Slowly, my gaze shifted to Hymel, and I knew when I read him moments earlier that whatever deal Hymel had struck with the Hyhborn, it hadn’t been a wise one. He hadn’t laid out whatever terms he’d agreed to clearly. He was a fool.
“You did well.” Lord Arion faced Hymel, his cloak fluttering over the floor as he approached him. “Our king will be forever appreciative of your service.” He cupped the man’s cheeks, pressing his lips to Hymel’s forehead. He lifted his head. “It will not be forgotten.”
Hymel’s tentative smile faded.
There was a quiet moment.
Just a heartbeat.
The crack of Hymel’s neck snapping shattered the silence.
I watched as Hymel . . . as he crumpled, just as I’d seen, dead before he hit the floor.
CHAPTER 38
“I think we’re being followed,” Grady whispered in the darkness of the unfamiliar chamber of the Bell’s Inn, somewhere in the Midlands.
We lay facing one another on a narrow, stiff-as-a-board bed, but at least it was an actual bed indoors. We’d spent a few hours the night before camped alongside the Bone Road while coyotes howled and whined as if they could sense the Hyhborn’s presence and were unsettled.
The only reason we were together was because the Bell’s Inn didn’t have a lot of rooms, and the Hyhborn, well, they might have curled their lips at the accommodations, but they weren’t all displeased when they discovered that the owner offered more than food and drink to his patrons. The owner, a thin man who went by the name Buck and didn’t seem all that concerned when he spotted me barefoot and Grady bloodied, also had flesh on the menu.
Just then, a cry of pleasure came from the floor above, momentarily overshadowing the steady thump of a headboard hitting the wall.
The Hyhborn were clearly enjoying themselves.
My gaze flicked up, where thin slivers of moonlight crawled across the ceiling. We were supposed to be sleeping. That was Prince Rohan’s order, but the thin walls did nothing to block sound. We could hear every grunt and moan.
“Gods,” Grady muttered wearily. “Do they ever stop fucking? They’ve been at it for hours.”
“I hope not.” I pulled my gaze from the ceiling. “They may separate us.”
“Yeah.” Grady sighed, and he shifted slightly, trying to get comfortable, but he couldn’t move very much with his arms bound above his head with chain secured to the headboard.
I wasn’t bound.
Because according to the Prince, I wasn’t being held captive. I was being rescued, and I thought they really believed that. But I also knew they had no reason to fear me attempting to make an escape. They were partly correct there. The first thing I did the moment they left was try to free Grady. I even used the lunea blade they’d yet to discover on me, but the chain . . . it was constructed of the same material, and I learned then that lunea could not pierce, crack, or shatter itself. But again, they were partly correct. Thanks to Hymel, they knew I wouldn’t leave Grady behind. I glanced at him, hating that he was in this situation because of me.
“Your eyes,” he said, voice thick. “I can’t get used to them.”
My eyes . . .
I’d finally seen them when we were placed in here and I was able to use the bathing chamber. There was a dirty mirror above the vanity and the light in there had been dim, but I’d seen them. The incandescent blue rings circled my pupils, just like they briefly had before. Whatever glamour the Prioress supposedly used had hidden them all these years, and I didn’t know if the glimpse of them before had been the glamour weakening or something.
“Are they . . . weird?” I asked.
“Kind of,” he admitted. “They’re also kind of pretty.”
I shook my head. “You were saying you think we’re being followed?”
“I heard Lord Arion talking to one of their knights this evening, before we stopped here. I didn’t hear why he thought this, but that’s why they wanted off the Bone Road for the night,” he said.
I swallowed, throat dry. There hadn’t been much in the way of food and water. Just a glass for each of us and something that was supposed to be a beef stew that we’d been given on our arrival. But if we were being followed? A tiny bit of hope sprang alive. Was it . . . was it Thorne? And if it was, what would happen then? “Do you think it could be . . . Thorne and his knights?”
Grady didn’t answer immediately. “I don’t know.”
“Neither do I.” I squeezed my eyes shut, opening my senses to find an answer to no avail. “I don’t see anything. I don’t know if it’s because a Hyhborn is following us or if it’s just that I’m . . . I’m tired and . . .” I sucked in a shallow breath that did nothing to alleviate the pressure gathering in my chest and stomach. “We’re what? About two days’ ride from Archwood?”