“That so?” Justin asked. “Good for him. Well, since you’re obviously not doing anything—”
“That’s not true, I have plenty—”
“—I think it’s a good idea for you and I to spend some time together. Just the two of us.”
I would have rather had my balls torn off. “Say what now?”
He sighed prettily. “Sam, you are to be the King’s Wizard one day. I am going to be the King. You will be my advisor, as wrong as that sounds. We should at least spend some time together before you leave for months on end. I mean, who knows if you’ll even come back? I would just feel awful if something happened to you out there in the big, wide world and I never had a chance to say we bonded.”
“Somehow, I get the feeling you wouldn’t be that upset.”
He grinned. “Nonsense. I would be broken to pieces.”
“I can tell. Your words are too kind, my Prince.”
“Now, what should we do? What could you and I possibly do together?” He tapped the side of his face, thinking malicious things. Then his eyes lit up. “I’ve just had the most wonderful idea.”
“Uh-oh,” I muttered under my breath. “Hold on to it. I have a feeling those are a rarity.”
“How’s that now?” he asked, stepping away from the wall.
“Nothing, Your Grace,” I said sweetly. “I’m sure whatever you’ve thought of is perfect.”
“Oh, it is. Shall we?”
I WAS completely and utterly fucked.
I figured as much when Justin got that glint in his eye that meant he was about to be a fucking jerk. Yes, I was not a fan of his (and I was most certainly not a member of his fan club—of which there were inexplicably several—though the two clubs met every other month or so to talk about “Rystin,” their favorite couple, while I would sit in the back seething that combining Ryan and Justin to make Rystin was stupid, but what if Ryan Foxheart had met a guy named Sam Haversford? It’d be HaveHeart! It practically wrote itself. This, by the way, being the twentieth meeting I’d attended). But I liked to think that maybe deep down in the black and murky confines of his soul, Prince Justin was an okay guy.
I was wrong.
“So, this is the sparring grounds,” I said unnecessarily. “And we’re alone.”
“Are we?” he said, sounding surprised. “I suppose we are.”
“You’re a Prince. And we’ve somehow managed to make it out of the castle and out of the city undetected to the sparring grounds. Which are empty.”
“How strange. Well, it’s Wednesday and the knights will be on the east end, going through their exercises.”
“And we’re west,” I said.
“West,” he agreed.
“You probably shouldn’t murder me,” I said out loud, even though I totally meant to keep that in my head.
He laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Wow. That was reassuring.
He walked over to a massive shed standing at the edges of the field. There was a metal padlock on the doors.
“Oh no,” I said. “It’s locked. We should go home.”
“Bah,” he said. “You have your magic. Unlock it.”
“I left my magic in my room,” I said, like that was a real thing.
“Oh. It’s good I have the key, then.”