Baz’s demeanor sharpened. The commander was suddenly back. “Junot can never find out. Nor can Terencia. Our mate bond?—”
“No mate bond,” I interjected.
“Our mate bond is a secret. A take-it-to-the-Etherlands secret.”
“Shit, none of us are going there,” Lev said. “But point taken. To the Igneuslands it goes.”
I shook my head so hard my hair bounced all around my face and shoulders. “There’s no bond. No secret.” I tacked on, “Just enemies,” because I really needed the reminder, when I really shouldn’t have.
The Bazrians looked at me with resignation. Marina’s eyes were still so big they seemed at risk of rolling right out of their sockets.
“There’s no mate bond happening here,” I added.
As if I hadn’t spoken, Félix asked Baz, “Beyond protecting your secret bond to the death, what are your orders?”
Baz walked toward a dresser, withdrew one sword, then the other from the harness at his back, and set them down. He unsnapped the harness, then reached for a dagger at his hip.
“We have numerous problems to solve and missions to complete. Junot and Terencia are missing.”
As was the bothersome little tattletale, Cosette, but I wasn’t about to remind anybody about her.
“Good riddance,” Lev muttered under his breath, while everyone pretended not to hear him. Such sentiments were punishable by death in the empire, even for a soldier in Baz’s elite squadron.
“We won’t be able to keep the absence of the emperor and empress quiet for much longer,” Baz said. “Already, it’s shocking that more guards haven’t noticed.”
“Incompetent fucks,” Night grumbled.
“That they are,” Moncho said.
“Once the guards notice—” Baz said.
“If they notice,” Lev interjected.
“They’ll notice,” Baz said. “They do a decent job of protecting their charges. It’s just that my … Junot and Terencia wanted a diminished protective detail since the castle is so remote and it’s only supposed to be us here.”
Lev smiled peppily at me. “Along with their sworn enemy.”
Baz sighed. “She doesn’t know about our mate bond, but she knows Soravelle is back and very much not dead.”
Lev’s smile turned vicious. His fangs elongated to protrude from beneath his upper lip. “So it behooves us to have Terencia never return.”
Baz tipped his head Lev’s way but wouldn’t agree aloud. To do so would amount to indisputable treason. “Once the guards realize we’re dealing with actual disappearances, they’ll wonder why I haven’t deployed the small contingent I keep stationed on the island.”
“That lack of deployment in a search and rescue effort could likely be explained away by the castle’s temperament,” I said. “She did murder a bunch of drakes and drakesses, or whatever they were, assuming the blats were her doing. At the very least, she didn’t stop the blats, when she surely could have.” Was I joining in like I was part of the team? By the Ethers, it sure seemed like it. “You wouldn’t want to endanger soldiers’ lives by exposing them to the castle’s attacks without direct need.”
And how did I know this about the “merciless Razer,” who had kept me as his prisoner?
Baz scratched the stubble across his cheek; the Rillis rope danced between us. “That is true. Though if Rishaq is truly on his way, that complicates things. Rishaq is…”
“A spoiled brat of a prick?” Lev offered.
Another tip of Baz’s head. “Complicated.”
“And not particularly reasonable or level-headed.”
“Takes one to know one,” Zi chimed in.
Lev scowled at her. Affectionately, she bumped her hip against his, and Lev wrapped his arm around her shoulders. She leaned into him, wrinkling her nose at the dampness of his pants and long hair, but then leaned farther into him regardless.