Wild Knight (Midnight Empire: The Tower #1)(21)

He moved to stand beside me and I studied the background. “The owner lived in quite an opulent place.”

“Oh, no. That’s a room in the palace,” Callan said.

My brow creased. “I thought you found the owner elsewhere.”

“I did, but I wasn’t about to leave behind the only bit of evidence.”

I nearly choked. “You carried this? By yourself?” Solid metal like this had to weigh…I didn’t want to contemplate it.

He grinned. “Have I finally managed to impress you?”

There was no way I could’ve carried the metal cocoon. No doubt the reason he brought me the photos.

“We can’t identify the type of metal,” Maeron said. “It’s unlike anything we’ve ever seen.”

“I have a sample if you’d like to take it with you for further examination,” Callan offered.

“I would.”

Now I understood why they needed a knight and why they needed one from a different banner than their usual ones. If word got out that a princess of House Lewis was missing, it would make the royal family appear weak. They wanted this kept quiet. The assignment was more complicated than I anticipated.

I looked at the queen. “And there’s been no ransom note, Your Majesty?”

The queen shook her head. “No communication of any kind. Not even to gloat.” She shot a pointed look at Callan. “Which is one of the reasons I believe she’s absolutely fine and enjoying the air of mystery.”

“The owner of the stone died,” Callan stressed. “The stone and Davina are now missing. What about those circumstances suggests that Davina is absolutely fine?”

I didn’t know much about the princess, but I was inclined to agree.

“I’ll need a description of the stone.” Searching for a stone in the rubble of Britannia City was akin to searching for a drop of water in the ocean.

“I’ll have it for you before you leave,” the queen said.

“That’s assuming you accept the job,” Callan added.

Maeron snorted. “Who wouldn’t accept a job from House Lewis? She’d have to be mad.”

“How about it, Miss Hayes? Are you mad?” The Highland Reckoning raised his eyebrows at me. A challenge.

I’d been willing to entertain the offer because of their stature and the payment involved, but now they’d given me another compelling reason. I couldn’t take the thought of a young woman in peril, even if she was a vampire. Davina was only seventeen. Vampire or not, I knew exactly how it felt to be a vulnerable young woman alone in the city.

I grew up in the long shadow of fear, but eventually I had to learn to stop being afraid. That didn’t mean I stopped hiding. To show my true self was suicide. It just meant to stop letting fear control me the way it had controlled my mother. Once I was born, her entire life centered around my safety. Every choice she made. She quit her job and moved flats. She used her magic to hide our scents. She didn’t allow herself any friendships and certainly not any romantic relationships.

And because she was alone, after she died, I was too.

I clenched my fingers so no one noticed my hand trembling. “I’ll start immediately,” I said.

The queen polished off her drink and handed the stained glass to Adwin. “Splendid.”





7





I left the palace, made one quick stop, and continued straight to the Circus. Now that I’d officially accepted the job, I needed a plan. There was very little to go on. A hunk of metal no one could identify. A nondescript stone from an excavation site. A missing princess.

I had my work cut out for me.

“Back so soon?” Minka asked as I entered the Pavilion. “Didn’t we see you yesterday?”

“What can I say? I missed you. Plus I promised to replenish Stevie’s snacks.” I held up a bag.

“I was wondering what happened to my emergency stash.” Stevie Torrin slid open her desk drawer.

“You changed your hair. Looks good.” The ends of her dark hair had been dyed silver to match the undertones of her brown skin.

“I told her to go for magenta,” Kami said.

Stevie shook her head. “Too close to red.”

Sniffing the air between us, Minka frowned. “You smell wrong.”

I edged away from her. “Gee, thanks. And your disposition is delightful as always.”

Minka wasn’t put off by my snark. “Where were you?”

I shook the bag. “At the shop.”

Her eyes narrowed. “No, before that.”

Damn Minka and her sense of smell. You’d think she was a shifter with that nose, but you’d be wrong.

“I had a meeting.”

Minka scrunched her nose. “In a graveyard? You reek of death and violence.”

I glanced down at my clothes. Although it wasn’t unusual for me to show up covered in blood and guts, today wasn’t one of those days.

“She couldn’t have had a meeting in a graveyard,” Stevie interrupted. “She wouldn’t have made it back here so quickly.”

“Could’ve been a pre-Eternal Night graveyard,” Minka countered.

I dumped the contents of the bag into the gaping drawer.

“Thanks,” Stevie said.