“You’re a long way from Rifthold, Captain,” she said, clearing her
throat. “Did you come with the army I heard thumping around earlier?”
She peered into the darkness beneath his hood but saw nothing.
Still, she felt his eyes upon her face, judging, weighing, testing. She
stared right back. Th e Captain of the Royal Guard would be an interesting
opponent. Maybe even worthy of some eff ort on her part.
Finally, the man raised his sword hand, and the folds of his cloak
fell to conceal the blade. As his cloak shifted, she spied the gold wyvern
embroidered on his tunic. Th e royal seal.
“What do you care for the armies of Adarlan?” he replied. How
lovely it was to hear a voice like her own— cool and articulate— even if
he was a nasty brute!
“Nothing,” she said, shrugging. He let out a low growl of annoyance.
Oh, it’d be nice to see his blood spill across the marble. She’d lost
her temper once before— once, when her fi rst overseer chose the wrong
day to push her too hard. She still remembered the feeling of embedding
the pickax into his gut, and the stickiness of his blood on her
hands and face. She could disarm two of these guards in a heartbeat.
Would the captain fare better than her late overseer? Contemplating
the potential outcomes, she grinned at him again.
“Don’t you look at me like that,” he warned, and his hand drifted
back toward his sword. Celaena hid her smirk this time. Th ey passed
a series of wooden doors that she’d seen a few minutes ago. If she
wanted to escape, she simply had to turn left at the next hallway and
take the stairs down three fl ights. Th e only thing all the intended disorientation
had accomplished was to familiarize her with the building.
Idiots.“Where are we going again?” she said sweetly, brushing a strand
of her matted hair from her face. When he didn’t reply, she clenched
her jaw.
Th e halls echoed too loudly for her to attack him without alerting
the whole building. She hadn’t seen where he’d put the key to her