Accomplice to the Villain (Assistant and the Villain, #3)(40)

The morning was still gray but lighter, the last dregs of night saying their final farewell, and Tatianna breathed it in like it was restoring her. “All right. Let me have a look at him.” Her hands took on their warm yellow glow, and she hovered them around the frog, scanning his small body for any issues. “But I’m telling you, there’s nothing to worry about.”

Kingsley blinked, his eyes homing in on the glow of Tatianna’s hands. And then he leaped.

Out the open window.

“Ah! Oh gods!” Tatianna screeched, and Trystan yelled as they both dove after him, shoving simultaneously through the window frame but clutching at only air. All they saw was a frog soaring, then hitting the ground gracefully and turning around to look at them with a soft “ribbit.”

“Oh gods! Tryst, what do we do?” Tatianna grabbed his arms, and they both knew the answer. They couldn’t take their eyes off that frog, but jumping out the window was a fool’s errand.

“Sir?” Sage’s voice floated up, and Trystan’s heart dropped. Had she stayed out there all night, waiting for the sun to rise on the stained glass?

And he’d assumed she’d retire; instead, he’d inadvertently left her out there to put it together with only Blade and an abandoned “outside dinner.” It was difficult to enjoy villainous acts when they made you feel like you were being boiled alive.

And then Kingsley hopped right at Sage, smacking her in the chest and forcing her to the ground arse first. Thank the gods, though, she kept her hands tight on the amphibian, effectively stopping his escape.

“Oof!”

“Tatianna?” Trystan said lightly.

“Yes?” she asked nervously, likely sensing the danger beneath it.

“I think we have something to worry about.”





Chapter 24


Kingsley


Alexander Kingsley was confused.

And perhaps a smidge disoriented.

He’d awoken, startled by the rush of footsteps, to find himself bouncing in Trystan’s hands, then to Tatianna’s office, and then…it was fuzzy, but he was no longer in the healer’s quarters at all. He was sitting atop Evie Sage’s midsection while she slowly moved to sit up.

“Sage!” Trystan yelled, bursting through the back door. “Kingsley!”

Tatianna scurried out next, her pink robe dragging behind her. Birds began their morning greetings, and Alexander tried his best not to be distracted by the sounds so he could understand the scene unfolding before him.

“I’m fine,” Evie assured them, looking down at Alexander, reaching up a finger to straighten his crown. “I can’t get my curls to stay put for more than a few hours. How on earth has this thing survived so long?”

“It’s glued to his head,” Trystan muttered dryly, extending a hand to help her to her feet.

“Is it really?” Evie scrunched her nose, looking down upon him.

Alexander sure hoped not.

“No, Sage.” Trystan was cranky, probably because he was tired. The man had been sleeping terribly lately, and judging by the dark circles under his eyes, last night had been no different.

“Are you hurt?” Tatianna asked, rubbing a hand down Evie’s arm.

Evie shook her head, smiling ruefully. “I think I’ve just become a magnet for trouble lately.”

“Lately?” Trystan questioned.

Evie pushed her tongue into her cheek, looking a bit like she was swallowing words that would unravel him. But instead she ended up stalking back toward where they’d put the stained glass pieces the night before.

Trystan caught up in seconds, and Kingsley hopped along, wondering how he got down here in the first place.

“Were you out all night?” Trystan asked cautiously.

Evie nodded serenely. “I couldn’t sleep. So I finished what we started with Blade.”

Trystan shot out an arm, halting Evie. “Gushiken!” he called.

“With the stained glass window pieces!” Blade yelled from across the yard, hiding behind Fluffy with a large sponge in hand for the dragon’s morning bath. “You know, since you left her to do it by herself.”

Alexander wondered if death wish was one or two words.

“Thank you for that courteous explanation,” Trystan replied sardonically.

“No problem, boss!”

Tatianna snorted, and Alexander marveled at how different his friends were and yet, in some ways, exactly who they’d always been from the time they were children—when their lives had barely begun to intertwine.

Alexander’s father, the king, had been a fair but diligent guide in his son’s education, ensuring he was a master in all things: diplomacy, science, philosophy, magic, an ironic skill for penmanship, and the history of the creation of the continent, including all its kingdoms.

But his mother had worried he was spending too much time in the library and not enough with other children, so off they went one day in search of “fun.” Within the week, he’d met Trystan, Clare, Malcolm, and Tatianna, and his life had been forever altered.

Alexander’s tongue suddenly shot toward a nearby fly. His tiny body jerked at the sudden urge. A new, foreign urge that he’d somehow avoided for the last decade. What was happening? Did frogs go through a second puberty?