Page 44 of By the Horns (Royal Artifactual Guild #2)

Thirty-Three

Gwenna

Spending time with my friends is just what I needed.

Sparrow fusses over me the moment she sees I’m crying and leads me to the kitchen.

My tears dry almost immediately because I hate feeling sorry for myself.

Sparrow makes me sit at the table and pours me some hot tea and then begins to cut up some bread and cheese to make a snack tray.

Poor thing is terrible at it, hacking at the cheese as best she can, but it’s sweet of her to try and so I don’t criticize.

“Tell me everything that’s been going on,” Sparrow insists, sawing at a block of cheese with what must be the dullest knife in all of creation.

Before I can launch into my tale of woe, a cat jumps onto my lap.

It’s Squeaker, her fat orange cat from home.

Squeaker made the trek from Honori Hold to Vastwarren City with us, and it feels as if she’s arrived to comfort me as well.

“Well, hello there,” I coo to the cat, letting her make biscuits on my thighs before she settles onto my lap.

I stroke her fur and immediately tufts of it float into the air.

Sparrow fans the cat hair away from the cheese, and discreetly moves the plate a bit farther away so I can continue to pet the cat.

I scratch at Squeaker’s ears, listening to her contented purring as Sparrow cusses at the cheese that’s fighting her.

Lark and Mereden show up before I get far into my story, and then we’re all hugging, with Squeaker making protesting sounds (but not getting off my lap).

Lark drapes herself around my neck, snuggling me as if she hasn’t seen me in ages, and the tears threaten once more.

“Are you loving being a fledgling again? I’m so stinking jealous! ”

It makes me want to burst into fresh tears. “Actually, no. It’s a mucking nightmare.”

“Is someone being mean to you?” Mereden asks, offense bristling through her sweet, gentle voice. It’s almost comical to think that pleasant and easygoing Mereden is determined to defend me.

“Worse. I’m being set up.”

Lark hobbles over to the far side of the table, grabs the cheese plate for herself, and gestures that I should keep talking. “Tell us everything.”

So I tell them everything. Well, most everything.

I don’t tell them about Raptor, because I don’t know how things are between us and I don’t feel like having my friends hash it out.

Instead, I tell them all about someone dropping an artifact into my bag to frame me and then the subsequent search of Master Jay’s nest. I tell them about the message scrawled in the books, and how the others are staking out the library to see if they can catch whoever it is.

“Why do you think they’re targeting you?” Mereden asks, worried. She steals a piece of cheese from Lark’s plate, her gaze locked on me.

“Gotta be the tits,” Lark chimes in.

Sparrow hesitates. “Truly, it can’t be just that…can it?”

“What else could it be?” Mereden asks.

I glance over at Sparrow. I’m thinking what she is—that someone might have it out for me because of my mancer ability. Is it safe to share my secret with them? She shrugs, leaving it up to me.

Do I trust Mereden and Lark with my secret…and my life? Because I’ll be killed if it gets out.

I look at my friends’ worried, earnest faces.

I haven’t even told my mother about my ability because I’m afraid to write it down.

Blurting it aloud feels terrifying. The only reason that Sparrow knows about what I can do is because of the situation with the corpses last year.

Otherwise, I’d have kept it a dirty secret, known only to me. “I…”

The words don’t come out.

“You don’t have to say anything,” Mereden reassures me. “We’re your friends all the same.”

“Are you in trouble of some kind?” Lark pushes her fist against her flat palm. “Do I need to bust heads?”

“No one’s busting anyone’s head,” Sparrow frets, even as another cat jumps on the table. This one’s a tabby, and she gives it a quick pet before pulling it off. “Not now, Buttons.”

Mereden points a badly cut wedge of cheese at me. “Is this about your dowsing?”

I go still.

“You think?” Lark mulls the idea. “It didn’t work for anyone else. Heck, it didn’t even work for us. It kept pointing us right at dead guys. You…”

Her eyes widen.

Mereden gasps.

“That’s the problem,” I whisper, hugging Squeaker tight even as cat hair wafts into the air around me. “I think I might be a mancer. Worse, I think someone else knows that, too.”