Threads of Emerald

Threads of Treachery: Chapter 19

The chiming of the clock from the slender tower across the square jolted me from sleep. The rhyme of its ancient chime causing birds to violently scurry from the trees as the flapping of wings sounded through the air.

Groggily making my way over to the window, I squinted to see what time it was. The hand pointed to four.

Shit.

Shit.

Shit.

I'd slept through the last two chimes of the bell. I pulled on the supple black leather boots and ran out of the room, not quite sure where I was going.

If I'd thought the Palace was a maze of corridors, this was an impossible fortress. The familiar darkness that clung to the walls and went stale in the air made it almost impossible to spy any light filtering from the rooms.

The deep voice of Orion as he cleared his throat drifted to where I was stood in the corridor, as Theo's had at breakfast that day. Following the deep notes of his voice, I finally rounded a corner and saw the deep wood table that sat under a chandelier in the centre of the room.

Or rooms, I should say. Pillars the size of tree trunks shielded my view slightly of where Orion sat at the head of the table. Archways of stone, held by the pillars, separated the room from the swathes of stone that formed the corridor leading into it.

The sounding of leather against the rocky floor told of my arrival before I strode through the archway on the right.

"Seraphina, I thought you'd decided to leave", Orion sat with the same leather clothes he'd worn before, the small beads of sweat no longer clung to his skin. His eyes still had that familiar haunted gleam as I took the seat next to him.

"Sorry, I slept through most of the afternoon", my messy hair and dead eyes probably gave as much away I thought as I tucked into the food on my plate. Succulent pig and potatoes and vegetables carefully placed on my plate from the platters on various wooden boards in the middle of the table.

"I wish I could have slept", he cut into the pig shining with juices, "I had lots of meetings with merchants about how to make these new trade agreements with the Diamond Kingdom work."

As he said that, footsteps sounded in the corridor I'd just stood in.

Wren strode in, taking the chair opposite from me and not so elegantly piling legs of lamb crusted with mint and spooning those deliciously salted potatoes onto his plate.

"Ah, those trade meetings", Wren smirked, shredding the leg of lamb apart into thin strips of meat and shovelling them into his mouth. Wren was handsome, I couldn't deny that. But there was something that didn't feel right about him, the predatory gleam in his eyes as he surveyed me as I cut up the meat and ate a few bites.

"You're apart of them?", I asked as I stopped the fork middair, "I thought you were the head of security".

Wren shifted slightly in his seat, his eyes watching as Orion leant back in his chair and swigged on the red liquid in his cup.

"Wren sits in all of my meetings, specifically the trade ones. Merchants and pirates tend to get a little angry if they don't get their own way", I almost spat out the potato I was swallowing.

"Pirates? What do you mean? I thought they only existed in fairytales", that earned a laugh from Wren. A bit of honey returning to Orion's eyes as his throat bobbed as he swallowed some of the potato he too had shoved in his mouth.

"Have you not heard of Setyn Hollos?", disbelief crossed his face for a second but was quickly replaced by an intrigued look as he set his utensils down with a clang.