The prince found her in the crowd. ‘Patience, merchant.’
‘She’s right,’ someone else shouted. ‘Your defenders are standing on the wrong side of the wall.’
‘You people do not get to decide what is best for the entire kingdom,’ Borin shouted.
‘But we should get to decide what’s best for us,’ Blake shot back. She pointed at the wall. ‘This further reduces our freedom and you know it.’
The defender closest to her made a move in her direction, but before he reached her, Harlan’s horse pushed between them. She looked up. The smallest shake of his head warned that she was crossing a very dangerous line.
‘Let’s go,’ she said, taking Eda’s arm and turning away from the prince.
The horse followed her.
‘Blake,’ Harlan said.
It was not the voice he had used with her in front of the fireplace, the one whispered against her bare skin. It was the voice of the commander who had killed her brother.
She did not turn around.
Harlan dismounted and caught up with her. ‘So you’ll take my food but won’t even reply when I call your name?’ He spoke quietly so as to not interrupt the prince.
She stopped walking. ‘I tried to refuse your food, but your friends are as pushy as you.’
His eyes moved between hers. ‘Go straight home. Stay away from the port for a few days. Understand?’
There was that anger again, simmering away in the pit of her belly. ‘What’s the matter, Commander? Having a tough time caging us in?’
His expression did not change. ‘Don’t make me assign a defender to your front door.’
She shook her head and resumed walking.
‘You’ll still be allowed to conduct business as normal,’ he said, following her.
‘Allowed?’ She laughed. ‘I’d fall at your feet with gratitude, but the street’s a little muddy.’
He looked over his shoulder, then closed the distance between them. ‘I don’t want the wall either, but since there’s not a damn thing either of us can do about it, best we both keep our thoughts to ourselves.’
It was one of those torturous moments where Blake was torn between shoving him and burying her face against his chest. Was it wrong to miss that earthy scent of his? ‘Better get back on your horse, Commander.’ She kept her eyes ahead. ‘I suspect the prince is going to need you.’
Chapter 31
Don’t go, Eda signed to Blake. The dying embers from the main room cast light through the open door over Eda’s bed.
Blake had thought her sister asleep as she tried to sneak from the room, but Garlic flapping around the place must have woken her. At least Lyndal had slept through the commotion. She could sleep through just about anything.
‘Go back to sleep,’ Blake whispered.
I saw the bag, Eda signed, referring to the one Blake had stuffed into the waist of her skirt. It was one of the canvas bags Kingsley used to take when he went through the tunnels.You’re going under the wall.
She was goingoverthe wall, but the less Eda knew the better. ‘Go back to sleep, and don’t say a word to anyone.’
Eda’s worried face was the last thing Blake saw as she fled the room.
As she stepped down onto the street, her mind went to the last time she had seen Kingsley. His final words had been equally as dismissive. She wondered if he regretted them as the roof of that tunnel collapsed on him.
This was different.
That was what she told herself as she headed into the forest. This was careful, considered. Carried out under the cover of darkness. If she was discovered, she could run and disappear into the trees. The defenders would never be able to identify her.
