Why did you do this? I would ask. Lord, Tessa. I told you of the danger. I showed you what was at risk.
There were times in the workshop where the distance between us was barely enough space to draw breath, and I crave that easy familiarity. That . . . friendship. That simplicity.
The distance between us now may as well be the width of Kandala. I’ll never have any of it back again.
A knock sounds at the door, and the guard outside announces, “His Royal Majesty, King Harristan.”
I stand, but my eyes flash to hers. There are a million ways this could go wrong, and a very short list of ways it could go right. “If you throw a glass of liquor at my brother, I really will have to cut your hands off. Keep your mouth shut.”
Her eyes are wide and alarmed and locked on the door, so maybe she didn’t need the warning. I don’t have time to tell her anything else, because my brother storms into the room like a tornado.
“Corrick. What are you—” He stops short as soon as he crosses the threshold and sniffs at the air. “How much have you had to drink?”
“Not nearly enough.”
His eyes sweep the room, and he stops when his gaze lands on Tessa. She’s drawn into the corner again, but she has the good sense to be on her knees. Her eyes are locked on the floor, and one of the silk pillows is clutched to her chest, as if that would provide any kind of defense against anyone at all.
She looks like a loud noise would cause her heart to stop beating. For half a second, sympathy joins the shame pooling in my chest, but then I realize the chain is nowhere to be seen, and I suspect she’s hiding it.
Please, Tessa. If she attacks my brother, there is literally nothing I can do to save her.
Harristan barely looks at her. His incredulous eyes snap back to me. “What are you doing?”
“Allisander demands punishment. Arella demands leniency. I thought I might have discovered a happy medium.” I move to the side table and fill a new glass, then hold it out to my brother.
He doesn’t take it. “Arella hardly thinks what you’re doing is lenient.” His eyes search mine. “For that matter, neither do I.”
It takes a moment for me to realize what he’s saying. Harristan gives me free rein to do what needs to be done, but he doesn’t like torture for the sake of pain and violence. He doesn’t like prolonging the inevitable.
I drain this drink in one swallow like the others, then drop my voice so my words are for him alone. “As you said, brother, all that matters is what it looks like.”
He frowns. “Cory. I don’t like this.”
I don’t like it either. I look away.
He’s watching me carefully, trying to figure me out. This isn’t like me. I know it. He knows it. He’s going to press me for more of an answer—or worse, for more of a decision. I’ll have to tell him everything, and then Tessa will end up in the Hold, and later, at the end of a rope. I’ll be right there next to her.
But then he coughs. It’s not a small sound, like in recent days. It’s a harsh cough that requires a breath of air that sounds as though it’s pulled through a wet sieve. Then again.
“Harristan,” I say in alarm.
He gives another short cough, then looks at me. “I’m fine.” He clears his throat. “If she escapes your room, she’s going to the Hold.”
I make my voice hard, the way he’d expect it to be. “If she escapes my room, she won’t make it to the Hold.”
I expect him to say more, but Harristan nods and turns away. He’s moving stiffly, his back tight as if he’s trying not to cough again. I stand in the doorway and wait until he’s out of earshot, then look to one of my guards. “Have the kitchen send a pot of tea to the king’s room, along with a vial of the elixir.”
“Yes, Your Highness.” He bows to me, and I close myself back into my chambers.
Tessa is still in the corner, looking at me with wide eyes over the pillow.
“What?” I say flatly.
“The king is sick,” she whispers.
“He is not sick,” I snap. I stride across the floor, and her eyes narrow in a way that tells me she’s going to drop the pillow and swing that chain.
I’m rattled and tired and full of tension, but on top of it all, I’m done with being struck. When she swings, I catch the end and jerk hard, looping it around one of her wrists and then the other so quickly that she cries out. Before she has a chance to fight back, I pin her against the wall, trapping her hands overhead.
She’s breathing hard, her chest expanding rapidly into mine.
“You’re not the first to attack me,” I say.
Her cheeks are flushed, and I wait for her to fight me.
She doesn’t. She stares into my eyes and we share the same air, until the moment shifts. Changes. Softens, though not in the way I expect.
“I wish I’d never let you kiss me,” she says quietly.
I almost flinch. I should have let her hang on to the chain. Being hit with that would’ve hurt less.
“Now I understand why you wouldn’t show me your face,” she adds.
There’s a note in her voice that makes me feel like a coward, and I don’t like it. I have to fight to keep my eyes on hers.
“You didn’t need to bother,” she continues, and her voice is very low, full of censure. “I’ve only ever seen you from a distance.” She hesitates. “This you, I mean.”
“I couldn’t take a chance.”
“Because it’s treason,” she snaps.
I say nothing. It is treason.
“And now what?” she says. “You grew bored with me? With your game?”
My thoughts flash on our last night in the forest, when she was so determined to play a role in a revolution—when she was so determined to get herself killed. She was fierce and reckless and passionate, and for one wild moment, I wanted to stand at her side and believe we had a chance at changing everything.
But of course I couldn’t. I can’t.
She can’t either. Especially not now.
Her heart is a steady thrum in her chest. I can feel it against mine. “I never grew bored with you, Tessa.” Then I frown, my eyes narrowing. “What’s your real name?”
She hesitates. “Tessa Cade.” She swallows. “It is my real name.”
I laugh, but there’s no humor to it. “Of course it is.”
“I’m sorry I’m not as good as you are at pretending to be someone else.” She hesitates, her eyes flicking to the door. “The king doesn’t even know, does he?”
I don’t answer, but I suppose that’s answer enough. I don’t like how easily she seems to see through me. She wrenches at the grip I have on her wrists, but I don’t give an inch. She finally stops, her eyes boring into mine. She lifts her chin boldly. “Fine. Get on with it, then.”
“Get on with it?”
“Whatever you’re going to do.” She’s so brave. It’s honestly astounding that she hasn’t gotten herself killed before now. “Prove your point. Break my bones. Cut my hands off. Set me on fire. Take your dagger and write your name in my—”
“This all sounds like it’s going to get rather messy.”
“Do it.”
“No.” I glance up at her hands, one of which is turning an alarming shade of pink. “I’ll ask again: If I let you go, can you agree not to strike at me?” She hesitates, so I add, “Most people don’t get a second offer. I definitely won’t give you a third.”
She blanches a little at that, and I watch the battle in her eyes as she wars with who I was and who I am.
“Fine,” she says, and her voice is breathy. “I won’t hit you.”
I release her hands and take a step back. I keep the chain and coil it around my hand. She stays pressed against the wall, but she’s rubbing one wrist.
Despite all the defiance, she’s still afraid of me. I can read it in the set of her eyes and the way she clings to the wall, waiting for me to do one of the things she said. As Prince Corrick, I can’t fix that.
Aga
in, I wish for masks, for darkness, for firelight and moonlit paths and everything we’ll never share together again.
Wishing solves nothing. I learned that the night my parents died.
“Are you hungry?” I say to her.
She looks startled, then suspicious, then resigned. “No.”
“I doubt that. You look like you haven’t eaten in a week.”
Her expression darkens. “It was hard to drum up an appetite when the King’s Justice executed my best friend.”
I’m used to having obscenities hurled at me, but her words hit me like the bolt from a crossbow, quick and painful, right through the chest. I have to glance away. I meant to protect her. I’m protecting her even now, and she looks at me like I dragged her out of the woods by her hair and strung her up on the gates myself.
I should have told her. That night, I should have told her.
Maybe I am a coward.
As the feared prince, it might be harder to fix what I’ve done, but it’s easier to force doubt and sorrow out of my head. She’s clutching her hands against her stomach, but I steel my thoughts against her judgmental expression. She can hate me if she wants. I’m used to it.
I move to the chair and my abandoned coat, then pull my pocket watch free. The jeweled face tells me it’s an hour past midnight.
When I open the door, my guards clearly thought I was either asleep or otherwise occupied—because they were leaning close, speaking in low whispers. They snap to attention at once, and they exchange a glance across the hallway.
I’ve given the entire palace enough gossip to last a week, so I don’t chastise them. “Send for a meal,” I say. “Enough for two.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
The door swings closed. I turn away and rub at my eyes. This day will likely never end. I can’t sleep with her here. I’ll wake up with that chain wrapped around my throat. Or worse, not wake up with that chain wrapped around my throat.
I lower my hands and study her. She still hasn’t said what she was doing in the palace, and there’s a part of me that isn’t sure I want the answer.
Her expression has gone flat, her eyes closed off, and she’s pulled into the narrow space between the hearth and the corner, in the shadows. After so many nights in close proximity, this distance feels unbearably far.
A knock sounds at the door, and I jump. It’s too soon for food. My guard calls, “Master Quint requests an—”
I throw open the door before he can come barreling in here. “Quint. Not now—”
But he’s already stepped past me, all but closing the door on my hand. “The Captain of the Guard said you refused to have a man stationed in your room. Honestly, Corrick, it should be two, at the very least—”
“Quint.”
“Consul Cherry has already drafted a formal complaint. Word will reach the Royal Sector by morning, if it hasn’t already.” He sighs. “They do love a good scandal—”
“Quint.”
“But I need to have some awareness of your intentions here so I can address the inquiries—”
“I hardly have awareness of my intentions.”
“When you have a girl chained in your room, it doesn’t leave very much to the . . .” His voice trails off as his eyes fall on Tessa in the corner, then quickly snap to mine. “She snuck into the palace to kill you and you’ve turned her loose? Are you mad?”
“Very likely.”
He sucks in a breath, and I know he’s about to call for the guards, so I slap a hand over his mouth. “Shut up.”
He shuts up.
I’ve never kept secrets from Quint, and I have no intention of starting now. “Quint.” I lower my hand and sigh. “Allow me to introduce you to Tessa.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Tessa
I’ve learned too much in the last hour, and my brain can hardly contain it all. I feel as though I’ve spent the last few years underwater, and Weston—no, not Wes, Prince Corrick—just yanked my head above the surface. If I hold absolutely still, I can almost imagine that this is a terrible dream that I’ll wake up from any moment.
But if I wake up, then Wes is still dead. I am still miserable. People are still dying. Kandala is filled with suffering. The prince and the king are still horrible men who do nothing to help their subjects.
Well, all of that is still true. Wes never really existed at all.
That’s almost harder to accept than his death.
The man who’s entered the room is the same man who first caught me in the hallway. Quint. He looks to be in his early twenties, with red hair and enough freckles to make him look boyish. He needs a shave more badly than Prince Corrick.
I’m clinging to the wall as if I can somehow pass through it and find myself on the outside, heading back to the Wilds and Mistress Solomon’s and my friendship with Karri.
I’m such a fool. I’m never getting out of here.
When the prince says, “Allow me to introduce you to Tessa,” the other man goes still, then sighs and runs a hand across his jaw.
“Tessa,” he says slowly, giving me a clear up and down. He looks back at Corrick. “Your partner?”
Corrick nods.
And just like that, I realize Quint must know about Wes.
I can’t decide if this is infuriating or a relief, to know that I wasn’t the only one aware of Wes’s existence, of the prince’s trickery. I suck in a breath to protest, but Quint puts up a finger. His expression has changed from one of incredulity to one of thoughtful scrutiny. He gives me a slower, more appraising look as he walks toward me. I can feel the moment his eyes skip over the torn fabric at my shoulder, and I clutch it against my skin protectively. But his gaze isn’t licentious, just . . . assessing.
Quint glances at Corrick. “Arella is livid. She thinks you’re forcing the girl into bed this very instant.”
The words make my stomach clench. Corrick hasn’t harmed me—not directly—but that doesn’t mean he can’t, or he won’t.
There’s one thing he said that keeps flickering through all my worries: The only place I can offer you safety is here, in this room.
I have so many questions.
Corrick is clearly not answering. He’s moved to the side table to pour yet another glass of liquor, as if I’m barely an afterthought. “Arella is livid about everything I do lately.”
Arella was the woman who spoke to me when I was chained. Before I knew who Corrick was. I don’t understand why he’d be so terrible in front of her—in front of his guards, even—when he’s made no move to harm me since I arrived in this room.
I open my mouth a second time, but Quint puts up a finger again. “Wait,” he says. “I’m thinking.”
He’s stopped in front of me, and his head is tilted slightly, as if I’m a baffling puzzle he’s been charged with solving. Even though he’s a bit disheveled himself, I feel like I should adjust my clothes and stand straighter.
“Be careful,” says Corrick. “She hits.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Only liars and villains.”
He lifts his glass to me. “Cheers.”
“Can you sing?” says Quint.
I blink. “Can I . . . what?”
“Sing. Or dance? Perhaps you know some sleight of hand?”
“I . . .” What is happening. “No.”
“Quint.” Corrick rolls his eyes.
“The king will never allow you to keep her here as some kind of . . . tortured concubine,” says Quint.
“I won’t allow it either,” I snap.
He’s not paying attention to me. “We’ll need to come up with something else. Something that will satisfy Allisander yet appease Arella.”
“I need to know why you were in the palace,” says Corrick, and his voice has gone cold again, the way it was when he grabbed hold of my hair and jerked tight.
I swallow. “I told you. It was a mistake.”
“Try again.”
It’s easy to see why people are terrified of him. It’s
not just his reputation. When his attention is so focused, it’s hard to think of anything else. I want to rewind time to the brief minute when he was still Wes, unchaining my hands, letting me cling to him the way I’ve done so many times before.
I need to shake this off. Wes doesn’t exist.
And Corrick is still waiting for an answer.
I glance between him and Quint. There’s no use in lying, not when the answer is so boring. “I had to make a delivery in the Royal Sector. I made a wrong turn and found myself facing the palace. I knew—” My voice breaks, and I have to clear my throat. “I knew the supply of Moonflower petals here was more potent than in the other sectors, and I wanted—I wanted—”
“You wanted to steal right from the palace?” says Corrick. “Even I didn’t take from the palace, Tessa.”
“No—I know. I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t even plan it. There were—there were girls. Serving girls, I suppose. I followed them. I thought for sure the guards would stop me, but—but I guess one girl in homespun looks just like the others. I walked right in.”
At that, Quint looks alarmed. Corrick’s whole demeanor darkens.
Quint puts up a hand before he can say anything. “I’ll find out who was stationed there at daybreak. You’ll have names by breakfast.”
I don’t take my eyes off the prince. “You’re going to kill the guard who let me past?”
“I’m certainly not going to write him a letter of gratitude.”
I say nothing, but maybe my horrified expression conveys my thoughts anyway, because he sighs and looks away. “I’m aware of my reputation, but I don’t execute everyone, Tessa.” He pauses. “Besides, I’m surprised you’re sparing a thought to his defense. If he’d done his job, you’d be in the workshop right now, filling vials and loading your pack.”
Hearing him talk about the workshop in such a flat voice makes my throat swell. Like it’s something to be mocked, and not a space where we shared the most important moments of my life over the last few years. I have to press a hand to my eyes before tears can fall.
When I steady my breathing and lower my hands, trying to blink the tears away, I see that Quint is holding out an embroidered handkerchief, and his expression isn’t unkind. It’s so shocking that it drives back some of the emotion. I take it, clutching it between my fingers. It smells like cinnamon and oranges and feels like silk. It’s quite possibly the most expensive thing I’ve ever held in my hands—with the exception of Moonflower petals. I hardly want to use it to dab at my cheeks. “Thank you.”
Defy the Night Page 12