Sacrificed Riley to the King novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: Three Nights

We did not burn the brooch.

Torin would not let me.

"If it goes dark, the people holding the other end know we found it," he said. "I'd rather they think it's still working."

He gave it to the captain of his guard, a lean woman with a gray braid, and told her to put it in a truck and drive it in slow circles around the southern end of the mountain.

"Make it look like she's wandering," he said. "Don't let anyone get close."

The captain took it in a handkerchief and left without a word.

I stood in the great hall with my hands empty and my neck feeling bare where the clasp had been.

Garrick had gone up to sleep in a room by Eli's.

It was dawn, and the windows had gone from black to a thin gray.

My phone buzzed in my pocket.

It was a text from Delphine.

Wynn!! I've been sick with worry. Where did he take you? Is Eli all right? Please just tell me you're safe xx

I read it three times.

Torin had come up beside me without a sound, and he looked at the screen over my shoulder, careful not to touch my arm.

"Don't ignore her," he said.

"I don't want to talk to her."

"I know. If you go quiet, she'll know you know." He kept his eyes on the phone. "Write her something small."

I typed with my thumbs, stiff and slow.

Eli is better. It's cold up here. I'll write when I can.

I sent it.

The answer came before I put the phone away.

Where exactly are you? Which side of the mountain? I want to send Eli's medicine.

I held the phone out to him without a word.

He read it, and his face did not change, but his hand closed on the back of a chair.

"That's not a worried friend," I said.

"No."

"She's been my friend since I was nine." My voice came out thin. "She braided my hair for my mother's last birthday. She was at my father's funeral."

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