Page 25 of Throne of Ice and Blood
“It’s, uhm…” Surprise flits across Kath’s face as she stops with her hand on the back of the empty chair and turns back to face me. “Father Almighty, I never even asked your name, did I?”
“Selena,” I reply while carefully eyeing the empty chair. “My name is Selena.”
“Selena,” Kath echoes, and sweeps a hand towards me as if she is introducing me to the others. “This is Selena.” Then she points towards the blond man seated at the table, who has been silent this whole time. “And this is Peter.” She moves her hand to the woman with chin-length black hair and brown eyes seated next to him. “And Ami.” Then she finally nods to the redhead. “And the suspicious one over there is my little brother Kyler.”
“Hello,” I say. It comes out sounding so awkward that I have to stifle a cringe.
Kyler just turns to his sister. “I’m still waiting for the part where you explain why you have brought a stranger here.”
“Right.” Kath shifts her gaze to me and then motions at the hood of my cloak. “Selena, would you mind…?”
I push my hood down.
Peter gasps. Ami jerks back and blinks in shock. And Kyler’s mouth drops open.
“Yep,” Kath says cheerfully, and then finally plops down on the empty chair she pulled out earlier. “That’s why.”
While I claim another empty seat at the table, Kath explains who I am.
“How do you even know that we can trust her?” Kyler says once she’s finished. He cuts me an unapologetic look. “No offense.”
“Dad said she saved Jerry from a shifter patrol,” Kath replies.
The moment she begins that sentence, I pretend that my cloak has gotten caught under the leg of the chair and bend down while twisting to the side as if to fix it. So once the final word has left her mouth, I have already summoned my magic while they can’t see my eyes. I shove it at the small sparks of trust that have appeared in their chests following Kath’s declaration. With a firm push, I blow those sparks into large steady flames. Then, I release my magic and straighten again.
It did the trick. No distrust shines on their faces when they look at me now.
“Do you realize what an excellent opportunity this is?” Kath says to her friends before turning to me. “Okay, I know that I have been really cryptic and stuff. So, here’s the thing…”
I pretend to be surprised while she explains what I already knew. That they are members of the human rebellion and that they are trying to take down the Iceheart Dynasty. Then the surprise becomes genuine when she explains what their current plan is.
“A heist?” I echo. “You’re planning a heist?”
Wicked mischief glints in Kath’s eyes. “Yes. We’re going to hit their treasury and wipe out their financial leverage. It’s going to cripple their entire rule.”
Ami, the dark-haired woman, slides intelligent brown eyes to me. “But we haven’t yet been able to figure out how we’re supposed to actually get all of us into the treasury, and then out again with all the loot.”
Another beaming grin spreads across Kath’s face. “Which is where you come in.”
Confusion ripples through me, and I frown at her. “What do you mean?”
“You can be our eyes and ears.”
Silence falls over the room as the four humans turn to me with hopeful eyes. Light streams in through the window, making their eyes practically glitter. A few dust particles that drift through the air catch the light. They swirl in the draft when Peter leans forward in his chair and braces his arms on the dark wooden table. The silence is so loud that I can practically hear it ringing in my ears.
Ice seeps through my veins when I finally realize what their words mean.
“You…” I begin, but I have to swallow down the dread and panic rising like bile in my throat before I can continue. “You want me to… go back.”
Sympathy floods Kath’s face, but she still says, “Yes.”
My hand drifts up to my throat. “Do you know what they do to me in there?”
“No.” Her voice is as soft as her eyes. “But I can imagine that it’s not pretty.”
I draw in short shallow breaths while desperately shaking my head. “I can’t go back. I have literally just escaped. I can’t…” I shake my head again.
“Look,” Kyler interjects. There is sympathy on his face as well, but it’s almost hidden behind blazing determination as he squeezes his hand into a fist. “I know that we’re asking a lot. But the truth is that we will never be able to pull off a heist without someone on the inside. We need you.”
