The Queen's Line (Inheritance of Hunger #1) - Kathryn Moon Page 0,78
the words, or if the dream had impossibly manufactured the thought. With the first raucous snores from the guard's sleep, I sat up and moved to dress. The sky was still black with the middle of the night and my shift wouldn't start for hours. I was familiar with the slight purpling shift of color that meant dawn was approaching and it was still a long way off, but I was too uneasy to go back to sleep. I dressed in my uniform and my belt and sword sheath but left my armor behind. I moved better without it, and it was more for show than function.
I stopped in the doorway of the dormitory, waiting to see if Brummer or his conversational companion woke. There were others sleeping in the room. Yorley was missing, likely down in Rumsbrooke drinking at a tavern. I studied the men in their beds, running through a checklist of who I could not have heard, and who it might've been, landing finally on Nicholas Walsh. Nicholas Walsh was older, but good looking, and had been a well-respected captain in the army until he aged out without promotion. He never looked me in the eye when he spoke to me, and I wasn't sure if it was because I was darker than him and he didn't like it, or because he thought he should have my position instead. I'd be watching him now.
I moved softly through the dorm and up to the palace, checking every guard in their station on my way, ignoring their glares. I was their nanny, checking needlessly on her charges. Except I wasn't so sure it was needless. My instincts as a man told me most of these guards didn't see any nobility in their position. My instincts as an animal told me there was a threat, vague and distant, and that it was time to keep an eye on what was important.
"What are you doing up?" Stanley Piper whispered as I joined him in the princess's hall.
"Not sleeping. You can stay or you can take a free night off," I answered, keeping my voice low.
Stanley's brows bounced at the offer. I didn't dislike Stanley, he was young and quiet and had a slight limp that was always worse after a night standing on duty.
"Fine," he said with a shrug and a nod.
I took his place in front of the doors as I waited in the dim candlelight for him to leave. The hall was silent and still shining like new. I stepped forward, just slightly peering through the crack in the door to the suite. It was dark, quiet. My hand turned the knob slowly, waiting for a rustle of activity. Nothing.
The moon was bright enough in the sky, light falling in through the windows of the sitting room to reveal that it was empty, that the bedchamber doors were shut and a little warm light slipped across the floor from inside. It wasn't outside my duty to take a position in the sitting room, even if I'd never instructed anyone to do it before. Princess Bryony had made it clear she preferred a level of privacy and I was willing to give it to her, or at least grant her a good illusion of it.
Right now, I needed to know she was safe.
I stood in the heart of the room, my ear turned to her door, my eyes on the hall, my hand on my sword, and waited for dawn.
21
Wendell
Thao blinked smugly at me as Bryony dug her fingers into his thick fur, scratching behind his massive ear as she lounged against his ribs. Golden eyes met mine, and breath puffed through his giant nose, whiskers twitching and tail thumping against the grass.
I was jealous…again. And this time, the reason was a little less clear. I was jealous of the way Bryony was cuddled up against Thao, irritated that she seemed so comfortable doing so while he was a tiger when she never had been in his human form. I was even more jealous not to be in my tiger form with Bryony curled up against me. I had softer fur than Thao. Fluffier too. She'd bury her fingers in it, and I would purr for her.
"Oh, should I—" Bryony sat up, and Thao made an irritated but quiet growl at her movement as she looked between us. "I hadn't even thought."
I laughed and shook my head, digging my hand through my hair and tugging on the strands as I