Betrayed by Magic (The Baine Chronicles #5)(58)

“Well, I am a guard, so I’m dressed in uniform, naturally.” Rylan grinned, giving me an extravagant bow. “Lord Iannis suggested this look. He felt it would be better not to walk around the Palace looking like I normally do, under the circumstances,” Rylan added in mindspeak.

“I see.” So he’d cast a spell on Rylan to make him look and smell like a tiger-shifter, then dressed him up as a guard and assigned him to me. “I hope this means you’re not going to be hovering above me while I sleep.”

“That would be rather improper,” Rylan said dryly. “No, I am to accompany you around the Palace, and around Solantha as well, by Lord Iannis’s orders.”

I bit back the protest rising to my lips—I didn’t need a babysitter. But it occurred to me that I was babysitting Rylan as much as he was me. He couldn’t leave the Palace without an escort, so without me, he would be stuck to the confines of these walls. Besides, Rylan was resourceful and handy in a fight, so I couldn’t say that he would hamper me by tagging along.

“Don’t worry—I’m sure I won’t be shadowing you when your fiancé spirits you off for a romantic evening,” Rylan said dryly in my head. His grin widened as he craned his neck around me and met Nelia’s gaze. “And who is this?”

“This is Miss Nelia Thrase,” I said, turning to see her staring wide-eyed up at Rylan. To my surprise, and discomfort, I caught the fascinated attraction in her dark eyes. “She’s my new social secretary.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Nelia said, getting to her feet. A faint blush spread across her cheeks as Rylan approached, deliberately looking her up and down.

“Oh, the pleasure is all mine.” Rylan took her hand and pressed a kiss against her knuckles. Nelia’s eyelashes fluttered, and, for a moment, I thought she might actually swoon. “Hopefully, your position means I will be seeing you more often.”

“Hopefully,” she agreed, sounding more than a little breathless.

“All right, Bodyguard,” I said, barely managing not to roll my eyes. “Can you take me to dinner, then? I’m starving.”

“Of course.” Rylan dropped Nelia’s hand. “See you later, Miss Thrase.”

“If you break Nelia’s heart, I will send you off to the mines myself,” I warned as we all exited the room. I loved Rylan, but he was a player, and I wasn’t about to let him mess with my employee.

My employee. How weird is that?

“Don’t worry,” Rylan said, sounding completely serious now. “I intend to serve out my sentence in peace, so that I can eventually rejoin the clan. My place is with our family, and I’ve neglected it for far too long. I want to get back to it someday.”

I mulled Rylan’s words over in my head, my heart growing heavier as we walked. Rylan did have a place in our family, that was for sure. Mafiela might be angry with him, but he was her son. She would welcome him back into the fold as soon as he made things right with her. But I wasn’t sure there had ever been a place in the Jaguar Clan where I’d fit in the past, and now that my life had changed so much, I wasn’t sure there ever would be in the future.





24





I expected Rylan to take me to the large dining hall where all Mage Guild employees gathered to eat. But, instead, he led me past it and into the smaller, private dining room that was used to entertain guests, as confidently as though he were thoroughly familiar with the warren of a palace. I wasn’t really surprised, though—Rylan had always had a good sense of direction.

Iannis and Director Chen were already seated at the glossy, oval-shaped wooden table, enjoying wine and bread as they waited for the first course to arrive. Fenris was there too, as well as Cirin Garidano, the Finance Secretary.

“Good evening, Miss Baine,” Director Chen greeted me with a smile. “I am pleased to see you looking well.”

“Thank you.” I gave her a small smile in return as I seated myself in the empty chair to Iannis’s right. My stomach growled as I caught sight of the bread basket, and I took a roll for myself as Rylan left the room at a gesture from Iannis. I figured it would be weird to have him hover over us and listen to us talk about sensitive information. Maybe he’d head down to the kitchens and get himself some food in the meantime.

“I hope I didn’t miss anything important while you were waiting for me,” I said to Iannis. It was the closest I would give to an apology—after all, I hadn’t been told we were having a dinner meeting, though I supposed it wasn’t surprising.

“We were just discussing the interrogation of the Palace staff,” Iannis told me. “Fenris was running it before he joined us in Osero.”

“Oh, right.” The bomb attack had almost slipped my mind in the last few days. I turned to Fenris. “So did you find anything before you left?”

“Three humans fled the Palace after I announced we would be subjecting the staff to a truth spell,” Fenris said. There was no hint of the tension he’d radiated earlier, but then again, he was talking to me rather than Iannis. “I was in the middle of tracking them down, with the help of the Enforcer’s Guild, when I was called away.”

“One of them was Darca, one of my better accountants,” Cirin said irritably, his dark blue eyes narrowed. “As you can imagine, finding out that I may have been employing a traitor has not improved my staff’s morale.”