“Checking. Please, don’t make any noise. Just for a couple moments. I know there are no guards nearby. Which was foolish of you, by the way.” The Aleran language flew off my tongue easily, as it had for as long as I could remember. But I saw her eyes narrow at my implied threat.
“I may look helpless, child, but I am far from it,” she scolded.
That made me grin. “Same.”
Perhaps out of sheer curiosity, she watched me silently as I continued my journey around her office. I was less concerned with the outer rooms, as she and Crayden had spoken quietly. No, if someone had a listening device in here, it would be close to her desk. As close as they could get.
When I had circled the room, I asked her to stand. Looking annoyed, she did and I walked around her desk at a snail’s pace.
There. A buzzing so slight the bee making it would have been the size of a grain of sand. But I could hear it. Freaking amazing. I could hear everything. And the more I used it, the better I got at controlling what came into my head and what didn’t.
Sliding my fingernail beneath what looked like a natural whorl in the wood-like surface, I lifted a flake from the bottom edge of her desktop, midway between her chair and the desk’s corner. I began to peel the glue flake from the back of the small transmitter, but her wrinkled hand wrapped around my fingers and I looked up to see her shaking her head.
“Too small.”
I held it out to her with my finger over my lips.
She nodded and then pointed to a place on her desk and I set it down there, gently, in case anyone was listening. Speaking in a normal voice, I stepped away and sat back down in the chair opposite her desk. “I was just curious about the tunnels, Elder. I am new here. I am sorry. I didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”
“And yet, you witnessed the murder of Cleric Crayden.”
I shook my head. “Oh, no. I didn’t. I didn’t see anything. Just found the body. That’s all. You can ask the guard who brought me here. It was all a big misunderstanding.”
“You are coated in his blood.”
“I had to check. You know. Just in case I could help him.” I stared down at the caked blood on my clothes and hands. I wasn’t acting now. The shiver that raced through my body was very real. As was the sadness I felt in my eyes.
“Check what?”
“For a pulse. I touched him. I’m sorry. That’s where all the blood came from.”
“I see.” She swiveled in her chair and stood, motioning for me to follow her to the door. “I will confirm your story with the guard. You are free to go, for now.”
“Thank you. I’m so sorry. Thank you.”
She opened the door to her office. Loudly. “Don’t leave the fortress. I may have more questions for you later.”
“Of course not. I have nowhere to go.”
That caused her to raise a brow, but she waved me into the hallway and I went. To my surprise, she followed, and made a production of slamming her door closed. “Are there more transmitters out here?” she asked in a quiet voice.
I closed my eyes. Listened. Nothing. No guards. No buzzing. Nothing. “I don’t hear any.”
“Good.” She crossed her arms and looked me over like she’d never seen me before. Too damn smart. Reminded me of Trinity. “So, you’re the third princess.”
I gasped. How the hell did she know that? “I’m no one. Just an initiate.”
The old woman actually rolled her eyes. “Right. You’ve been here less than two weeks, appearing in my fortress the day after three mysterious females disappeared inside the citadel. There are no records of you from your previous years of life. No birth records. Nothing. And you can hear the microscopic buzzing of a comm transmitter, which means you and your sisters already received your gifts from the citadel.”
“What?” No one knew about the gifts. No one outside the royal bloodline. That was what Mom had always told us. It was too dangerous for outsiders to know. Then how?
“Don’t worry. I am loyal to your mother, Queen Celene. I have been protecting her throne for nearly thirty years, waiting for this day.”
“How did you know she wasn’t dead?” I asked, then groaned. Stupid question. I already knew the answer. So did all of Alera.
“The spire, of course. It never dimmed.”
“Right. Sorry. I forgot.” I lifted my hand to rub my face, saw the blood and dropped it. I took a deep breath. Allies. We needed allies. “All right. Look, I know you are loyal. And I know you sent Crayden to find out about the mysterious prisoner in Cell Level C in the Optimus Unit.”