But Ditmar would accuse the servants who stayed behind of being loyal to a traitor, when in truth they had been loyal to Ayla. She owed a duty to them to do whatever she could.
Even if, in her heart of hearts, she felt safer in the castle than she had since her wedding night.
Megh brought a late lunch, and whispered gossip: the knight had released a messenger bird with a letter attached to its leg. The soldiers said it was headed to Eyron, to fetch an army. They’d been planning to leave that day, back up into the Kettalist on the horses Ditmar had prepared to hand over. Some were upset they’d be spending the winter at Blackfell, but others seemed grateful to be staying inside the castle walls.
“They wereleaving?” Ayla asked in disbelief. Megh shrugged.
“That’s what the man I talked to thought, at least.”
Ayla frowned and picked at the thick slice of dark brown bread on her plate, slathered with blood-red cherry jam. Why had the knight even told her to pack her things, if he was about to forfeit the castle back to Ditmar?
The knight hadn’t decided to staybecauseof her. That would be absurd. His men must have simply been wrong. So it changed nothing.
Megh left with the dirty plate. Ayla harvested four stilder berries and settled back in front of the fire.
It was quiet work, cutting into the hardened, dried flesh with her fingernails and scraping out the tiny pink seeds, setting them on a little square of fabric in front of the fire. She scrubbed her hands so hard with soap after that she thought the ends of herfingers might crack open, but she didn’t want to accidentally stick her tongue to her finger and keel over dead from the stilder’s juices. She wasn’t sure when she’d have an opportunity to use them, if she ever did.
Except then she went to the kitchens a little before supper, feeling anxious, her blood pounding with anxiety from a plan she’d barely put into motion. She sat at the table with a plate of food as the three cooks swirled around her, the air sizzling and hot and full of rich smells. Nyven hadn’t thrown her out, but hehadrefused her help.
“That’s for the knight,” Sarella called to Megh, sliding a plate with wheat dumplings and slices of roast across the counter, dressed in a pretty red sauce. “Can you take it to him?”
“I feel like a pack horse,” Megh complained, her hands already full with a tray of the same roast she was carrying to the hall for the soldiers. “Soon as I’ve set this down.”
“Hurry. He’ll want it hot,” Sarella said, and then turned back to the ovens to pull out another tray.
Ayla’s mouth went bone-dry. When would she ever get such a clear chance again? She fumbled with the pouch at her side, her heart beating so hard it pulsed in her mouth. With shaking hands she untied the bundle beneath the table and looked around the kitchen.
Nyven chopped something across the room, his knife falling so fast and hard she couldn’t hear a break in its rhythm. The young girl, Isalde, stirred a huge pot over the fire, spooning out the dumplings that floated to the top. Sarella adjusted one of the fires, sweat staining her face as she fanned at the wood and held a hand up to gauge how hot it was.
Before she could think twice, or wonder if the knight's soldiers would kill her, Ayla shook the tiny pink seeds out over the plate and shoved her hands back beneath the table. She didn’t breatheas Megh came back in. A stab of fear pierced her. Ayla opened her mouth to confess, then shut it.
This was war.
“Looks nice,” Megh said, picking up the plate and turning back towards the door.
“Don’t eat anything off it,” Ayla hissed. Megh lifted an eyebrow.
“It’s not my first day on the job, lady,” Megh said stiffly. Ayla bit her lip and watched the maid go. What would happen, once the knight…? And what if they accused the kitchen. Theywouldaccuse the kitchen. She’d just have to take the blame, that was all.
She hadn’t thought this through. She’d refused to let herself. Ayla stared down at her half-eaten plate and slowly stood.
“Something wrong with the food?” Sarella asked with a frown, glancing over her shoulders.
“It’s lovely,” Ayla said hoarsely. “I’ve just… I think I need to lay down.”
Behind the closed door of her room, she waited for the alarm to sound. Waited for a scream, or a pounding fist on her door. She went to bed cold, curled up beneath piles of blankets and furs, and slept fitfully, expecting every small noise in the castle to be the news. In the morning she woke to pearl-gray light filtering through the window and Megh yawning in front of the hearth as she built up the fire.
“What news?” Ayla whispered.
“News?” Megh asked, sounding exhausted. If only the servants would let Ayla help. It was too much work, trying to run a castle with only a handful of them. “No new gossip, lady. Are you wanting tea?”
“I’ll get it myself,” Ayla said, as Megh stood and hauled her fire-starting basket back onto her hip.
“I suppose I should insist on doing it, but I'm not going to,” Megh told her.
Nobody in the kitchen had anything to say. But surely they would by now. Either the knight was dead, or he knew what she’d done. Feeling like she’d throw up if she tried to take a single bite of food, Ayla carried tea upstairs to her solar. She gripped the steaming mug between her icy fingers and stared out the window at the mountains, wondering if it was possible for a human to be immune to stilder berries.
She was used to uneasy days, waiting for a hammer to drop. She bathed as best she could with a bucket in front of the hearth, and read for an hour from her books, the passages so well-memorized they couldn’t distract her from her fears. But nothing happened until the sun dropped, afternoon giving way to evening. She sat in her room then, debating whether she should go downstairs and insist the servants let her help them, or whether it was safer to stay out of everyone’s sight.
