Page 180 of Death of a Mortal

“Noxie? Where are you now?”

“Movingslowly through the halls toward the throne room. Hang tight, I should be there soon.”

“He’s almost there. He’ll tell me when he is.”

Drayce nodded.

“What’s our story as to why we’re petitioning the king? In case we get asked, we should have a solid story,” I said.

Everyone looked to Drayce before he responded. “So long as Sevrin’s glamour holds, it can be anything we want. Taxes are too high, the mortals aren’t behaving, our gold isn’t shiny enough.”

This earned him a few chuckles and an elbow to the side from me.

“I can see the end of the line, but there are a lot of guards monitoring. So far, I haven’t seen them interact with anyone in line, but let me watch for a minute.”

I relayed the information to the group, and Drayce’s face quickly reset to stern and determined.

“I vote we go with the mortals-acting-up story, if anyone asks. It’ll be believable, and the guards will sympathize with us, less likely to ask too many questions,” said Bramick.

“Everyone getting in line is coming in the side entrance of the castle from the courtyard where you…”

“Almost had my head cut off?”

“Yeah…”

“Okay, well, at least I know how to get there from here.”

“It’s a long walk from there to the throne room, but the line is short. I’d go now if I were you.”

“Okay, keep an eye out for us.”

I told Drayce what Noxie had relayed, and we all nodded our approval when Drayce said it was time to go.

Kellan told his final soldier to stay here in the servants’ corridors and send as many mortals as he could on the path back to the chamber closet. Any that wanted freedom, he said.

I tried to shake the nagging feelings off as I led our crew to where I’d exited the corridor that day, blocking out the memory. Weclimbed the stairs that would lead us to the hallway just off the grand staircase. Once we stepped through this last door and into the castle halls, there was no turning back. Either Caedryn died, or we did.

Drayce hesitated with his hand on the door handle, seemingly thinking the same thing as me. “Ready, Sevrin?” he asked.

Sevrin looked shaky but nodded, the tingling sensation spreading over me once again with his glamour magic.

With a last look over his shoulder at us all, Drayce said, “For Keryth,” and then opened the door, bright light spilling in.

We quickly exited the corridor and went right as instructed by Noxie. With the glamour magic, we were a mix of well-dressed males and females, looking every bit the part of snooty nobles from Dolvenar in our varying shades of green and gold, and angles of upturned noses. I had to hand it to Sevrin. None of this would have worked without him. We just had to hope he could hold on long enough for us to get to the throne room and seal the doors.

Noxie guided us through the hallways until we arrived at the back of the line. There looked to be about fifteen fae in front of us. Worse, though, were the dozen guards with their sharp swords walking up and down the line, observing but, as Noxie had said, not interacting.

I put on my best smug and entitled face and looked to Sevrin, now a tall and young brown-haired male, to find another bead of sweat rolling down his brow.

Despite our glamour, I felt as though, somehow, the castle knew I was here, like I was heading deeper into its eagerly waiting clutches. I tried to convince myself it was lingering feelings from my last day here that was causing my paranoia.

“Random thought,”I said. “You said the name Noxie justcameto you when you saw me?”

“Yep,”he said.

“Like you didn’t have a name before you became my Familiar?”

“Correct.”