Read Online Ross Lawhead by The Realms Thereunder - Free Book Online Page B

but I must ask . . . why not simply kill them or detain them in a more conventional manner?” He held his breath to await reply—or punishment—from perhaps the only man in the world whom he truly feared.
    The man on the throne raised a hand to his chin. Robin nearly flinched at the action. “Really, Robin,” he said. “Is that any way to treat a friend?”
    Robin bowed and turned. He didn’t expect an answer anyway. He never should have said anything.
    He retraced his steps quickly and drew the watch out of his pocket once more. Good, the door would still be open. No need to make other arrangements.
    Exiting the hill, he swiftly made his way through the blue door and back into George Street Mews. And since there was still no one in sight, he stretched out his arms and scaled the wall. Slinking along the rooftops, he made his way back to the rooms he occupied where he lived under the disguise of a human.
    3
    At a quarter past two, Freya started off for her tutorial. She left the coffee shop and made her way to her tutor’s room using the most populated streets. She ran into Julie, the other student she was to take her tutorial with, just outside the college. Freya was angry with herself for arriving on time; if she were just a little earlier, she would have been able to enter and reenter the doors and arches. The arches especially upset her.
    Fighting anxiety, Freya mounted the stairs ahead of Julie. Reaching the door of the tutor’s room, she knocked and reached into her bag for her tutorial gown. She pulled it out, deliberately bringing some papers with it. She bent down to collect them as they heard, “Come in, please,” from inside the room.
    â€œYou go ahead,” Freya said to Julie, deliberately picking her bag up the wrong way around to spill some of her books onto the floor.
    â€œI’ll help,” Julie said, bending down.
    â€œNo! That’s fine, I’ve got it,” Freya said, harsher than she had meant.
    Julie nodded, stood, and entered.
    Freya stuffed the books in her bag and then took a bottle of pills out of an inner pocket. She dry-swallowed a couple and then went to a window in the hallway. Where was the sun? The sky had become overcast, but it wouldn’t set until around five thirty this time of year. Surely the tutorial wouldn’t drag on that long . . . but it might.
    She took a deep breath. One crisis at a time. She opened the door and went in and out of it as fast and as silently as she could, seven times. That did absolutely nothing to calm her—she had gone through too many arches already. The only thing that could help was if she went back to the street and started again fresh. She closed her eyes and started to massage her forehead.
    The door clicked shut behind her, making her jump.
    â€œI’m sorry, did I startle you?”
    â€œA little . . .” Freya saw Professor Stowe, her tutor, standing just inside the doorway.
    His face was concerned. “It’s okay. I’m a little anxious because I thought I would be late.”
    â€œNo, dead on time, as usual. Shall we start?” He gestured to the sitting room where Julie was already settling herself.
    Freya bustled into the next room and sat on a small, uncomfortable wooden chair next to Julie, facing Professor Stowe’s leather wing-backed chair.
    The next fifty minutes were dedicated to the discussion of Freya’s and Julie’s essays on determinism. Julie got high praise for hers, while Freya had all the flaws and bad reasoning pointed out in hers. She stopped taking notes when he started critiquing her sentence structure. Eventually, Stowe got down to the end of the paper and paused long enough for her to assume that he’d finished.
    â€œAlright,” she said, her voice quavering just slightly, feeling very much under attack. “You’ve told me all the things I shouldn’t do, what are the things that I should do?”
    The