By the time she reached the stables, the hands on duty knew there was a noble on his way and gave Carys barely more than a quick leer before she passed into the grand structure that smelled of hay and manure. Horses nickered. Hay crunched under her feet. The dim glow from wind-powered sconces lit her way as she headed toward the ladder that led to the hayloft where Carys, Andreus, and Larkin spent hours playing over a decade ago.
A stiletto clutched in one hand, Carys reached the loft. No wind-powered lights graced its walls, and Carys squinted into the shadows as she moved carefully deeper into the hayloft.
“Larkin?” she whispered, clutching the stiletto tight. Hay crackled in the corner and Carys turned in that direction. Nothing there. She whispered Larkin’s name again and jumped as something else rustled in the loft.
“Larkin?” Two stacks of hay moved and Larkin appeared. “Thank the Gods,” Carys whispered, hurrying forward toward her friend, who was wide-eyed and pale. “Are you okay?”
“I worried that your maid wouldn’t give you the message or that you wouldn’t understand where to come or that I wasn’t hidden well enough and someone might have seen me.” Fear colored Larkin’s voice and her eyes were bright with tears.
“What is it? You can tell me—whatever it is.”
Larkin nodded and swallowed hard. “I know you wanted me to leave town and my father and I planned to, but I wanted to bring you the dress I’d been working on for you. The tournament was over and everyone was returning by the time I reached the castle with the garments. There were rumors about an attack at the tournament and I wasn’t sure if someone would question me coming to the castle, so I went through the maze paths in the courtyard that lead to the kitchen gardens.” She paused to breathe. “It was there I heard Lady Imogen’s voice coming from around the corner. I started to go back the way I came. But that’s when I heard her tell someone not to worry. That Prince Andreus already was hers in ways Micah never was and once you were killed he would rely on her even more. She said that once the appointed time came for the true King to take the throne, Prince Andreus would be far easier to kill than Prince Micah and King Ulron had been.”
For a moment Carys couldn’t breathe. The words slammed through the haze that surrounded her and the truth dawned. “They killed Micah and my father.”
“I believe so, Highness. I should have left and found the guards and brought them there to hear them speak, but I didn’t know who to trust. And I was too scared to move.”
Carys was certain had Larkin left she would never have brought the guard back in time. Even if she had, after the part Captain Monteros and his men had played in tonight’s trial, there was a chance he was part of Imogen’s plot. If that were the case, Larkin wouldn’t be standing here to tell her tale now.
“You did the right thing. Did the person Lady Imogen was speaking with give any clue as to his identity?”
Larkin nodded. “His voice was low and quiet and I think I heard him say something about a visit to the North Tower, but I can’t be sure.” Larkin took a deep breath and looked Carys square in the eye. “But I am sure she referred to him once as Elder and that he is on the Council.”
The Council that was running the Trials—the Trials that would end if one of the twin heirs to the throne won or ended up dead.
“She said her visions told her they would triumph. That the orb would crack and the winds would sweep in a new ruler to sit on the Throne of Light. Just as they planned.”
A new ruler. Did that mean Andreus, or someone completely new?
It had to be Garret. Or was it? He had wanted something when he talked to her today, but it felt as though he wanted something from her personally, not just the crown.
Carys’s head spun. Her legs tingled, spots appeared in front of her eyes, and she grabbed the stack of hay bales for support.
“Are you okay, Highness?” Larkin rushed forward to take her arm.
“I’m fine,” she said as the lightheadedness faded. “It’s you I’m worried about. You have to—”
They both jumped at the sound of footsteps in the stables. Carys’s heart hammered against her chest as the footsteps stopped near the ladder. Then whoever was below began to climb.
“Behind me,” Carys hissed, ignoring the weak trembling of her legs as she lifted her stiletto and prepared to throw.
“Should I be concerned that you’re making a habit out of aiming that at me, Highness?” Lord Errik asked as his head and shoulders appeared. Carys lowered the stiletto with relief. Before she could ask why he had abandoned his job as a distraction, he said, “We’ll have to talk about your penchant for sharp objects later because unless I’m mistaken, this lady is the clever seamstress the guard believes was part of today’s plot to assassinate the Prince.”
“What?” Larkin gasped as Carys said, “That’s ridiculous.”
“I would tend to agree, but the guard won’t find my point of view all that compelling. From what I could learn in my quest to play irritating nobleman, they have sealed the gates under orders from the Council of Elders and are searching every house in the city in order to find her.” Errik turned toward Larkin. “I fear, my lady, you have made an enemy who wishes to see you dead.”
Imogen. She must have seen Larkin in the courtyard or perhaps she simply learned of Carys’s secret friendship and was using Larkin against her. “You have to get out of the city.”
“How?” Larkin asked, panic clear on her face. “With the gates sealed, there’s no way out.”
And eventually the guards would search the stables. If they found her, Larkin’s time in the North Tower would last only long enough for the Council and Imogen to organize her execution. Larkin couldn’t stay here. She couldn’t leave the city. Carys only knew of one place Larkin could hide where the guard would not know to look.
She studied Errik and wished she knew more about him. He was handsome. Clever. Determined. And he pulled at her in ways she hadn’t expected or wanted to think about. But could he be trusted?
Her stomach clenched. Her legs felt weak again, and she put a hand on the hay to steady herself as she weighed her options and realized she had none. If she wanted to keep Larkin alive, she would have to trust Errik with another secret.
“You have to hide until they have called off the search, and I know a place where they won’t find you.”
Quickly, she told Larkin about the hidden room behind the tapestry and the passages in the plateau under the castle. “Errik will have to escort you there. If Lady Imogen and anyone on the Council are behind this, they will have people looking for me in the hope that I’m helping you.” Putting her in the North Tower as a coconspirator for the assassination against Andreus would certainly guarantee her brother gained the throne.
“There’s no way the guards are going to let me into the castle looking like this,” Larkin said.
Damn. Larkin was right. Her pulse pumped. “There has to be a way to get you in.”
“There is,” Errik said. “Where’s your ball gown, Highness?”
“In the basket below, but it won’t fit Larkin.”
“It doesn’t have to fit,” Errik said with a smile. “Go back to the castle, Highness. I pledge my word, I will see your friend safely hidden away.”
She had no choice. Carys took her terrified friend’s hand and said, “Do as Lord Errik bids. He’ll keep you safe until I can find a way out of this for you.”
“And my father, Your Highness?” Larkin asked. “What about him?”
Goodman Marcus. She hadn’t thought that far ahead. Now that she had, a cold dread settled into the pit of her stomach. “He doesn’t have the same connection to me that you do, and he didn’t hear what you heard. He should be safe . . . for now.” They would throw him in the North Tower when they couldn’t find Larkin, but they wouldn’t kill him. Not if they could use him to draw his daughter out of hiding. But the image of the kindly, thin man with his warm voice and gentle hands in those cells pulled at her. She was a princess,
a member of the royal family of Eden, and yet she couldn’t be more helpless to prevent his suffering.
Swallowing down the knot of tears, she said, “Worry about getting yourself to the hidden room first, and I’ll be thinking of ways to get you out of this. I promise.” Even though she couldn’t. Not now. Maybe not ever. And if she didn’t come up with a way to defeat the treachery in the castle, everyone she cared about would end up dead.
Carys turned quickly toward the ladder so Larkin wouldn’t see the frustration and tears flooding her. Errik followed close behind. When they reached the bottom, he handed her the other stiletto from the basket and took her arm before she could leave.
“I will help your friend into hiding, Highness,” he said. “But you must know she will never be safe. The Council and your seeress have branded her a traitor. They will continue the hunt for her for years if necessary in order to demonstrate what happens to those who defy the crown.”
“Then what?” she hissed as anger heated the hollowness inside her. “You think I should just let the guards have her and be done with it?”
“No, Highness.” He reached up to her face and brushed away a tear that she hadn’t realized had fallen. “But you might want to consider other options. When a battle is being lost on one terrain, sometimes an army must draw back and find new ground to fight on.” He stared into her eyes for several long moments, then said, “I will get word to you when the package is safely delivered.” He took the dress out of the basket, put her stilettos back in, and shoved a bunch of hay on top before handing it to her. “Now, Princess, you should go.”
She hurried back to the castle the way she’d come, shivering as the wind gusted. The windmills seemed louder with every step. A guard stopped her at the gate and pulled her cap off her head to check the color of her hair.
Carys held her breath and tightened her grip on the basket as the man walked slowly around her. Sweat trickled down her neck and she tried to guess how long it would take for her to reach inside the basket and pull out the stilettos if it came to that. Finally, he gave her backside a squeeze and told her to come to the guardhouse after her kitchen duties.
“Me and my friends will pay you well for your time.”
Carys bit back the angry words that sprang to her lips and instead smiled. “I’m worth more than the few coppers you have in your pockets.”
“Name your price and if you prove you’re worth it, we’ll pay it.”
“A lord once said I was worth a sack of gold.” She smiled. “But I’ll take a sack of silver since you asked so nice.”
Swaying her hips, she hurried away from the guard. Then, ditching the basket behind a hedge in the courtyard, Carys jammed the cap back on her head, clutched the stilettos at her side, and kept her face tilted down as she passed servants and nobles stumbling back to their rooms after the ball.
Nowhere did she see Imogen or any of the Elders. Nor her brother. She would look for him after she changed and steadied herself. She needed just a bit of the Tears to stop her thoughts from tripping over one another.
When she reached her floor, she plucked the cap off her head, shook out her hair, and then walked around the corner as though her attire were typical. A young guard was stationed outside her door—the same one who had walked her from the North Tower. He glanced at her gray gown but said nothing as she let herself into her rooms and sagged against the door after it closed behind her.
Larkin’s scared warning.
The boy’s head falling with a sickening thud onto the polished floor.
Andreus’s expression of pride when he was declared the winner.
Errik’s warning and his smile.
The images swarmed in her head. Her fingers shook as she unfastened her dress, jumping when the fire in the hearth crackled and when the wind howled outside her window. Everything in her tensed and clenched as she pulled a simple-to-fasten dress out of her wardrobe and slipped it on. Then she knelt down next to her wardrobe and dug in the back with unsteady hands for the red bottles and the answer to the anxiety that was getting worse with every passing minute. She needed more of the Tears. Just a little would make it better—smooth everything out so she could find a way out of all of this for her and her brother, as she had always done.
Only when her hands opened the small panel at the back of the closet and she reached inside, she felt nothing.
Carys pushed herself to her feet. She grabbed armfuls of fabric and threw dresses to the floor until the wardrobe was empty and there was nothing blocking her view to confirm what she already knew.
The red bottles she needed were gone.
16
Andreus turned the empty red bottle over in his hand, then set it next to the line of other bottles on the table before going back to the window and closing it.
Perhaps he should get rid of the bottles so Carys would be forced to wonder who was responsible for taking them. Rarely did he deliberately provoke her anger. After all, he had always needed her to work with him to protect his secret. His curse.
Now that Elder Jacobs was bringing the Council to Andreus’s side, he didn’t need Carys to protect him anymore.
Still he stared at the bottles, marveling at how far they had come in only a week. Carys working to orchestrate an assassination attempt. Him ordering an innocent boy put to death.
The boy.
Andreus shook his head against the memory of the blade slicing through Varn’s neck. The sounds the head and the body made when they hit the floor.
Those sounds proved he was strong, he told himself. They proved he would be a king people feared and respected and would not cross.
He shifted his gaze from the bottles toward the bed where his mother slept before stepping out of the dim room and into the light.
Oben stood and asked, “Did the Queen stir at all when you spoke to her, Your Highness?”
“I’m afraid not, Oben,” he said with a sigh. “Whatever Madame Jillian gave Mother has her in a deep sleep.”
Oben shook his head and clutched his hands together. “Your mother seemed more lucid the last time she was awake. Madame Jillian was hopeful that this last dose would clear the rest of the darkness from the Queen’s mind and return her to us as she was before the King and Prince Micah died.”
“I hope that is true, Oben,” Andreus said, turning for the door. “You will send word if my mother’s condition changes?”
“I will, Your Highness. When it does, the Queen will be glad to hear you and so many others have come to spend time at her side.”
“Others?” he asked. “What others?”
“Several of the visiting dignitaries and High Lords have come to ask after the Queen. I have refused them all, but at one point I stepped out and when I returned Elder Ulrich was exiting the Queen’s room. He apologized for not waiting for me to allow him entry, but insisted it was of the utmost importance for him to see the Queen’s condition for himself.”
Andreus stilled. “Did he tell you why?”
“Only that it had to do with the Council’s duty to the safety of the realm.”
“Did he stay long?”
“Quite a while, Your Highness, and he spoke with her. I thought I heard the Queen’s voice while he was in there, but Elder Ulrich swore she never woke.” Oben shrugged. “I must be hearing things.”
Or not. Andreus looked back at his mother’s closed door. “What did you imagine you heard?”
“Nothing really, Your Highness. Elder Ulrich was speaking too quietly for me to make out the words. There was only one I thought I heard clearly.”
“What word was that?”
“Curse. Not long after that Elder Ulrich came out of the Queen’s room looking disturbed.”
As Andreus was now.
Could his mother have been talking in her drug-addled sleep and let loose Andreus’s secret? The possibility haunted him as he walked back to the Hall of Virtues, his hand on the hilt of his sword in case someone was hidden in the shadows. He almost hoped so
meone did attack. After years of living in fear of having his curse discovered and being slaughtered for the crime of being born, he was glad to face enemies he could see and kill.
The true question for him now was whether his sister was one of them.
The Hall of Virtues was empty and dark except for the throne, which was sitting in a round pool of light. All signs of the ball and the trial that had taken place here were gone.
“Prince Andreus?”
He turned and spotted Max standing in the arched doorway and smiled. “I guess you received my message. Come in.” The boy nodded and took several hesitant steps into the room instead of racing forward as was his typical way. “You must be tired,” Andreus said. “You’re normally in bed by now.”
Max shrugged and looked down at his shoes.
Andreus walked toward the boy. “Is something wrong, Max? Are you feeling all right? Have you had trouble breathing today?”
“I had a . . . ” The boy frowned. “Asode?”
“An episode?” Andreus asked, and the boy nodded.
“On the battlements. One of the Masters called for Madame Jillian and she had to leave the girl she was helping that was dying. She made me drink something even worse and yelled at me for being out in the cold air. She says cold is bad for me and that she warned me not to go on the battlements until it was warmer and said if I did it again I’d have to come help her tend to the sick, which I don’t want to do because the girl she was helping was the doom. You should have seen her face . . .”
From the look on Max’s, Andreus was glad he didn’t have to. “You shouldn’t go on the battlements anymore.”
“But I had to tonight,” Max insisted. “The Lord devil man went up there and you told me to watch him.”
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