Page 12 of A Court of Masks and Roses (Royal Scout #1)

KALI

I groan awake the morning after my encounter with Wil and Trace, and wince as I sit up on Kal’s hard cot.

Trace made good on his threat to draw blood, but after years of Lord Gapral’s discipline, the welts and cuts Trace left are little more than an inconvenience.

Beyond my tiny window, dawn is breaking in red and orange hues that give the Eye of the Goddess an ethereal glow.

I stare out at the grounds, marking the routine of patrols, memorizing the keep’s daily pulse.

The distant bum ... bum ... of the temple bell calls devout women to the morning service, where Bishop Bahir and his disciples will instruct the Goddess’s daughters on their duty to produce offspring at any cost to mind or body.

Closer to me, trainees stumble into the courtyard with all the enthusiasm of bears waking from hibernation.

I shrug into my uniform and buckle a practice sword to my waist, hoping that Kal’s second day proves less exciting than his first. I’m just starting on the jacket buttons when the door to my tiny room bangs open .

My knives are in my hands in a heartbeat.

“Hello, Trouble,” says my guest, pushing a cascade of red-brown hair behind an ear, only to have the thick strands drape right back over his light-brown eyes.

“Hells, Luca.” I slip the weapons back into their sheaths and make a mental note to lock my door even when I’m inside. “Have you not heard of knocking?”

“Aye. It usually makes the same sound as the whack of your head against a wall. Lounge in bed a bit longer and you’ll feel that too. Have you recovered from your acquaintance with Trace?” His grin takes the sting out of the words, but my face heats regardless.

“If I never see that man again, it will be too soon.” I throw frigid water on my face and attack my teeth with a brushing stick. If Luca insists on gracing me with his presence this morning, he can entertain himself.

“Yes, about that...” Luca helps himself to an apple I’ve been saving.

I consider smacking him for it, but the guard gobbles it down like a starved wolf, and I decide I should be fortunate that he hasn’t eaten the shelf along with the fruit.

“If my information is correct, and it typically is when it comes to things that will royally annoy someone, it appears that His Royal Highness Prince William has requested that one Trainee Cassidy be assigned to his personal guard. Quite the honor.”

My hand freezes mid-brush.

“But—” Luca pauses to survey my gear. Black trousers, blue shirt, a thick leather vambrace that conceals real throwing knives beneath.

“But as neither the king nor the guard master, nor anyone else with any wits, believes that a trainee with four hours’ experience is the optimal watchdog for a crown prince, they came to a compromise designed to make everyone unhappy in one shot. ”

I turn to him slowly and scowl at his spreading grin. “I will throttle you if you don’t get to the point.”

Luca pulls my newly issued practice sword free of its sheath on my hip and uses his boot knife to roughen the grip. “Trace is your new sponsor.”

I choke on my tooth-cleaning powder. The man who tried to intimidate me into betraying someone’s trust is my new bloody sponsor ? The brushing stick in my hand snaps under the pressure. “No.”

“Well, we both are, but mostly Trace,” Luca continues as if I hadn’t spoken. “He’s in charge, as you may have gathered.”

“Cassidy.” The low bark comes from the door, now blocked with Trace’s frame. Rays of sunlight curl around his hair, giving him a soft glow that’s utterly at odds with the hard set of his jaw.

My quarters, lavish as they are, seem to have become a common room this morning.

“Training grounds,” Trace says, the sun returning to my room as he pushes himself back into the courtyard. “Five minutes.”

Luca winks and tosses my practice blade back into my hands. The grip, roughened beneath Luca’s blade, is more comfortable but only half-finished. “You’ll want to use one of the keep blades for now,” he says, following after Trace. “See you soon, cub. And bring a waterskin.”

Alone in my room, I take a moment to curse soundly before grabbing my gear and resigning myself to an unpleasant morning.

Trace and Luca are already working at the far end of the grassy training grounds when I jog out.

Moving past the herd of trainees lining up before the guard master, I feel their gazes searing my back.

Getting an assignment and sponsors only one day after arrival is unlikely to make me many friends—not that I am looking for any.

Not that these sponsors—one sponsor in particular—are envy worthy.

Trotting up, I find Luca in the middle of an abdominal exercise, swinging his upper body between the ground and his bent knees while Trace braces his feet. Right. Of course Trace has chosen something to irritate my back, lest I forget who holds the power in this new setup.

“Two hundred two, two hundred three,” Trace counts for Luca. “Two hundred four.”

I sit on the ground beside Luca, the dampness of the earth seeping through my clothes as the smell of fresh-cut grass rises around me. I wonder if Trace expects me to balk or complain, and if he’ll be disappointed when I don’t.

“Two hundred twenty,” Trace counts to Luca’s unwavering rhythm. “Two hundred twenty-one.”

Maybe he doesn’t care either way. Crossing my arms over my chest in imitation of Luca, I bend my knees and start lowering my shoulders to the ground. At least Trace chose grass. Lord Gapral would have had me on gravel.

“Halt.” Trace’s large, calloused palm braces the back of my head before my back hits the earth. “You already made your point yesterday. We meant to finish these before you came.”

I pull away from Trace and rise to my feet, an unsettling shiver running down my skin.

“To be clear,” Trace hefts his practice sword into his hand and motions for me to choose one off a nearby rack, brought out for morning training, “this arrangement is not a partnership. You will accompany Luca and me on select assignments with Prince William. I will be your trainer, your evaluator, and your commander. Understood?”

I nod mutely and move to select a wooden blade from the arsenal of offerings.

I will always prefer my knives but can manage a sword without stabbing my own foot.

No one would expect much more from Kal, but having seen Trace spar, I little wish to make a fool of myself.

My fingers trail the wood in search of something light, easy to handle, and—

I freeze mid-motion. There is someone behind me, reaching for me, for my back.

My chest tightens, my fingers grasping the nearest blade.

The sun, the fresh-cut grass, the green training grounds filled with uniformed boys, they all blur into a sudden nothing.

My body uncoils like a whip, the blade an extension of my hips and arm.

The wooden practice sword flies free of the rack, arcing and snapping down at my assailant.

Trace’s blade intercepts mine, stopping me a hair short of fracturing Luca’s wrist. The crack of wood on wood echoes through the yard, turning heads.

“Holy bloody stars, Kal.” Luca withdraws his hand slowly, his tawny eyes wide. “I was just going to wish you luck.”

“Don’t. Touch. Me.” The words escape before I can stop them, my chest heaving with my racing pulse. The confusion in Luca’s face demands an explanation, but the truth—that my upbringing wasn’t one where people patted shoulders for luck—would raise more questions than it satisfied. Hells.

I force a rueful half smile to my face, as if nothing of significance has happened. “Forgive me, Luca. My back is bothering me this morning.”

The two men exchange silent glances. Trace tilts his head.

Luca shrugs. “I’ve something to attend to,” he says, saluting us both with his practice blade before swaggering off to provoke a nearby guard into a sparring bout. If being assaulted and dismissed bothers Luca, the man lets none of it show as his natural grace morphs into a deadly dance of blades.

“You lied to him,” Trace says .

I turn, raising my palms in shameless innocence. I may owe Luca an apology, but Trace has nothing to do with this. “Not at all. My back hurts. Would you like to see the marks?”

Trace’s lips press together into a line. “No.”

I bring my blade to ready guard. “Then I’m at your command, sir.”

Trace obligingly salutes and swings his sword at my skull.

I’ve seen enough of his fighting skills to know he could splatter my brains across the grass anytime he wishes, so the only reason I manage to block the assault is that he allows me to do so.

I’ve enough wits to angle the blade, letting his attack slide off my parry instead of pitting my muscle against Trace’s.

His next blow targets my sword arm. Then the right hip.

The knees. A full circle around my body to probe my skill, which falls several measures below his and Luca’s but is at least more solid than what I note of the other trainees.

Trace nods and quickens the pace, the smell of fresh grass now giving way to salt and sweat.

The tip of my blade ducks down to defend my legs.

Right, left, right. My wrist protests the harsh angle that low parries require but moves in reflexive obedience to the attacks.

My pulse and lungs quicken and steady, fueling my body, and I savor every caress of cool wind.

Right. Left. High. Low. Step. Pivot. Lunge.

Within a bell’s time, it’s hard to be angry or annoyed or do anything but just be .

The practice blades find a rhythm, beating like a metronome in a forever-even song of Trace’s choosing.

If this is what sword practice can be like, I understand why so many prefer the weapon.

Another bell. Another hour. My muscles burn; my shirt clings to my body. My breath comes in short bursts.

And of course, this is when Trace decides to speak. “Yesterday,” he feints a blow to my head, switches mid-arch, and slices at my left flank instead, “I was asking for nothing but the truth.”

I snort. “You knew the truth.” I block the left attack, but it’s a close call.

“You were asking... that I turn in... someone else... to save my own hide.” The words come in hard-won bursts, and I’m unsure why I feel the need to justify myself to Trace at all.

The hilt of my sword drops too far and Trace’s next blow cuts through the weakly posed blade.

He raps my side lightly, but my flesh is sore and I wince.

Hooking the underside of my wrist with his sword tip, Trace expertly guides my hand back into proper position. His eyes are distant and he says nothing while he repeats the attack I failed to parry earlier, his movements crisp and practiced. “How old are you?”

Almost eighteen. But Trace is asking Kal, not me. “Sixteen,” I pant between moves.

Trace’s hand tightens on his sword, the knuckles bone white, but he doesn’t speak.

“Would something be different . . . if I were fifteen . . . or seventeen?”

“No.” Trace pulls his next attack mid-blow and sheathes his blade. “That’s enough for today. You are free until tomorrow morning.”

I blink once, then brace my hands on my thighs, my mind scurrying to catch up with what just happened, what the importance of Kal’s age might be. I don’t ask. The less I talk, the less opportunity I have to say something stupid.

Reaching into a satchel on the ground, Trace tosses a tin into my hands.

I open the lid and take a careful sniff. The tang of willow bark, mixed with a few leaves I vaguely recognize, tickles my nose. An analgesic salve to soothe shallow cuts and deep bruises .

“It will take the edge off,” says Trace, his attention on his own gear.

It likely will, but in my world, there is no such thing as a free gift. Closing the tin, I toss it back to Trace. “I have my own.” With a half bow, I store my practice weapon and walk away to spend some time in the trees, watching the palace’s back entrance for anything interesting.