Chapter 403 (1/2)

Chapter 403

Chapter 401: Highbloods in Low Places

CAERA DENOIR

Heavy black clouds had turned day to night, pouring down thick sheets of rain that puar on the Redwater The city was eerily quiet under the blanket of rainfall, broken only by the rattle of carriage wheels over wet cobbles or the rare shout froht out in the storm as they rushed furtively toward their destinations

I'd had nearly a week to come to terms with the events in Sehz-Clar, but the rushed pace of Seris's ht Still, I kneas at stake In truth, I aler of being outside the shi+elds

Finding the street I was looking for, I pulled the hood of nature before cautiously edging around the exterior of a large three-story inn Dilass, the low ru into the street from the open door

I scanned the alleyway behind the inn, but it was empty aside from the usual collection of rubbish that had been tossed out by the too-busy staff

Slipping along the rear wall of the building, I tucked myself into the narrow alcove the backdoor provided and waited, watching the street No one breached the mouth of the alley, and the street beyond re rain Confident that no one was following me, I eased open the door and ducked into the dim interior

I found myself in a narrow corridor To one side, the cacophonous din of the bar vibrated through the thin boards, and a handful of doors opened into storage rooms and the proprietor's private quarters on the other

Once I had passed these, the susurrus of quiet voices edged into my perception, subtle beneath the louder volu from a room at the end of the hall

I cautiously approached the last door, and the voices grely louder until I could eneral cla from a space between two planks in the wall, and when I put my eye to the spot, I could see a slice of the roo several of the speakers

I could have laughed

Each of the le was dressed more ostentatiously than the last It was a wonder they hadn’t arrived accompanied by a parade of blood ht have been forgiven for thinking that a clandestine ood tihbloods couldn’t resist the opportunity to flaunt their wealth, even if only to each other

Although, to give them soing from hooks on the back wall

“Scythe Seris Vritra’s eoatee had faded nearly to white, but there was steel in his eyes and he stared around the roo hi h t-n o v el r e a-d e rorg

A hed low and dangerous “Highlord Frost, this is a Scythe we’re discussing” He druers across the scarred table that doh, I suppose such a title is no longer appropriate At any rate, her representative will arrive, and when they do, they will consider themselves exactly on tier sort of place to hlord Frost’s thick brows rose as he considered the younger h, if Scythe…ah, Lady Seris expects to win our goodwill, perhaps she should start by treating us better than her previous co to so, “Oh really, Uriel When have you ever been treated poorly in your life? Born a highblood and heir to the title of highlord, your success and authority were very nearly predestined You’ve heard the parable of the silver spoon, I assume?”

There were several scandalized scoffs frohlord Frost scowled, a look that would have frozen the blood of ood fortune to be born into our position, while others have fought and bled to scrape their way up fros of the unblooded” His tone was e just audible in the undertones “But we are all highbloods now, Matron Tremblay And all here for a shared purpose I suspect if your blood’s interactions with the Scythes and Sovereigns had been positive, you would not have answered Seris’s invitation”

“Well said, Uriel,” said one of the others, a younger ht ponytail

“Oh, indeed,” Matron Treon of facundity”

I pulled back fro to s escalated further

“If you have sohlord Frost’s voice ruhlord Frost These newbloods have no appreciation for those who came before,” Lord Exeter said

I opened the door to the sight of a tall, athletic woer extended toward the men at the other end of the table and her mouth open to hurl as no doubt to be a well-practiced insult But her burgundy eyes shi+fted to e in her sun-kissed face, and she stopped

“Caera?” she asked uncertainly

I focused on the short horns that grew from her forehead to curve back close atop her lustrous blue-black hair, which she had pulled back into a tail She was Vritra-blooded But her blood name, Tremblay, wasn’t familiar Then, belatedly, I realized I’d heard her first naer version of the fierce young woer with blue-black hair down to the back of her knees “I see your blood has orously, clearly excited and eager to speak, but the men were all on their feet now, and we both seemed to realize this wasn’t the ti back her smile, she sat back down

On the other side of the room, a couple of thewarily

Only Lord Exeter approached,his hand I went to shake it, but he turned my hand and pulled it toward him I could only watch, surprised, bemused, and love

Maylis snorted

“By the Sovereigns’ grace, Lady Caera of Highblood Denoir, what are you doing here?” he asked,voice said, drawing hblood in purple and silver battlerobes “This is some kind of setup! The Denoirs have already spoken out vocally against the situation in Sehz-Clar—”

A bark of laughter froine, Highlord Seabrook, is why this girl is here, instead of the heir, Lauden, or Highlord Denoir hiine”

I leveled a cold, unblinking gaze at the rooirl’ is here because Seris herself has chosenon” I focused on the pluhlord Sebastien Seabrook “And, Highlord, if this were sohly incri absence of prudence”

Next tostep back, bu incoherent, then finallyfiendishly “What’s the er to present yourself as a vacuous, self-indulgent blowhard only a o”

This seehtened his jacket and turned his nose up “ForgivePlease,” he said, waving lare at Maylis before returning to his seat

“Indeed, we seehlord Frost said into the silence that followed “If you have truly come on behalf of Lady Seris, pray tell, what exactly does she hope to accomplish with this act of rebellion?”

This question, I kneas intended more to usher us into a conversation than seek an actual answer Each of these highbloods had received a number of missives already, which offered explanation for Seris’s purpose They knehat she was trying to do, but what they really wanted to gauge was if there would even be a chance that she could be successful And, perhaps hbloods to align with her against Agrona

“Seat yourselves and I’ll answer any sensible questions you ht have,” I said firmly I kept id

Norhbloods, the practiced courtly demeanor my foster parents had drilled into h the typical machinations of noble politics If they saw me as their lesser—or even their equal—then it would be all but ioal

I was here as Seris’s e in a delicate dance of ould sit first and in which seats, the highbloods filled the long chipped, stained table There were eight people representing various highbloods that had shown cautious interest in Seris’s e I stayed on my feet with my hands clasped behind my back and let the faint impression of impatience bleed into my expression

Lord Exeter was quick to take a seat halfway down the table His gaze kept twitching toward Maylis, and although he presented hi below the surface I hadn’t heard of Highblood Exeter, but by the way he had sneered at Maylis about being a “newblood,” I doubted he hi blood from Sehz-Clar or Etril, raised up due to the ath in war or success as ascenders

Highlord Frost took the seat at the head of the table opposite me I’d met several of his blood at Central Academy, and the Frosts did occasional business with the Denoirs I’d been quite ihter, Enola, who had won her event at the Victoriad

Highlord Seabrook, the puffy, purplevoice, sat to Frost’s left He was staring aton his cheek in a distracted sort of way

To his left was the second son of Highblood Uiven name I couldn’t recall His brother, I kneas off in Dicathenthe blood’s affairs The fact that he was here instead of his father, Highlord Gracian U the waters At least the Exeters had sent their heir

Still, the U ht his nahblood had been close to the Denoirs when I was a child, but so out between my adoptive mother and Matron Clarvelle resulted in the two bloods drifting apart As chamberlain, Geoffrey was a trustedas this was al

We’d have to be careful with the Clarvelles

On the other side of the table, Highlord Ector Ainsworth sat to Highlord Frost’s right In his sixties, Ector still had dark black hair, except for a slight lightening at his teoatee He had been quiet so far, both before the ray eyes seeh , nervous-lookingat Highlord Frost like he was trying to catch his eye His back had been to nized the hawkish downturn of his nose and his unusual eyes; one was bright scarlet, the other a muddy brown

“Lady Caera…” he said softly when he realized I was looking at hih his eyes focused on the table and notpolitely R e a d f-irst at ReadNovelFullcohblood Redwater was a Virtra-blooded foster like s—four brothers and a sister—had all perished tragically in the Relictombs As his Vritra blood never manifested, the Redwaters were allowed to nahblood—a very old blood that took its na not half a mile from the inn—would live on

I’dVritra-blooded foster children I’d been forced to attend when I was young I reme the self-iin,” I said when I’d finished scanning the room, “there are two points I must make clear immediately First, this is not a battle to replace one overlord with another Seris does not seek to n over Alacrya, or even to rule at all”

Highlord Seabrookacross the table at Highlord Ainsworth with a foolish grin on his face

Frost steepled his fingers and leaned toward me “So her missives have explained Thus far, she has painted herself as a…freedoood of the people of Alacrya” Wolfru he was the only one “I would ask you to speak plainly, on your honor as a Denoir What is Seris’s true purpose, and why now, in thisto do with the sudden turnabout happening on the other continent?” Seabrook burst in “I lost ten battlegroups in the city of…hatever it's called,” he finished lamely

“The second point I a their questions for the moment, “is that this is not a syhlord Frost? Because this is our last opportunity” I put my hands on the table andith the other asura clans ipe out our world if we don’t prevent it”

A chorus of voices broke out as Umburter, Seabrook, Exeter, and Frost all attempted to speak at once

“—absurd—”

“—can’t be sure that—”

“—stop it even if—”

“—believe a word of that nonsense!”

My hand cah the noise like spellfire, and the h I drew hostile looks from Umburter and Seabrook

“Apply the same lessons of etiquette you would enforce on your own blood,” I said coldly, ain”

The room went still in tacit adth of three breaths, then continued “There are few enough who can clairona Vritra, but Seris is one of them He will burn this world as fodder to return to the land of the asura, and all of us with it The rest of the Scythes and Sovereigns are prepared to follow him even to that end, but Seris is not”