Page 64 of Boundless

What else was there to do, anyway?

“You’ve been busy,” Jasewine said, eyeing the shadows on the marble floor as I slowly coaxed them off, and pushed them toward the walls so that the room could swallow them. Or keep them—I didn’t mind. “I’m glad it finally worked.”

I looked up at Jasewine again. “It did,” I said, just to test what she actually meant.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that,Your Highness.” A mischievous little grin, like she knew exactly how much I hated those words. “I’ve been spying on you. And don’t beat yourself up over it—I’m just better than you at this place. Better than Aunt Raja. Not that she would ever admit it.”

Straightening up against the stair, I turned to face her better. “You’ve been spying on me.”

“Well, you make it easy. Father made it easy, too. Keeping all these shadows here”—she waved a hand around the room—“how are you going to know which is yours and which is mine?”

“You have shadows in the throne room?” I said because that was…kind of smart.

“I do. It takes up energy, but you don’t allow soldiers in here I could have pleasing me in bed—andgiving me information. So, I have to make do with what I have.” She shrugged.

There was something about her.

She dragged herself a little closer. “The point is that you broke the banishment of the mortal you’ve been obsessing over. And I’m here to offer you a helping hand.”

“Hold on,” I said, raising a finger. “How could you have your shadows here when I specifically asked the throne room to keep away any magic that tries to harm me?”

“But I never did,” Jasewine said. “I never planned to harm you—on the contrary. And me and this palace have history.” She sat up straighter and brought her hands in front of her feet,pattedthe floor as if it were her pet. “It knows me.”

The palace knew her. Allowed her to hide shadows in the room with me.

I didn’t know whether to be impressed or pissed off. I didn’t know whether that meant I couldn’t trust this very palace that was supposed to be under my rule at all.

“You’ve broken the banishment, and you seem okay,” Jasewine said. “I know you can’t leave the palace just yet, and that is whyI’mhere.”

Hope was such an incredible thing, able to materialize out of nowhere, all at once. I watched her lips, expected her to tell me that she knew of a way to get me out of here, since she and the palacehad history,apparently, but…

“I’m going to go out there myself, find the Aetherway, and bring that woman back to you.”

My heart skipped a beat.

I wanted to sayyesso badly.

“No.” And I finally stood up.

Jasewine followed me to the dining table where my jacket hung on the back of a chair.

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t trust you.” And she couldn’t have known much about Nilah if all she heard was the conversations Raja and I had in the throne room.

But then those times when I invited the seer, as well…I flinched.

“Why do you think I’m here, asking you to let me sacrifice myself for a stranger? Amortal?”

If she only knew…

I put the jacket on and turned to her. She was shorter than me by half a head, and the look in her eyes was fierce. The magic radiating from her body was not weak, either.

In fact, it wasmuchstronger than I expected.

“Because you want toearn my trust?”

I knew she got the sarcasm in my voice. She just chose to ignore it.