"I will."
"Then your trial shall be thus. A Grand Inquisitor is arriving in Venice tonight. His mission, as we know it, is to eradicate the Unsired and Wingless within the city. Rid us of him, and you shall have proven yourself worthy. Do you accept your trial?"
My knees wobbled, and I stared at Tiberius. "A Grand Inquisitor? This is suicide."
"This is your trial. You may refuse. There is no dishonor in that."
"There is no honor in this trial. One does not simply kill an Inquisitor."
"One worthy to be High King will find a way." He grinned, no doubt to kindle my rage. It worked.
"I accept my trial. May the Inquisitor shudder in his sleep, for I will see him in his grave." I stood.
Tiberius nodded. "So be it. Now, venture forth and prove your worth."
I bowed and walked away. No ceremonial claps followed me out the door, only Ezio grumbling about Inquisitors and trials. He was right to complain. To kill an Inquisitor and live would be impossible.
But Tiberius never said kill.
Still, not killing meant talking, and I preferred the former. As we rounded up the stairs, the rage inside me boiled and with it hunger. I wished to blast the steam at Tiberius, who doomed me with his trial, and Dante, who thought he could beat me at this game. That's all it was, after all—a game to see who should be king. And they dealt me a losing hand. I wanted to cut theirs off. If they'd been there, I would have.
But instead, the stone door opened, and a portly man gazed at me, draped in the white garbs of a priest. "Who are you, my son?"
"The devil, Father." I showed my face, and the old man dropped his scepter. He'd caught me in a bad mood. More's the pity. Venice stank of the people that populated it. One less person made it smell a little better.
Seduced by Innocence (The Seduced Saga, Book 1 of Rose's Trilogy) Page 17
