prowling shadows. It was full night now, the only light the lanterns that hung along the walls below.
“We’re not?” Elliot asked dubiously.
“Nope. Just listening,” she said, reaching the apex of the roof. There she stopped, seeming to get her bearings.
“To stuff we’re not supposed to,” he pressed, catching his breath as he joined her.
Sparrow turned to face him. “Exactly,” she said, smiling brightly before turning and making slower progress down the other side of the sloping roof.
“So, spying,” Elliot muttered.
They’d already had several variations of this argument, but no matter what he said, Sparrow refused to budge, insisting she was going to make the climb anyway. Elliot didn’t know how to just let her go while she did something so dangerous—she was blind, after all—so he followed her, though now that he’d done the thing, he was quite certain she hadn’t needed his help in the slightest. Except for the spying, of course. She’d said he “might” make a useful assistant since he had “working peepers,” and that had made Elliot smirk just long enough to realize he was in it, whatever the outcome.
As they neared the edge of the roof, Elliot reached out instinctively, gripping Sparrow’s arm as they crept toward the drop. Voices rose from somewhere below, and he guessed they were perched directly above the commander’s window.
Fear, sudden and fierce, rooted him to the spot. The air froze in his lungs. What was he doing? If he was seen, if somebody caught him… Elliot didn’t care about himself, about destroying his chances of ever being a Rider again—though the thought of what that would mean for Jax made his heart lurch painfully. The only thing that mattered to him was his sister. And if Elliot angered the commander… maybe he’d decide her rescue wasn’t worth the effort. Or worse, maybe he’d think Elliot deserved it for defying him once again.
“Sparrow,” he whispered faintly, his lungs still arrested in his chest. “I can’t be here. I can’t—” He clamped his mouth shut as a single voice separated from the general murmur.
“…looks like we’ll need to adjust morning patrol?” That was Fallon, the second patrol leader.
“Indeed,” said another voice—the commander’s familiar, steady intonation. “All three of us will need to attend the audition.”
Audition? Elliot frowned, leaning closer, despite his recent apprehension. Next to him Sparrow was motionless, but he knew she listened as closely as he did.
“Right—Darius can take point,” Fallon answered, and there was a soft scrape of chair legs, as if he were pushing back from the table and getting to his feet. “I’ll make the arrangements now, if we’re all finished here?”
“We are,” said the commander. There were murmured goodbyes, along with scuffing boots, clinking glasses, and the whisper of loose papers.
Elliot was secretly relieved. The meeting was over; it was time to get out of there. He crouched, preparing to stalk away, when Sparrow found the edge of his tunic and tugged him back down.
“Not done,” she whispered, so softly he had to squint at her mouth in the darkness to catch her words. Not done?
A door shut in the room below. There were several moments of silence in which Elliot was certain they’d all left, but then Beryk’s measured voice floated out into the night.
“I think you should reconsider, Cassian.”
“What—telling Tristan? You know he can’t be involved in this.” Elliot leaned forward. The commander was keeping things from Tristan? Not only was he Tristan’s father, but Tristan was a patrol leader.
“Not just Tristan. All of it. The risks—”
“—will be well worth it, Beryk, if my plan succeeds.”
“That is a large if, Cassian,” Beryk said, his tone steady. “It is just as likely to fail.”
“It won’t.”
Elliot had never heard such steel in the commander’s voice. He was always a strong-minded, self-assured man. Poised, powerful, and in control. But this… There was a dangerous edge to his voice, a coldness, that brought to mind the blade of a knife. And when you walked that line… one slip was all it took.
“What next, then, Commander?” Beryk asked briskly, all his dire warnings forgotten.
There was a soft squeaking sound like a drawer being opened and shut again, then more shuffling papers.
“There are nearly fifty members of the Grand Council, and it’s safe to say these”—a stack of papers thwapped onto the table—“are sympathetic to Lord Rolan, while these”—another rustle of pages—“are supportive of animages, Pyra, and the Phoenix Rider cause.”
The Grand Council? Elliot had heard about the ruling body in the empire and knew they met very sparingly—and