I swore, making a bunch of promises I planned to keep, some I didn’t, and some that weren’t possible, as the mirror flashed again in a pattern, the code clear this time, before it stopped.Shit.It was a call for immediate help, only to be used in a dire emergency.
When Vilkurn nodded, turning away, I was gone in a flash, racing along the top of the battlement to the only possible pathway down the side of the tower. I would know; I’d created it, and made certain every other way a person could climb up was impassable. My fingers and toes, wrapped in my favorite ridged, thin leather boots, found each crevice in the stone, along with the few small nails I’d hammered in when I was younger and couldn’t reach quite far enough. I’d leave the nails in when I left Turino, since one of my crew would have to take over my shift guarding the queen’s brood once I was gone. Verity, probably, and she was short for an eleven-year-old.
My heart felt heavy and light at the same time as I raced to answer the call for help halfway across the city.My city.Goddess, I’d miss it. But Vilkurn wasn’t punishing me. He was giving me the chance to grab the brass ring, to live a dream I’d never even admitted to myself.
“Master Spy of Rimholt,” I whispered as I ran toward the docks. “The crew will never believe it.”
A few minutes later,I stopped celebrating, and cursed in disbelief instead. I’d assumed the mirrored signal had originated from the roof of the nearby apothecary, the usual place in this neighborhood my crew used for communications. And I’d been dead certain it had come from one of them, the nine street rats who’d grown up with me as their leader. Who owned these streets, and knew everyone and everything that went on in them.
But now I was close enough to see who was signaling me, and from where, and my mouth went dry. I approached the buildingI knew very well, but had kept secret from all but the ten of us for almost seven years. The person who had signaled me, in broad daylight, was definitely not one of mine, though I was well acquainted with him.
“Dashiell?”
Perched on the roof of an abandoned warehouse I knew for a fact could cave in at any moment—since I’d weakened the timbers myself in certain areas—was the crown prince of Rimholt, holding a mirror and flashing it in the code I’d taught him years before.
Well, not that many years. The kid was barely eight.
But not likely to live to see nine. As I watched, he slipped slightly on the roof tiles, and I heard the unmistakable crack of a board beginning to break.
“Shit,” I cursed, running as fast as I could and shimmying up the side of the warehouse. I knew where the only safe places to step were, or at least the ones that had been safe a year before. No one used this rooftop anymore. It might draw attention to the treasure hidden below, inside.
The vulnerable women and girls I’d been keeping safe.
I leaped from shingle to shingle, never more grateful for the gripping surfaces of my handcrafted boots, when the board that had been breaking finally snapped.
The prince didn’t even have time to take a breath and scream, but his eyes—dark like the queen’s—met mine as he fell. I leaped toward him, my body skidding across the splintering tiles as I lunged to grasp his hand.
And caught it. He dangled from my grip, and I grabbed hold of his wrist with my other hand to secure the hold. My heart was pounding so fast, my vision grew hazy for a moment. I closed my eyes, breathing slowly, trying not to black out.
Then the prince whimpered in pain. I opened my eyes immediately, pulling him toward me as smoothly as I could. “I’mgoing to… lay you flat on a safe patch,” I huffed. “Then I’m going to crawl to the roofline where you climbed up, yeah?” He didn’t nod as he slid over the sharp-edged tile, and didn’t flinch at the pain he must have felt as I dragged him to relative safety. “You’ll crawl or step only in the places I do, and lightly. Then we’ll climb down. Got it?”
“Got it,” he agreed breathlessly.
I watched as he got to his hands and knees, then did exactly what I’d said. When we were safely on the ground, I checked his arms and legs for cuts. He was scraped to bits, and would bruise up pretty nicely, but he was whole. In fact, he even smiled slightly, peeking up through his shaggy, dark curls.
“Thank you, Ratter. I knew you’d come.”
Satisfied he was all right, I took each of his sturdy shoulders in one hand, and began shaking him. “What were youthinking?You almost died! You should be dead; I boobytrapped this place myself.” I shook harder, the fear I’d been suppressing rushing to the fore.
“You committin’ regicide today, Ratter?” the oldest member of my crew called out, as he jogged up Fish Street.
I didn’t stop shaking Dash as I called back, “It’s not regicide if he’s not the king, Rubs.”
He let out an exasperated, “It’s Robert.” I winced. I still forgot to call him Robert when I was agitated, though he’d changed his name officially years ago.
“It’s prince-icide,” a new voice yelled from another direction. Two more of my crew, Devil and Guts—although they insisted on using the far less fear-inspiring names of Devorah and Augusta—were sprinting to a stop in front of me.
I dropped Dash to the muddy cobbles where he lay like an overturned turtle, and snarled at them. “You were supposed to take my shift in the castle. Who’s watching the rest of thebrood?” If Dash was here, that meant Queen Vali’s younger children could be exposed. Unprotected.
“Trevor’s there,” Augusta sneered, wrinkling her freckled nose. “It’s nap time, anyway.”
“Well, there’s one who didn’t get that reminder,” I said, staring in disgust as Dash smiled up at me with wide eyes.
“You saved me, Ratter,” he murmured. “I knew you would. Blessed be the hand of the Goddess.” He flipped over, scrambled to his feet, and bowed down to me, like I was the royalty, not him. The others began coughing, to hide their laughter. I felt my cheeks go red.
“It’s still so awkward to witness this,” Dev whispered. “He’s so intense.”
“She saved me. It’s a sign,” Dash announced, rising to one knee. “Everyone pretends like I’m going to marry some stupid princess. But I heard my dads talking, and now I know Ratter is Her voice in the land, and Her avatar beats out a princess any da?—”
