“I’m the woman with no shoes who saved Galiene’s daughter.”
Wesla drew a sharp breath.
Just as I thought. By now the rumors about the shoeless beggar woman who had mysteriously warned Galiene had spread through the Garden. I was probably credited with all sorts of mysterious powers.
“I see all,” I declared. “I know all. Did you think your theft would go unnoticed?”
She jerked as if struck.
“How dare you take advantage of your lady? She feeds you, she takes care of you, and how do you repay her? Admit your guilt.”
Wesla opened her mouth, struggling to say something.
“Speak!” Hade snapped.
“I stole the Queen’s Delight,” Wesla announced, her voice high-pitched. “I was the one who did it. I meant to only take one, but it was delicious, and I couldn’t help myself.” She dropped to her knees. “I accept my punishment. Please, don’t throw me out.”
I turned to Galiene and spread my arms.
“. . . I will do anything, please, please, please don’t send me away . . .” Wesla dissolved into sobs.
Galiene heaved a sigh.
“. . . I have no place to go . . .”
“Nobody is going to throw you out,” Galiene said. “Return to your room. I will speak to you later.”
Wesla got to her feet and fled.
“All of that over sweets.” Hade rolled her eyes. “That child has no sense.”
“Yet she can calculate a month’s expenses without paper,” Galiene said.
“If it’s not Orrem or Wesla, it has to be Arale. Search her room,” I said. “There might be a small purple pouch hidden somewhere in it. If you find it, do not open it.”
Ten minutes later two guards led Arale in. The fairy princess from the first floor, the first person in the Garden to speak to me. She had traded her gown for a red robe and her hair was undone.
“Is this about the shipments?” Arale sighed. “I had nothing to do . . .”
The mage approached Galiene’s desk and placed a small purple pouch on it.
“What is it?” Galiene asked me.
“Poison. The plan was for you to be taken away by Hreban and for her to take your place. Since that failed . . .”
In the original storyline, Arale took over Galiene’s job, but she kept making mistakes. Shortly after the failed raid, Hade died suddenly. A purple pouch containing traces of poison was found in her room. I’d always thought Arale was the one who’d done it. Without Hade she had free rein, and within a year she had run the Garden into the ground.
“You just couldn’t help yourself, could you?” Galiene said.
Arale looked at Hade. She must’ve seen something terrifying in the old woman’s eyes because she flinched. She caught herself in an instant, but we all saw it.
“Everything I have done was for the sake of the Garden,” Arale said.
Boom, there she is.
Hade stared at her, and the old woman’s eyes were dark and cold.
Arale raised her chin. “Why her? She is neither beautiful nor skilled.”
