Tristan shook his head. He didn’t need to say anything. It had been extremely dangerous getting in, and it would look suspicious if they suddenly left. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to start sidling toward the doors. If they got into the grounds, at least they could go and look for Tor. And perhaps Val had been moved to the cells.
They both took a step toward the door, and then another.
Before they could go any further, there was a disturbance from the courtyard. The musicians faltered and then, at a gesture from the king, stopped playing. The crowds elbowed and shoved, trying to see what was happening.
Tristan wrapped a solid arm around her waist and drew her back toward the wall, ducking his head down beside hers so that he could watch unobtrusively, as she stood on her toes looking between the people in front of them.
A small unit of Blues stepped into the door and immediately spread out, clearing a wide space as the banquet guests pushed even further back.
Between them stood a small woman, her red-blond hair falling loose down to her waist. She was dressed in a short, sleeveless muslin shift that showed the green bands of stylized Verturian knots tattooed around her biceps—but nothing else.
Tristan bent closer to her ear and whispered almost too low to hear, “Keely, the queen’s maid.”
The crowd in front of her parted slightly, and Nim could see that Keely was barefoot on the cold stone. And that she had a long chain shackled to one ankle, the end gripped firmly by the lead soldier.
She must have been terrified, but Keely’s back was straight, her eyes narrowed in a glare of such loathing that Nim could feel its fury all the way from where she stood at the back of the hall.
Nim turned her head to watch the king. For the first time, he’d lost his bored slouch and was sitting forward, his lips curled up in an arrogant smirk.
He held out a hand, his rings sparkling as he gestured the guards closer.
The group walked forward, the chain rattling along the floor in the ominously silent hall, and stopped in the clear space in front of the throne.
The king stood abruptly and stepped down from the dais to the floor, heels clicking on the marble as Keely took a stumbling step backward in a futile attempt to escape.
The lead guard chuckled and shoved her forward, hard enough that she tripped on the chains at her feet and fell heavily to her knees in front of King Ballanor.
Ballanor smirked down at the woman at his feet. He leaned forward and put his face against hers, his voice low but clearly audible in the frozen hall. “I told you you’d get on your knees for me eventually.”
Keely pushed herself backward, her bare feet scrabbling on the slippery floor as she tried to stand, but the guard grabbed hold of her hair and held her still.
Ballanor simply watched in amusement before lifting his hands and clapping loudly. The doors were flung open once again, and a new set of guards stepped in. The first immediately stepped to the side and called in a loud voice, “Her Majesty, Queen Alanna of Brythoria.”
A second later a tall, slim woman stepped into the hall, head bowed and arms clasped in front of her. She had long, golden hair lying loose in a soft fall down her back, held back from her face by a gleaming diadem, its intricate Verturian knotwork reflected the intertwining green tattoos around the tops of her bare arms. Her luxurious dress, the color of the deep forest, was cinched in at her tiny waist with a gold belt of the same weave as her diadem and the tattoos around her biceps.
She lifted her head, and the crowds nearest her gasped softly. She simply lifted her chin further and made slow eye contact with her mesmerized audience.
As she turned her head, Nim saw what had caused the onlookers’ shock. One side of the queen’s face was marred by a livid purple and green bruise. Her lip was split and her eye puffy and swollen.
Queen Alanna acted as if nothing was amiss, simply took one graceful step forward, followed by another, flanked by her guards as the crowd separated before her.
The woman her brother had returned to protect kept her spine straight and her posture elegant as she slowly scanned the mass of people in front of her.
Alanna’s gaze traveled over Nim, passed, and then flew back to her, their eyes meeting in a flash of something that seemed like recognition before the queen quickly swung her head away and stared at the king, resolutely ignoring Nim and the mass of gaping guests.
Nim had heard that Queen Alanna was cold and uncaring, proud and difficult. But Val had told her that everything she’d ever heard about the queen was a lie.
She watched her now, a young woman, not much older than Nim, alone in a foreign country, bruised and hurting. Standing with grace and poise despite the evidence of abuse all over her face, while her husband sneered maliciously down at her. A husband Nim already distrusted on every level.
She didn’t look proud and difficult to Nim; she looked like a woman who had wrapped her armor around herself so tightly that she could barely carry the weight. But who was pushing forward nonetheless. A woman who had known who Nim was. Could easily have given her away. But who quickly averted her gaze instead, protecting her.
The guards walked the queen up to Ballanor, forcing her to stand before him.
And then Nim saw Grendel stepping away from the refreshment table closest to the dais to stand beside the king. He had been hidden by the crowds before, but now she couldn’t miss him. Her breath caught in a reflexive flood of fear and horror, and she flinched, every nerve standing on end.
Tristan’s hand wrapped around hers and gripped it tightly, and she clung to him, using his strong grasp to anchor her. Forcing herself to stay still and silent as they watched the king play out his macabre little act.
“Thank you for joining us, wife,” Ballanor drawled as Queen Alanna dropped a rigid curtsey. He flicked his fingers toward the kneeling maid. “I seem to have found a little butterfly flitting about the palace.”
