In the Enemy's Service (Annals of Alasia Book 2) by Lima Annie Douglass

Author:Lima, Annie Douglass [Lima, Annie Douglass]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Annie Douglass Lima
Published: 2014-01-17T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

Anya spent the next morning in the palace kitchen helping to wash the breakfast dishes and peeling potatoes and carrots for lunch. Though she overheard plenty of conversations, none seemed to be about anything important, and she was relieved that she wouldn’t even be tempted to report them to Regent Rampus.

While she worked, she thought over what Private Dannel had told her last night, trying to figure out what he might have meant. If only she had had a chance to ask him more questions. Like what kind of role her father could possibly have played in the Invasion. He was a merchant, after all, not a soldier. As far as Anya knew, he had never had anything to do with either the Malornian or the Alasian military or government. He bought goods in Alasia and took them to Malorn to sell, and vice versa. That was all. Wasn’t it?

Last night she had sat up late with Eleya and Tonnis and Wennish, discussing the assignment Regent Rampus had given her and the hints Dannel had dropped. Anya had decided that it was finally time to tell her friends what little she knew in the hope that they could help her figure it out. But the three adults had been as puzzled as she was, though they tried to come up with ideas.

“A merchant must have a lot of business contacts,” Wennish had suggested at one point. “Perhaps some of them have been paying him to bring them information. Didn’t you say he travels a lot? Maybe he’s a spy.”

“No way,” Anya had protested indignantly. “Not my father. He’s not that kind of person.” She had paused a moment, an ache rising in her throat as she pictured her father. He loved travel and a good bargain and a well-seasoned steak, disliked rain and heavy traffic and being talked back to. She could almost hear him whistling a tune through his teeth as he drove the cart along a peaceful country road on the way to the next customer. He doesn’t have any secrets from Arvalon and me. Not any big ones, at least. She was nearly certain of it.

“He’s not that kind of person,” she had repeated. “He loves both Malorn and Alasia. Besides, things like discovering that your father has a secret career as a spy only happen in stories.”

Wennish had laughed bitterly. “Look around you, Anya. The whole Invasion and everything that’s taken place since are the sort of things that only happen in stories. Look at me. I’ve returned from the threshold of death, thanks to the three of you, and I’m the only one of my three hundred comrades on the palace guard who survived. And look at you. You were kidnapped, and now you’re a slave, and an enemy leader has asked you to spy for him. Those all sound like part of a story to me, but they’re our lives. Events none of us would have dreamed of a few weeks ago have happened.

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