Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass #4)(60)

Chaol sliced a glare in her direction, but then shifted his attention to the crowd around them, and said again, “This is a terrible idea.”

She followed his stare toward Arobynn, who stood across the sandy pit in which two men were fighting, now so bloodied up she couldn’t tell who was in worse shape. “He summons, I answer. Just keep your eyes open.”

It was the most they’d said to each other all night. But she had other things to worry about.

It had taken just one minute in this place to understand why Arobynn had summoned her.

The Valg guards flocked to the Pits—not to arrest and torture, but to watch. They were interspersed among the crowd, hooded, smiling, cold.

As if the blood and rage fueled them.

Beneath her black mask, Aelin focused on her breathing.

Three days after his rescue, Aedion was still injured badly enough that he remained bedridden, one of Chaol’s most trusted rebels watching over the apartment. But she needed someone at her back tonight, so she’d asked Chaol and Nesryn to come. Even if she knew it would play into Arobynn’s plans.

She’d tracked them down at a covert rebel meeting, to no one’s delight.

Especially when, apparently, the Valg had vanished with their victims and couldn’t be found despite days of tracking them. One look at Chaol’s pursed lips had told her exactly whose antics he thought were to blame for it. So she was glad to talk to Nesryn instead, if only to take her mind off the new task pressing on her, its chiming now a mocking invitation from the glass castle. But destroying the clock tower—freeing magic—had to wait.

At least she’d been right about Arobynn wanting Chaol here, the Valg clearly an offering meant to entice the captain to continue trusting and confiding in him.

Aelin sensed Arobynn’s arrival at her side moments before his red hair slid into her peripheral vision.

“Any plans to wreck this establishment, too?”

A dark head appeared at his other side, along with the wide-eyed male stares that followed it everywhere. Aelin was grateful for the mask that hid the tightness in her face as Lysandra inclined her head in greeting. Aelin made a good show of looking Lysandra up and down, and then turned to Arobynn, dismissing the courtesan as if she were no more than a bit of ornamentation.

“I just cleaned the suit,” Aelin drawled to Arobynn. “Wrecking this shit-hole would only mess it up again.”

Arobynn chuckled. “In case you were wondering, a certain celebrated dancer was on a ship heading south with all her dancers before word of your escapades even reached the docks.” The roar of the crowd nearly drowned out his words. Lysandra frowned at a reveler who nearly spilled his ale on the skirts of her mint-and-cream gown.

“Thank you,” Aelin said, and meant it. She didn’t bring up Arobynn’s little game of playing her and Chaol against each other—not when that was precisely what he wanted. Arobynn gave her a smile smug enough to make her ask, “Is there a particular reason that my services are necessary here tonight, or is this another present of yours?”

“After you so gleefully wrecked the Vaults, I’m now in the market for a new investment. The owners of the Pits, despite being public about wanting an investor, are hesitant to accept my offer. Participating tonight will go a long way toward convincing them of my considerable assets and … what I might bring to the table.” And make a threat to the owners, to show off his deadly arsenal of assassins—and how they might help turn an even higher profit with fixed fights against trained killers. She knew exactly what he would say next. “Alas, my fighter fell through,” Arobynn went on. “I needed a replacement.”

“And who am I fighting as, exactly?”

“I told the owners you were trained by the Silent Assassins of the Red Desert. You remember them, don’t you? Give the pit-lord whatever name you want.”

Prick. She’d never forget those months in the Red Desert. Or who had sent her there.

She jerked her chin at Lysandra. “Aren’t you a little fussy for this sort of place?”

“And here I was thinking you and Lysandra had become friends after your dramatic rescue.”

“Arobynn, let’s go watch somewhere else,” Lysandra murmured. “The fight’s ending.”

She wondered what it was like to have to endure the man who had slaughtered your lover. But Lysandra’s face was a mask of worried, wary mindlessness—another skin she wore as she idly cooled herself with a gorgeous fan of lace and ivory. So out of place in this cesspit.

“Pretty, isn’t it? Arobynn gave it to me,” Lysandra said, noticing her attention.

“A small trinket for such a tremendously talented lady,” Arobynn said, leaning down to kiss Lysandra’s bare neck.

Aelin clamped down on her disgust so hard that she choked on it.

Arobynn sauntered off into the crowd like a snake through the grass, catching the eye of the willowy pit-lord. When he was deep enough into the crowd, Aelin stepped closer to Lysandra. The courtesan glanced away from her, and Aelin knew it wasn’t an act.

So softly no one could hear, Aelin said, “Thank you—for the other day.”

Lysandra kept her eyes on the crowd and the bloodied fighters around them. They landed on the Valg, and she quickly looked at Aelin again, shifting so that the crowd formed a wall between her and the demons across the pit. “Is he all right?”