Page 75 of Accomplice to the Villain

That feeling wasn’t improved when Lord Fowler called to them like they were all dear friends who’d arrived there of their own free will. “Now, everyone! We have only an hour until the dinner party, and I’ve taken the liberty of having outfits prepared for all of you!” Fowler smiled, clapping Trystan on the shoulder. “It’s themed, you see.”

“Lovely,” he seethed, taking a step toward the rogue, but Sage moved between them, wrapping her arm through Fowler’s.

Trystan’s jaw clamped closed so tightly it may have cracked a tooth.

“Lead the way, Lord Fowler. I do so love a theme. Perhaps on the way, you might give me a tour? I’d be very interested to see the wand up close.” Her eyes met Trystan’s for the briefest of moments before she looked away.

Fowler led her through the open library doors, and Trystan stared after them, gobsmacked and feeling out of his depth.

An elderly man who Trystan knew to be Fowler’s tried-and-true butler stepped through the open balcony doors. “Follow me, young ladies and—” The butler paused. Having met Trystan only once, the old man clearly didn’t have a very good impression of him.

Entirely possible, as the only time Trystan was here, he threw a chair out the window. In his defense, it had tried talking to him.

The magic in Fowler’s residence was an ambiguity that Trystan did not and could not tolerate.

“Lead the way, Jester. I’m hungry and desire a comfy chair in which to rest,” Trystan gritted out.

The butler winced, and Trystan took morbid satisfaction in it.

They all entered the house. To attend a fucking dinner party, with conversation and—Trystan shuddered—socializing.

It would surely end in murder.

The question was…whose?

Chapter 41

Gideon

Gideon was suspicious.

Of people, of long-lasting friendships, of how others often thought women more emotional than men when Gideon had watched Keeley calmly look death in the eye while the king he’d served for ten years sprinted from it like his ass was on fire.

Keeley would never run like her ass was on fire.

Good going, Gideon. Now you’re thinking about her ass.

It didn’t help that he had a perfect view of it as he snuck quietly after the Malevolent Guard on the north road to the abandoned tunnels into the Gleaming Palace, trying to keep a healthy distance as he followed the fearless women and men down the path to their possible demise.

How many times had he made this march for King Benedict? How many times had he hated himself for it, for unquestioningly following a man he knew was a monster because he was too afraid of what he’d return to if he went back to his family?

But this band of soldiers was nothing like the Valiant Guard. They were acting not out of fear but out of loyalty. Without even realizing it, The Villain had created a cause that all his workers were willing to fight for, just because they believed in it, in him. It was exactly what Benedict had preached his men were to the public. It reminded Gideon that the world should always be wary of a king who boasts and instead pay attention to the misfits and outcasts. They usually had far more important things to say yet far less opportunity to say them.

“Sir knight!” a voice hissed before a force hit the back of his legs and knocked him flat on his stomach. Hands wrapped around his ankles and dragged him into the bushes, a canopy of trees above them. “What are you doing? Have you lost your mind?” Keeley spoke in whispers, but he was close enough to hear the venom in them. Amazing. Gideon didn’t know how she managed such a thing when speaking at such a quiet volume.

“Not yet, but the night is young!” Gideon grinned, then groaned when Keeley punched her steel fist into his shoulder. Rubbing it, he sat up and brought himself onto his knees. “I take it you’re not happy to see me.”

She flicked him on the shoulder and hissed, “I told you that you weren’t to come. I said to stay put, and instead you follow us on our recon mission? If one of the others had seen you, they would’ve shot you on instinct.”

Gideon put a hand to his heart, mock-touched. “Are you saying thatyourfirst instinctisn’tto shoot me?”

It was too dark to see for sure, but he hoped he had made her cheeks take on that lovely rosy flush that made him stare at the wall for a little while afterward. But there were no walls about, so he was left to stare right at her.

“I really hate you,” she said, sounding more irritated than actually angry.

“I think youwishyou did,” Gideon supplied helpfully and threw up his hands when her fist swung back again. “All right, I surrender! I was upset at being left behind when this is the one way I can help my sisters.”

Keeley bent to stand, reaching a hand down for Gideon and surprising the deadlands out of him. He took it cautiously, checking under her wrist and over it. “What are you doing, sir knight?”