~~Quinn's PoV~~
I force myself to keep quiet as Carter negotiates with the man he called Alfric. This wizard rubs me the wrong way. I don't like his showy little magic tricks and I don't like the way he dismissed the well-being of the empire as being completely unimportant. He obviously cares more about himself than about anyone else and in my experience, those kind of people are not to be trusted.
It's the kind of man I thought Carter himself was, until I got to know him.
And then there was the look Alfric gave me when he asked if we were here to talk about the mate bond. Even though Carter answered him, I could have sworn Alfric was actually talking to me, like he knew something about Ethan, or about the bond my aunt thought was broken when I was a child? Or maybe he meant some new bo
