Marked For Death: A Dark Urban Fantasy Novel by Becca Blake

Author:Becca Blake [Blake, Becca]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: urban fantasy
Published: 2021-03-15T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

On the morning of Orion’s trial, I put on the same black dress I wore to my father’s funeral. This time, I slipped a pair of gym shorts on underneath and tied my hair back in a neat braid. If things went poorly, I didn’t want modesty or flowing hair getting in my way.

I wanted to bring along my sword, but it wasn’t exactly something I could hide in the back of my dress. Instead, I settled for strapping my handgun to my thigh, where the folds of thick fabric would conceal it. My mundane bullets wouldn’t do anything against demons, but they’d work just fine against other humans if I needed them.

I wouldn’t go down without a fight.

Jacob emerged from the bathroom wearing one of my dad’s old dress shirts. “I hope you don’t mind. Everything I own is back at my place.”

“It’s fine.” I checked the time on my phone. “Orion is probably already there by now. We should get moving.”

Word of Orion’s trial must have spread through Haygrove quickly. It seemed as though everyone in town beat us to the town hall, as we couldn’t even see the entrance through the tightly packed crowd. The eager murmurs that surrounded us as we pushed through reminded me of the excitement surrounding evaluations, the way everything in town stopped to await the results.

Except this time, they weren’t waiting to see how many of the newest group of trainees would become Arbiters. They were waiting to see if a commanding officer, one of the most respected men in Haygrove, would be declared a traitor and punished for his crimes.

None of them knew the truth behind what had happened, and they probably never would. No one questioned the Council, so they would cheer for Orion’s death if they were told it was justice.

I thought I might throw up.

We pushed our way through to the front, where a pair of the Council’s personal security guards stood in front of the doorway. They checked for our names on a list of approved attendees, then stepped aside to let us in.

Our footsteps echoed off the high ceiling of the town hall as we passed through the empty entryway. The courtroom was on the ground floor, its huge double doors right across from the entrance, though I’d never seen inside it before. The Council didn’t use it often, as far as I knew, and the few trials I’d heard of weren’t open to the public.

It surprised me to find that it looked more like a theater than a courtroom, with a stage and all. The rows of elevated seating looked like they could seat a couple hundred, though only a handful of those seats were occupied by Orion’s fellow commanding officers. I recognized a few of them. They were friends of Orion’s. Of my father’s.

What had they been told about the incident? What did they believe we’d done?

I supposed it didn’t matter. They would believe whatever the Council said.

Doing my best to ignore the stares around us, I folded my hands in my lap and looked up at the stage.

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