Alpha's Favourite Girl

rom the lift to t

ince the winter his father died, and he had never told anyone, because a King who counts his steps is a Kin

ed to the people who were most afraid of it. They stood as he passed: the night receptionist, two analysts finishing a s

, Mrs. Achter

t her granddaughter was in Year Eleven and was applying to nursing school, which wa

the boardroom door

rgot in an elevator. He had been head of Alexander's security for six years and had neve

etly. "Voss is in holding. He's stopped bit

gua

Okoro's two ribs and a disloca

hear it from us before t

. Something behind it did, very

wen

ng table, and none of the

ty years, to explain. Treasurer Odalys Brandt wore grey silk and a single pearl, and could read a balance sheet the way

Alexander's father's and was not Alexander's, because Ale

d raised Alexander more than his father ever had. He rose when Alexander entered, and Ale

r said, sitting. "F

ound at the perimeter of Aldermere Academy, half Turned and bloody to the elbows. He

's sergeant at a s

oundation requested extr

equest

people, Alexander. A school full of donors and a chequ

it in the time it took the Marshal to draw breath. It was a hab

aff for the event," he said. "The school's ow

s nothing you could have pointed

," Silas said. "Mine. I didn't

ke it l

ned his head, easy as br

han necessary, and could find nothing at all.

"three of the great Houses have requested private audiences this month. Each has cited concern about

perfect

diences shou

Voss," Alex

wrists. Ruan Voss was a big man, forty, with a good record and a wife who baked. His shirt had been cut fro

ble. Forty-one steps, he thought, and th

never needed to. He said it the w

ne

in the air like the second before a storm, and he felt every wolf in the room feel it. The Marshal's chin

id not

ryone in the room knew it. The yellow in his eyes didn't lower or soften.

ast month, and once in an empty room, and then not ag

" he sa

a fraction. Odalys Br

. It was where it had always lived, as natural as a pulse.

ing unstrung, shoulders sagging, breath sawi

ran over Alexan

ack of his wrist, and looked out at the city, which was grey and lit and en

His Majesty has been awake since yesterday morning. M

lanced back once, and her eyes went to Alexander's cuff, where a si

oor c

ng?" Si

know what

xand

dow and his face was entirely composed

w the thing in his face that he had never been able to

ellor said, and picked up the Marshal's rep

glass of water. His eyes had gone back to brown, a

y. I don't reme

hat you do

e line. And then-" He frowned, as though trying to re

in

urs. I couldn't hear it, not at first. Someone else was already

was ver

what

it." He looked up, haunted. "I'm sorry. I've never felt a Call like

, and Dane, by the doo

ng, because he was the sort of man who unders

m. The lab ran it against the Registry at four.

ho

cus

stop walking. It

d had told him afterwards that a King who couldn't take a hit was only a man in a nice coat. He had died eighteen years ago, the winter Alexander was ten. There had been a

t had bee

long recovery,"

ind the kitchens, a lot of it, and a trail to the service gate. And a print

that isn

areful. "Hale is gone. No body. Nothing past the gate. A man d

t el

irst time Alexander could re

fore your father's time. It went off at 9:58 last night. Somewhere in that b

ssed the call button and watched the lig

father's study before the study was locked: a dark stone in a band of worn gold, about the size of a th

n't say

d. "It was destroyed. It's in the

rong," said Dane. "

view his grandfather had paid for. Alexander stood in front of neither. He sat in the

nd tables, candlelight, a stage. A girl in a navy blazer stood at the le

," Dane said. "Elia

ut at three hundred people as though she were deciding which of them to prosecute. "So I will. It has given this school a library,

his chest that was adjacent to it, small and startled, and he realised he was lo

heard himself described as ruthless, gifted, cold and a dozen less printable things, but he

," he

rewou

orks so well that it

stop, and said, in a voice he didn't entirel

gh a kitchen with an older man at her shoulder. Her left hand was holding the first-aid kit. Her right, Alexander

asn't in the building at 9:57. At 11:02 it registered

a scholarship, with a closed f

ve it to her,"

hink

ighteen years give the most dangerous

ed. "There's one more thi

printout, with a header Alexand

diplomat. The Foundation asked, through the Trustee's office, for the Scholar to s

and countersigned by his signature, a hundred documents a month that crossed his desk to be initialled, and

th her name on it. That was not t

th the absolute neutrality of a man wh

," Alexander said. "The actual p

e Chanc

M

Your M

hin, a school record, the sort of thing that was prin

ose, née Vale, baker. Father: Thomas Rose, de

he word over, and

her, standing at a debate podium. She wasn't smiling. She had her chin up and her feet planted, as thoug

en that j

that had been unlocked in his lifetime only once, there was a gallery nobody visited. It held the portraits of the old rulers,

til a night when no one was watchi

en smiling either. She had looked out of the canvas with the same level, stubborn, unimpres

that portrait. He had looked onc

desk, gently, the way you set down

icked up

said. "Ge

Cou

oblem fo

room before he noticed that h