Total pages in book: 215
Estimated words: 206625 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1033(@200wpm)___ 827(@250wpm)___ 689(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 206625 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1033(@200wpm)___ 827(@250wpm)___ 689(@300wpm)
“The fuck you will,” I mutter. There are only a dozen feet left to the outside of the citadel’s enormous walls. My left foot slips, and I wobble, but I only lose a heartbeat before I’m moving forward again. The fortress looms behind those thick battlements, carved into the mountain in an L-shaped formation of tall stone buildings, built to withstand fire, for obvious reasons. The walls that surround the citadel’s courtyard are ten feet thick and eight feet tall, with one opening—and I’m just. About. There.
I bite back a sob of relief as stone rises up on both sides of me.
“You think you’ll be safe in there?” Jack’s voice is harsh…and close.
Secure on both sides by the walls, I run the last ten feet, my heart pounding as adrenaline pushes my body to its max, and his footsteps charge behind me. He lunges for my pack and misses, his hand hitting my hip as we reach the edge. I hurtle forward, jumping the twelve inches off the elevated parapet down to the courtyard, where two riders wait.
Jack roars in frustration, and the sound grips my heaving chest like a vise.
Spinning, I rip a dagger from its sheath at my ribs just as Jack skids to a halt above me on the parapet, his breath choppy and his face ruddy. Murder is etched in his narrowed, glacial blue eyes as he glares down at me…and where the tip of my dagger now indents the fabric of his breeches—against his balls.
“I think. I’ll be safe. For right. Now,” I manage between ragged breaths, my muscles trembling but my hand more than steady.
“Will you?” Jack vibrates with rage, his thick blond brows slashing down over arctic blue eyes, every line of his monstrous frame leaning my way. But he doesn’t take another step.
“It is unlawful for a rider to cause another harm. While in a quadrant formation or in the supervisory. Presence of a superior-ranking cadet,” I recite from the Codex, my heartbeat still in my throat. “As it will diminish the efficacy of the wing. And given the crowd behind us, I think it’s clear to argue that it’s a formation. Article Three, Section—”
“I don’t give a shit!” He moves, but I hold my ground, and my dagger slices through the first layer of his breeches.
“I suggest you reconsider.” I adjust my stance just in case he doesn’t. “I might slip.”
“Name?” the rider next to me drawls, as if we’re the least interesting thing she’s seen today. I glance in her direction for a millisecond. She pushes the chin-length, fire-red strands of her hair behind her ear with one hand and holds the roll with the other, watching the scene play out. The three silver four-point stars embroidered on the shoulder of her cloak tell me she’s a third-year. “You’re pretty small for a rider, but it looks like you made it.”
“Violet Sorrengail,” I answer, but a hundred percent of my focus is on Jack again. The rain drips off the lowered ridge of his brow. “And before you ask, yes, I’m that Sorrengail.”
“Not surprised, with that maneuver,” the woman says, holding a pen like Mom uses over the roll.
It might be the nicest compliment I’ve ever been given.
“And what’s your name?” she asks again. Pretty sure she’s asking Jack, but I’m too busy studying my opponent to glance her way.
“Jack. Barlowe.” There’s no sinister little smile on his lips or playful taunts about how he’ll enjoy killing me now. There’s nothing but pure malice in his features, promising retribution.
A chill of apprehension lifts the hairs on my neck.
“Well, Jack,” the male rider on my right says slowly, scratching the trim lines of his dark goatee. He’s not wearing a cloak, and the rain soaks into the bevy of patches stitched into a worn leather jacket. “Cadet Sorrengail has you by the actual balls here, in more ways than one. She’s right. Regs state that there’s nothing but respect among riders at formation. You want to kill her, you’ll have to do it in the sparring ring or on your own time. That is, if she decides to let you off the parapet. Because technically, you’re not on the grounds yet, so you are not a cadet. She is.”
“And if I decide to snap her neck the second I step down?” Jack growls, and the look in his eyes says he’ll do it.
“Then you get to meet the dragons early,” the redhead answers, her tone bland. “We don’t wait for trials around here. We just execute.”
“What’s it going to be, Sorrengail?” the male rider asks. “You going to have Jack here start as a eunuch?”
Shit. What is it going to be? I can’t kill him, not at this angle, and slicing off his balls is only going to make him hate me more, if possible.