She Was Supposed to Stay Broken, So I Let Her Think She Had novel · Chapter 30 of 40
Chapter 30: The Scent at Her Place
Lirien lifts her chamomile cup. The scent reaches me before she drinks. She sits within reach, the woman who engineered my rejection, with the proof of it in her hand.
I turn from the unsigned review order to Kael. 'Place the bond-reading page before the clerks. Not before Eln.'
The room has not settled after the clerk marks my refusal. Papers remain spread across the council table, and petitioners wait behind the clerks. Lirien sets down her cup.
Kael opens the inner pocket of his coat and draws out the sealed page. He has kept it from Lirien. He does not make me ask twice.
'You have the document,' he says. 'The clerks can examine it without treating it as a ruling.'
He lays it before the nearest clerk. The sealed edge faces the panel. Nobody touches it yet.
Chamomile clung to the page when Kael brought it to Maren. I recognized the scent then and kept the connection to myself. Lirien does not know I know it is hers.
She rests her fingers beside the cup. 'I can explain where that scent came from. The page was stored in my elder's cedar chest. The lining was treated with chamomile, and the wax must have picked it up there.'
Her smile comes before the last words. It is the reassuring one she uses when she needs people to stop asking what came before her answer.
An amber shimmer blooms around her head. Her spoken explanation continues, with a second voice slipping beneath it, thin and quick.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–20 of She Was Supposed to Stay Broken, So I Let Her Think She Had are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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