Gods. Beside her, she felt Keely tensing to fling open the wardrobe door, leap out, and grab her friend. But the lock was already turning in the outer door. They only had a second to pull the wardrobe closed before the king’s door flew open, and they both froze, muscles trembling with the thwarted need to follow Alanna and the fear of discovery.
She turned her head to look at Keely in the dim space and saw desperate tears swimming in her eyes.
Nim’s chest felt like a giant hand had closed over her ribs and squeezed. What had just happened?
“I thought I told you to put them in here.” The king’s voice, petulant and whining.
“Where are those fucking women? They were here.” Grendel’s oily reply sent an acidic burn of fear through her veins. Her own breathing was loud in the close darkness of the wardrobe.
“What happened to them?” The king’s voice, slightly further away.
“They never came out, Your Majesty. I swear.” The guard’s voice was rough and adamant. Probably terrified.
“Don’t just stand there. You—take the guards and sweep the corridors.”
Boots stamped away.
A different door slammed, and Nim knew they were looking in the bathroom. Grendel growled from nearby, and her gut clenched painfully as sweat broke out down her back. She remembered the feel of him. Rough hands on her throat. Hot breath on her face.
She wanted to slide to the floor and curl into a ball, but she forced herself to stand still. She would face him on her feet.
Suddenly there was a muffled thump. Gods. Had Alanna done something in the other room to call their attention?
There was a moment of stunned silence before Ballanor spat out, “Why the fuck is that door unlocked?”
She heard the men stalking angrily toward the queen’s room. The door crashing open. Loud coughing and wheezing.
Acrid smoke seeped through the cracks around the wardrobe door, scratching her throat, and she had to swallow repeatedly to stop herself from coughing.
“What the fuck?” the king rasped from the other room.
“Why is the queen…?” Grendel’s cold tones broke into a spluttering fit of coughs.
Nim risked a peek out around the side of the door. Ballanor and Grendel had their backs to her and Keely, hallowed in wreaths of smoke, both choking on the pungent fumes. Ballanor went down onto one knee in the doorway as Grendel mumbled something vague and stumbled into Alanna’s room.
It was their only chance.
They crept out of the wardrobe, quickly and silently.
Ballanor gave a rough, confused order, and the shock of hearing his voice so close spurred them into action. They flew across the room, dropping the scraps of fabric from their faces, and desperately praying that the disorienting smoke was masking their escape.
And then they were out, into the blissfully clear air of the corridor. The guards were gone, sweeping the corridors. But for how long?
Holding hands over their chains, they ran like deer in a hunt as Nim tugged Keely along, forcing her faster.
She could hear the other woman sniffing and knew that she was devastated to leave the queen. It was agonizingly awful to run away and leave Alanna behind, but she had no idea what else they could do.
They flew around a corner, and Keely pulled her through a servants’ door onto narrow stairs, lit only with small pools of intermittent light from lamps in recessed sconces. They were both wheezing from the smoke and pounding terror.
Keely was weeping openly, angry tears, leaning against the wall as she shuddered. “Oh, Bard! Oh, how could we? We left her!”
Nim leaned against the wall next to her and felt her own throat clench tight with horror and shock. “We didn’t have a choice.”
“We did! We have to go back!”
Nim took a deep breath, and then another. “If we go back now, all they’ll do is catch us and put us right back where we were. She did this to save us. Don’t make a mockery of her bravery.”
And then, in an ice-cold shock of realization, she finally understood the truth and slowly added, “Sometimes you have to walk away to survive. Not because you want to, but because there’s no other choice. Because if you don’t, then hope is utterly lost. Then everyone dies.”
