“Let go of me! I only want to go home!”
The moonlight lit the person’s face as they turned, and Lux’s eyes widened as their gazes met. Red hair tumbled to the girl’s waist—for she was indeed a girl, not a woman. She couldn’t have been much older than Aline, and certainly younger than Luxherself. Lux’s attention dipped at the resulting clank of iron. The girl’s ankles were secured in shackles.
“Devil below, what is going on?”
The girl ripped at her nightgown. “Help me, please! She won’t let me go!”
The attendant was quiet but strong. A topknot of greying hair bobbed as she was dragged forward by the girl and still, the older woman’s grip would not yield.
“Hildred?”
The awkward attendant who’d tended her fire glanced at Lux for only a breath. “I cannot let you go,” the woman said, sure and steadfast as any line she’d delivered to Lux earlier that morning.
As if they weren’t all dangerously close to a perilous drop.
“Youwilllet her go,” said Lux loudly to be heard above the crashing waves. “You’ve no right to keep anyone here. What has she done?”
“She’s disobeyed,” said Hildred and yanked.
The girl toppled forward but didn’t fall.
“I did not!” cried the girl, and though her voice was high and light, it wasn’t as meek as it’d sounded while Lux was eavesdropping from the cart. Red splotches bloomed on her cheeks. “I quit! I don’t want to work here anymore.”
“There you have it,” said Lux. “You can’t force someone to work for Mothlock. You certainly can’t chain them. That’s not done.”
“You must stay in your room until sunrise. Those are the rules.”
Lux gaped at the woman. Because either she hadn’t heard them, or she was too dense to understand.
“Hildred.” Lux stomped up to her. Sea-spray lifted on the wind and coated her skin.Saints above, we’re too close to the edge.“You’re going to cause her to fall. Unhand. Her.” Lux pried at Hildred’s fingers without hardly any success.
She dug her nails into Hildred’s damp forearm next. The older woman didn’t so much as blink.What the devil.Lux seethed and dropped her hands, reaching for Shaw’s knife.
“I only want to go home. I haven’t done anything I shouldn’t. I only want to go.”
“Mothlock is your home. You will do as the lords say.”
The girl screeched when Hildred’s fist tightened in her hair.
“That’s enough!” Lux shouted and ripped her blade free. “I will use this; I do not care where.”
Hildred hardly glanced at it. Instead, she hauled at her prisoner. But the girl dug in her stockinged feet—and slipped. She fell, crashing to her side, and the momentum propelled Hildred backward.
The girl screamed with a voice full of pain; the attendant hadn’t released her hair but used it as an anchor. Lux didn’t think any further before her wrist whipped out. She cut through red locks of curl easy as butter.
It freed the girl on the ground.
It freed Hildred too.
The woman flailed her arms for balance. Once. Twice. Then she pitched straight off the cliff.
Chapter twenty-eight
Lux’sbodywoundtight.She walked along the precarious edge. Hildred was dead for certain, but she needn’t stay that way. Lux stared hard at the shore far below but could see nothing aside from jagged rocks and frothing waves. It was too dark.
“Where have you gone?” Lux asked.
What have I done?
