I separated three strands of her silken hair and began to weave them together. “Have you seen Matron’s jewelry? The rubies alone should have cost a fortune. What do you think the prince was buying? Silence? Loyalty?”
I placed a sparkling pin between the layers, watching her neck muscles tense, the pulse in the hollow of her throat briefly standing distended before she forced herself calm again.
“Rubies are the stone from the outskirts of the queendom. Harvested only from a windswept island in the North Sea. Their price has always been high due to the cost of the lives lost climbing the cliffs, scrambling amongst the scree, and fighting the black-tipped waves to bring them ashore.”
She paused, fighting a shudder as I gently placed another pin.
“The princess of the isle was here barely six months ago. As a wedding present, the prince had gifted her a ruby studded crown. When she was found, the crown was so deeply embedded in her skull that the bone had fused with the crystals, red on red, as if it were part of her.”
“Then why in Goddess’s name are you here, Lilyanna?”
“I intend to live.”
“Me too,” I muttered.
My mind returned to those black boots and the jangling clink of spurs. The Sheriff had led me on a merry dance round the entire queendom, vanishing into thin air whenever I neared. I knew everything about him, from the women he favored to the jewels he stole. The only thing not told to me was why he had been targeted, which one of the many jilted women glaring at his retreating back had struck a bargain for his capture.
If I finally took him, I could let the prince go. I liked that he’d moved away from the queens to set up his own life, created a pocket of freedom even if it was in this cursed castle.
Then I’d persuade Lilyanna—kicking and screaming as I tied her like a sack to my horse and hand delivered her back to the West—that marriage was not in her best interests, that those ridiculous tea leaves were wrong and remaining in this creepy hellhole would have her buried in a golden casket before the year expired.
She smiled, more a flattening of her full lips than a curve. “You can take these out now.” She flung the pins from her hair, not waiting for me to do it. Thin golden strands hung like twisted nerves from the metal.
“How have there not been wars over these women? I’ve heard nothing of these events until recently, and I spend a good deal of time listening to gossip. Were they linked to the other murdered women; the ones supposedly killed for their magic?”
“The other women I don’t know.” She rose and walked me to her door. “But news of the ladies of the court was kept quiet because a deal has always been struck that could not be refused.”
“How do you know?”
“Us outlying towns talk more than people think.” Her face remained light, her hand resting upon my arm, soft and warm, but a steeliness formed inside her. “I’m going to get out of these burned clothes and lie down for a while.”
I nodded.
She wouldn’t leave willingly, and she knew much more about this situation than I did. I too was bound by a contract, my life dedicated to a cause I hadn’t chosen. The risk of death was always there, but I wasn’t surviving just for myself.
Lilyanna was a martyr, not a hero. Exactly like me.
CHAPTER NINE
THE ART OF SEDUCTION
Now I had two bounties at once. And neither of them was going to magically appear in Lilyanna’s room while we idled the day away playing checkers. I left her behind after asking an unimpressed Matron to watch her, ignoring the irritating flicker of worry in my gut and headed out.
The market was easy to find. I followed the cries, calls, and raised haggling voices, my nose upturned as the wind carried the scent of roasted chestnuts and blackened swedes. After spending days trapped in the gray stone castle, I had to hover in the alleyway until my eyes adjusted to the colors.
Carts laden with sprouted cauliflower and bushy lettuce formed a meandering path while crates of potatoes and blood-red radish stacked ten high teetered over the crowd. People milled around, some with wicker baskets looped around their arms, others with pockets stuffed with wares. The scene was so similar to the one from my childhood, a pang struck my heart. Only then I’d been the one dragging a sheep on a fraying halter over the cobblestones or carrying as many chickens as would fit in my arms. Not for the first time I wondered what had become of our abandoned smallholding. Someone would have destroyed it as the wall ran straight through the land, but did they pillage it first? Were any of the items in the market heirlooms of my past?
Young children surrounded by a bubble of raucous energy sat cross-legged against the front of the houses, dice and sticks thrown on the ground in front of them. A small pile of coppers sat ferociously guarded in a scrawny girl’s discarded hat.
Look at them closely, my dear. Siobhan’s voice whispered against my skin, tickling the top of my ear. The memory as clear as if she were standing with me now. One of them is a cheat.
Siobhan had taught me how to read micro expressions on someone’s face, a shift in body posture or an almost imperceptible alteration in voice pitch. To start with it was easy. When we were at market and my nerves shot, my stomach growling, she’d move us to the side and stand close, one hand kneading my shoulder, her fingers never wavering, her support unbroken. She’d toss a gideon in one hand, my reward if I guessed correctly and enough to last me a month.
I watched for a few minutes before it became clear. The youngest of the group threw weighted die. They wobbled on the edge before tipping in the wrong direction. The group cheered in unison, color warming their pallid cheeks. The boy grabbed the die and cupped them in his hands, ready to throw them again. Secretly imprinting his thumb on the numbers he wanted to fall next, he transferred a magnetic magic marker. The rest of the group muttered excitedly, unconcerned and unaware.
I could easily tell them, just a casual sentence dropped in passing. Siobhan would say, It doesn’t matter. You got your answer and now you move on. It’s simpler that way, no guilt.
I pressed back against the wall and tugged the hood of my cloak over my face. If the boy remained this adept, his luck would continue. If he were truly clever, he’d switch back for the regular pair hidden in the pleat of his trousers just before the group’s suspicions fell on him. I wonder what other tricks he could do with that rare magic?
