She’d worked every day to make him proud?—to prove that she had learned her lesson, would not repeat the same mistakes. But she had made mistakes regardless, planted seeds of doubt that Richard now sought to water. He was likely dragging her name through the mud this very second, so that even if she escaped, it would be impossible to show her face. Without anyone to advocate for her, what would her father decide? They had been separated seven years. Her term reports had always been excellent, but the headmistress had never missed an opportunity to write home for every infraction. Was three weeks long enough for her father to see the change in her? To know that she could never commit the crimes Richard had charged her with? Her lungs constricted. She flung herself down on the hard cot.
Poppy couldn’t go back to Welkland. She had lost seven years of her home and family to exile, and she would not allow it to happen again. She had not pushed herself so hard at Thornhaven, swallowing racist vitriol?—
Thornhaven! Poppy scrambled upright. Richard had instructed his accomplice to write to a cousin in Welkland, who hadattended Thornhaven at the same time as she had.
Only one woman at Thornhaven fit that description: Geraldine Alderfort. Poppy’s heart sank. Richard had allied himself with the Alderforts. If he was forging alliances with the other First Families, then he’d been gearing up to take the viceroy’s office for a while now?—muchlonger than their brief courtship.
Poppy wouldn’t let him have it. She would die before she let Richard inherit her father’s office. He was untrustworthy, manipulative, vile?—the least worthy successor she could possibly imagine.
I would have made a better successor.
The rogue thought rushed through Poppy’s mind with a vicious edge that shocked her. She tried to shove the idea back down. It was preposterous?—there had never been a female viceroy, and certainly not a Virian one.
But why should that stop her? She had all the trappings of a proper heir: She was her father’s eldest child, she had an education just as extensive as most of her peers, if not more, and she cared deeply about the future of her island. Had her father not said something similar at dinner the day she had returned? The possibility had certainly threatened Richard, so much that he had mentioned succession laws to his accomplice the night of the party. If he had taken her father’s words seriously, perhaps she should too.
The more Poppy thought about it, the harder it was to silence the idea. The role of viceroy would bring her more stability than any husband. She’d hold the highest-ranked office in the land, answerable to none but the Welkish emperor. No one could exile her. She would be in charge, free to roll back the brutal, ineffectual laws that held the colony back. The export crisis, the famine?—she could pass new laws, increase the food supply, distribute resources to those who actually needed them, not just the police. She could do so much more than build orphanages. She could sendRichardoff to Welkland, where he could never threaten her again.
But for any of this to happen, she had to get out of this cell. And if it meant using the last tool she had available to her, the one she had sworn to never use again, well, so be it.
Poppy closed her eyes and reached for her unnatural powers. Holding her breath, she tentatively explored the walls of her cell with her mind. Her stomach turned in response, but she ignored the discomfort, pushing harder. Her senses found moisture, cool and smooth, in the ceiling. It flowed in a cylindrical shape?—a pipe. If she could stop it from moving, and create enough pressure, she could blow a hole in the ceiling and escape.
She pushed on the water with all her might, forcing the flow to halt. Pressure built as the water accumulated behind her block, but she held firm, even as spots danced in her vision.Come on.The water tested her, seeking a way out. She gagged, the nausea disrupting her concentration. As she slumped back onto the cot, something gave way in her mind. The pipe burst?—but not with the satisfying, room-destroying explosion she’d been aiming for.
Water trickled from a small fissure in the pipe, pooling in the space between the upstairs flooring and the cell’s ceiling. It was trapped.
Just like Poppy.
She turned and retched over the side of her cot, then promptly passed out.
Chapter Fifteen
Stalemate
Zeyar had stopped speaking to Hasan.
Which was fine, because Hasan had nothing to say to him anyway. That was what he told himself as he stood in the Devar Brothers Shipping Co. office, angrily preparing Poppy’s lunch: a cup of chai, a cucumber-and-chutney sandwich, and four digestive biscuits. It wasn’t much, but it was more than what many had. He put the dishes on a tray and headed down to the basement.
Normally, when Hasan arrived, Poppy would already be standing by the door, looking down her nose at him as though she were one of the maharanis of old as she fired questions at him like bullets. Her ability to remain haughty and imperious, dressed in an oversized, threadbare salwar kameez, was impressive; he’d give her that.
But this time, she wasn’t there. He frowned, balancing the tray against his hip as he turned the key in the lock. “Miss Sutherland?”
The door swung open. Poppy was inside, lying on her bed. He took a step forward?—right into the middle of a small puddle.
He jerked back as water seeped into his sock. “Where the fuck did this water come from?” Something wet struck his forehead with a splat. He tilted his face up. A dark shadow stained the ceiling.A pipe must have burst.As he stared, another droplet fell, catching him right below the eye.
He cursed. In this drought, the burst pipe might as well have been a severed artery, the room soaked with blood.Focus on the problems you can solve.He turned his attention back to Poppy. “Get up, Miss Sutherland,” he ordered. “I’ll transfer you to a dry cell.”
She didn’t move. He glared at her. Of course, after consistently bombarding him with questions nonstop, the obstinate woman had chosentodayto give him the cold shoulder. “If you want to molder away in a wet cell, be my guest! I’m leaving.”
She still didn’t stir. Hasan narrowed his eyes, sensing something amiss. He put her food tray down in a dry corner and approached the cot.
Then he noticed the bile spattered at the side.
“Are you ill?” he demanded, his frustration forgotten. How had she gotten sick? Had it been something in the food? Anxiety drove his voice up in pitch as he called her name, trying to rouse her. “Miss Sutherland. Miss Sutherland?”
She remained limp. He leaned over her, gently rolling her body face up. “Poppy?” She was boneless in his arms, just as she’d been that first night on the Montrose driveway. The green-and-violet bruise on her temple stood in lurid contrast to her ashen, bloodless face. The sight sent his heart plummeting.
He kneeled on the bed beside her, searching for a pulse. “Please, please don’t be dead,” he whispered, the sound barely audible over the blood roaring in his ears. The only heartbeat he could feel was his own, racing at an alarming speed. If she was dead, this would ruin everything. Montrose would kill Paranjay for sure. Zeyar wouldneverspeak to Hasan again.
