Alex Lidell - The Cadet of Tildor

A snort from behind got his attention. Kye had stopped frolicking and now pawed the ground, ready for battle. Savoy knotted Lava’s reins and sent the gelding toward the stable before vaulting into Kye’s saddle and, heedless of the setting sun, kicked him into a gallop.

Lightning ripped through the early autumn sky, startling clouds into a downpour. Alec snatched the half-finished mapping assignment from Renee’s hands and tucked it into his tunic. “Figures.”

Renee shielded her face. “We can still memorize the pace count.” Daylight had dimmed behind the clouds, and night approached swiftly through the rain.

Alec took her shoulders and turned them toward the main Academy grounds. “We’ll finish it tomorrow. It isn’t as if either of us has Queen’s Day plans.” He sighed. “That’s it, isn’t it. That’s what’s spurring today’s masochism?”

Renee shrugged. Queen’s Day was for family, and even the Academy suspended classes to welcome parents onto its grounds. Not Lord Tamath de Winter, of course, but he had been absent for three years anyway. It was for the better. She didn’t need Savoy informing her lord father that all the failures he assigned to his daughter were, in fact, accurate. And her mother . . .

Alec squeezed her arm. His own family never came to Queen’s Day, his grandmother being too old for the trip and his mother estranged since his birth. The situation seemed to bother him little, however, as, poking her shoulder, Alec offered up his miracle solution to most of life’s issues. “Let’s eat.”

Despite having rolled her eyes, Renee found that a bowl of hot porridge did improve her spirits, enough even that after returning to her room and hanging damp clothes up to dry, she could ask Sasha’s plans without fighting a hitch in her own voice.

“Palace.” Sasha, who saw no reason to pull her nose out of the thick volume weighing down her desk, traced her finger down the page. “I’m going to tell Lys he’s an idiot.”

“Some Servant you are.”

“As a Servant, I enforce his laws.” Sasha tapped a line and picked up a pen. “As his cousin, I tell him he’s an idiot. And tomorrow, I’m his cousin.” She scratched out a note and looked up, her face flushed. “Do you know what he did when the Vipers burned down that registration post? He denied audience to the Madam’s emissary and turned the arrest decrees into death warrants. That’s . . . that’s like lighting a match in a barn full of straw, Renee! Walks around like a rooster now, saying he won’t bow his head to criminals.”

The liberties Sasha took in discussing the Crown, though only in private, made Renee blanch even after years of exposure. “My father pays the Family to leave his wagons alone,” Renee offered. “The price grows each year. You think that’s better?” She fell back on her bed.

“Victory in war does not come from fighting battles. It comes from winning them.” Sasha tapped her book. “Lys’s just fighting. And you think that’s great because you like the cause. And I think the Crown is about to get a bloody nose or worse!” She paused for breath and blinked, rubbing her forehead. “Speaking of tomorrow, I near forgot to ask . . . Would you be my Queen’s Day dinner bodyguard?”

Renee raised her brows. The Palace Guard was responsible for palace security and hated outside interference, especially from the military. “The Palace Guard will never permit it.” She could already see Fisker’s face darken at seeing a cadet interfere with his work. “And why bodyguards at a family dinner to begin with?”

“A compromise. With the recent unrest, the guard captain wanted extra palace security in the dining room and Lys didn’t. They finally agreed that Fisker’s team will remain outside and each guest will choose his own bodyguard to bring inside. I asked that you be mine. If you don’t mind, of course—”

Renee vaulted up to hug her friend, not bothering to muffle a cry of glee. She was going on her first field assignment. In the palace . With the Crown himself in attendance. “Do you know who will stand behind King Lysian?” she asked upon reclaiming some semblance of dignity.

“Last I heard . . . ” Sasha made a show of rubbing her lip in thought. “Who was it? Oh. Right. Servant Commander Korish Savoy.” She smiled. “He wanted you to come see him tomorrow. You two are the only ones coming from the Academy.”

“The only ones?” Renee echoed, licking her lips. The only ones. Just her and the commander of the Seventh.

Excitement roused Renee from bed before dawn the next morning. Her sword, sharpened and polished, hung on her hip. She ran her hand over the pommel, engraved with the crest of the de Winter estate. The sword had been intended for her brother, but Lord Tamath had gifted it to her back when he believed her capable of graduating, when he thought she’d grow as strong as Riley had once promised to be.

Still, it was her blade now, and together they were heading to their first real mission. Renee smiled. Her uniform was pressed. Her boots polished. And, despite her stomach’s rebellion at the thought of food, she was ready. She was not, however, suicidal, and thus confined herself to loitering outside Savoy’s quarters instead of waking him.

She was still there when a whirlwind of a boy in a nightshirt raced through the corridor and vaulted past her into the room.

“Korish!” Diam’s voice escaped into the hallway. “Korish! There’s someone under my bed.”

A pause. Renee held her breath.

The bed creaked. “Go kill it,” said Savoy.

“I don’t wanna kill anyone.”

A sigh. “Ask de Winter to do it. She clearly has no better activity for this hour of the morning. Guarding my room notwithstanding.”

Her cheeks heated. Taking the comment for invitation, Renee edged her way inside. With the furniture back in place, the quarters looked almost normal, except for the small boy curled at Savoy’s side.

“There’s somebody under my bed,” Diam informed Renee gravely, then turned back to his brother. “A page said Mother and Father couldn’t come today ’cause mercenaries aren’t allowed.”

Mercenaries? Renee kept her face still. Soldiers for hire held little reputation for honor.

“Horse shit.” Savoy spoke to his brother but looked at her, daring a comment. When she made none, he extracted himself from the bed and tossed a blanket over Diam’s head. “They don’t come because they have a contract in the west, at the Devmani border, guarding a merchant caravan from unwelcome neighbors.”

“Why?” The wool muffled the question.

“Because a new king is an appetizing target.” He turned to Renee and sighed. “You’re attending this evening’s farce with me, aren’t you? All right. One—eat. Two—it’s Queen’s Day dinner. Early is good, this early is ridiculous. The day is yours until the second afternoon bell. I will meet you by the practice courts then. Three”—he pointed to a weapon standing beside his—“you will carry that blade and not the club you’ve strapped to your hip.”

Her heart sank. It was a junior sword, the kind carried by young cadets not strong enough to wield the real thing.

Half an hour before the appointed time, Renee pulled herself up on a practice court fence to await Savoy, who still spoke with parents and students. It was odd to hear his voice blending with dozens of others. Usually, when Savoy spoke, no one else did.

She stood to stretch her shoulders and froze. Walking beside two well-dressed nobles was her father. His gaze passed through her as if she were fog. She waited a few moments, but the group continued toward the main courtyard, quickly leaving the practice courts—and her—behind.