Eduma’s shaking subsides, but she still looks wary. “You . . . you do?”
“Yes. I wanted to ask you about something else. Do you know that around the time you were arrested, your employer’s wife, Neveah, went missing?”
Tears well in her eyes. “I don’t know anything about that. Please, I told all of this to Mister Sixmen and the decurio already. I was telling the truth the first time. Please, can I go home now?”
Heat swells with the force of her lie. My heart shatters for her. It’s rare that I wish to be wrong, but I do now. Eduma looks to be in her thirties. Too young to no longer have the rest of her life ahead of her. I make a vow to get her out of this. She won’t rot in prison for something she didn’t do. “Help answer my questions truthfully, and I’ll talk to the Praeceptor about pardoning you.”
Eduma stares at me in shock. “Truly?”
“I swear. Now, can you tell me the last time you saw Neveah?”
Eduma swallows. “I didn’t see her. I heard her and Honorate Sixmen.”
“When was this?”
“Around this time two years ago.” Eduma ducks her head. “She went missing later that same day.”
“Where were you when you heard them?” I ask.
“The kitchen. I wasn’t supposed to be there. No one was.But I’d forgotten something, so I ran in to grab it. I heard Honorate Sixmen . . . exchanging words with his wife.”
The pause before “exchanging words” doesn’t go unnoticed. “They were arguing?” I press.
Eduma swallows before answering. “Yes.”
No wonder Sixmen got rid of her. He was arguing with his wife the day she mysteriously disappeared.
“Did you hear what they were saying?”
“No,” Eduma says quickly.
A rush of heat accompanies her words. I tense. I don’t want to push this frail woman too hard, but I see no other choice. “Eduma.” I soften my voice further. “I can’t help you if you don’t help me. That’s not true, is it?”
“I—” Eduma’s eyes dart around nervously, looking anywhere but at me. “I’m sorry. Mister Sixmen came to see me last year. I thought I was finally getting out of here.” Tears well in her eyes. “But nothing happened. I don’t want Mister Sixmen to know I said anything and keep me here longer.”
“I promise you, you won’t get in trouble. I won’t repeat anything you tell me to Mister Sixmen. I just need to know the truth so I can get you out of here. Now, what did you hear the day Neveah went missing?”
She shifts in her seat, and her eyes flutter shut for just a moment. When she opens them, she seems to have decided to trust me.
“Honorate Sixmen was mad at his wife about something. She told him it was a mistake she made over twenty years ago, and he needed to get over it. He started yelling at her.”
Twenty years ago . . .
I’ve made a life of collecting secrets. Years of operating as the Shadow Queen have made me well versed at readingbetween the lines of what peopledosay to hear what theywon’tsay.
Someone mentions a “mistake” in a marriage, they’re almost always referring to an affair.
What really snatches my attention isn’t the inkling that Neveah had affairs of her own—it’s the time frame. Twenty years . . . Neveah’s only son, Flynn, is just over twenty years old.
Stars in hell . . .
What if Neveah was hiding more than just an affair? What if she was hiding that Flynn isn’t Selva’s son? The news would be catastrophic. It would mean Selva Sixmen has no children. No sons. No heir to inherit his position in the Honorate. It would be an end to the Sixmen legacy.
Right now, it’s just a theory. But if it’s true, it’s a secret Selva would’ve killed to keep buried.
“What happened after that?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” Eduma says. “I wasn’t supposed to be there, I didn’t think they would like me listening, and . . . well, Honorate Sixmen was yelling so loud, he was scaring me. So, I left. When Mrs. Sixmen went missing later, I didn’t know what to think. At first, I thought she took a break to clear her head. But when she didn’t come back, I thought . . .” Her sentence trails. “Well, I’m not sure what I thought.”
