everyone was.