Quill of Thieves

Chapter 20

It was hard to square his shoulders when his arms felt as limp as wet rice noodles.

Sebastian surveyed the length of the impossibly high doors before him. How could he possibly hype himself up in the shadow of those monstrosities? 

"You can do this," he hissed to himself. "For Abel."

A small cough from behind him sparked his already frayed nerves. "Are you speaking to yourself, sir?"

It was strange to be called a title so formal. Sebastian glanced at Melvin who stood guard just to the side of Queen Davina's doors. He was so motionless that Sebastian would have thought it had been a disembodied voice that had spoken. If he believed in such nonsense, that was.

And if Melvin didn't constantly seem to thrum with energy.

The carved words of the Scribal tongue weighed down on Sebastian from where they lay etched into the wooden beam above the doors. Then again, perhaps illusions such as invisible voices existed in a place such as this one.

"Sir?" 

"I'm only...thinking," Sebastian replied.

There was a brief pause. He felt a shiver work its way up his spine. Perhaps it had been a ghost.

"Out loud?" Melvin spoke once more.

Sebastian frowned at the motionless guard. "Yes."

Another beat of silence. "Was I meant to respond, sir?"

Sebastian sighed. "Not particularly."

How did Astrid stand being followed by guards every waking hour of her day? It was like having a third eye on the back of his head. One that he couldn't see out of but would undoubtedly receive a play-by-play of its wanderings. Sebastian swiped at the sweat dewing on the back of his neck.

He wasn't quite sure how much he trusted Astrid and this plan of hers for Abel. Part of him didn't doubt that this could have been one large ruse on Astrid's end to get him sent to the gallows before Queen Davina's tournament began. Winner by default. Somehow, he doubted Astrid would accept such a win. She would most likely find a gruesome way to reincarnate his body and fight his living corpse. Ugh. He really had no other options other than to trust her, which was very bleak, indeed. Sebastian lifted his shoulders.

"For Abel," he muttered again.

"Miss Venande seems a noble cause, sir."

Well now, Sebastian wondered if perhaps he had found the bloke responsible for Abel nettling her way into the fortress in the first place.

After all, she had claimed to have charmed aid from a young lapdog. 

He barely had time to raise an eyebrow at Melvin's declaration before the reddening guard used the hilt of his sword to rap into the heavy doors of Queen Davina's throne room.

The three echoing knocks clattered Sebastian's teeth.

"Command the room,"  Astrid had told him. "Act like the heroes in the books you read."

"Bash is already a hero," Abel had said.

"Yes, well, be the opposite of that kind of hero."

With that overwhelming confidence in mind, Sebastian trailed Melvin into the throne room.

Sebastian gasped and stumbled as something large and billowy sailed over his head. Melvin grabbed him around the elbow as if to pull him away from the unidentifiable assailant.

It was then that Astrid's haughty voice demanded throughout the room. "I will not be wearing that!"

She was standing to the left of Queen Davina's throne, her arms crossed across her chest, cheeks pink and hair a tangled fisherman's nest of a mess. Surprised to see her there during what was meant to be his private audience with the queen, Sebastian glanced back at the object that had narrowly missed smacking him in the face.