I glance around the clearing, but the kelpie bares his sharp teeth in warning. There’s no way I can outrun a kelpie. If I fought him off, tricked him again, I’d still have to make my way to Fairweather Palace. Still have to risk that Torben could already be…
Vertigo seizes me. I refuse to finish the thought as I sway on my feet.
“It’s too late, Astrid,” Myrasa says, her tone filled with false sympathy. “I know all about the queen’s hate for you. And I know where your most recent captor went. He won’t be coming for you, nor you for him.”
Rage heats my blood, and I use it as an anchor. A tether to logic. It’s all I can do not to give in to my grief. I fix Myrasa with a scowl. “You sent Marybeth to lie to us this morning, didn’t you?”
“I sent her to free you from yet another man holding you captive.”
“He wasn’t—” I bite off my words, knowing there’s no point in arguing with this creature. What I want from her now is the truth. “Did you force her to end her own life with the Crimson Malus?”
“I gave her a set of orders,” Myrasa explains. “Words she must say. Words she cannot say. Being given the power of one’s true name doesn’t grant ultimate control, only the ability to compel the person through direct commands. So I had to make my orders very clear. I have from the start. One of her orders for this morning was to swallow the poison under two conditions. The first was if you refused to come with her. The second was if she said so much as three words that compromised you coming to me. It was a safeguard, should she find a way around the other words I ordered her not to say.”
My breath hitches as I recall the last thing that left Marybeth’s lips.
Don’t trust me.
Three final words.
I thought she’d meant that I shouldn’t trust her because she was taking me to Tris. Now I know she’d meant not to trust the words she’d said prior to that moment. I recall how she seemed to be fighting to speak. Struggling to get every word out. I’d thought she’d been battling her master’s compulsion, but instead…
She’d been fightingnotto speak. Fighting the scripted lie she’d been sent to deliver. A lie meant to separate me and Torben. A lie that would convince Torben we were out of time. The only way Myrasa could have predicted the scheme would work is if she knew what Torben meant to me. Not only that, but she had to have known where to find us in the first place.
That’s when I recall what Torben said this morning—that he’d recently seen a kelpie on his property. I know now it hadn’t been just any kelpie but Vartul, sent by Myrasa to spy on us. But how did he know to look for us at Davenport Estate?
Myrasa takes a step closer to me, and I stiffen. Thankfully, she doesn’t draw nearer. Instead, she folds her hands at her waist. “I would have let the girl live if you’d come with her.”
“I tried,” I say. “I agreed, but she…”
“Ah.” Myrasa’s lips curl with amusement. “It was my second condition then.”
“Which means you killed her.”
She lets out an irritated sigh. “The girl was responsible for her own fate. She knew the dangers of giving away the power of her true name.”
I narrow my eyes. “How did it happen? When?”
Myrasa gestures toward the boulder and stump again. “Can we sit? I’m not strong outside of my pond these days.”
Something flares in my chest, a simmering combination of hope, rage, and…and something darker. Vengeance. It’s what I once felt for Tris when I was certain she’d killed my father. It was what drew me to Wrath’s fighting pit night after night, eager to learn whatever I could. I doubt much of what I learned will help me now, but at least I know the value of learning your opponent’s weaknesses. And Myrasa just hinted at one of hers.
I fold my arms. “Fine.”
Her smile stretches wide, but her cold eyes remain fixed on me as we take our places at her makeshift seating area—she on the boulder, me on the stump. “I’d offer you tea first, but I’m not some simpering human,” she says, tone mocking.
“Just speak.”
“Very well. You want to know about how your lady’s maid came into my company?”
“I want to know everything.”
She quirks a brow. “Are you certain? The truth can be a heavy burden to bear.” When I refuse to acknowledge her question, she rolls her eyes and speaks. “I’d been looking for you for a year when your lady’s maid and I crossed paths. That was two years ago. After searching for where Edmund had taken you, I discovered you’d become a princess, stepdaughter to the Seelie Queen of Spring.” She says the last part with a snarl. “I tried to come see you, but I couldn’t so much as enter the palace grounds. They were warded with enchantments. Every fabricated request for a petition with the queen was denied. It seemed you rarely left the walls of the palace yourself, so I couldn’t meet you face to face. So I waited. Settled a body of water nearby in the Fairweather Woods where I could watch for any potential leads that would help me get you back. That’s when I discovered your maid often met with a human messenger after dark to exchange letters she couldn’t send from inside the palace. I intercepted the first letter. It was written to a cousin of hers named Danielle. A young woman I’d heard about during my investigation to find you.”
A pit forms in my stomach at the mention of Danielle. “What did the letter say?”
“That little friend of yours was selling your secrets. The letter detailed your magic—something she’d recently learned about from you.”
My chest tightens, part with sorrow, part with anger. I trusted Marybeth. Befriended her. I always thought she asked me questions out of genuine curiosity. I never suspected she was encouraging me to divulge my secrets so she could pass them on to Danielle.
