Orli scoots off the bed and walks to the window. She pushes the curtain aside and peers out into the sunny morning. “Malam didn’t do anything to me.”
I almost miss what she’s saying. But she turns around and repeats her words.
“It was a handful of deranged people. Not Malam. Not Aodren. And the same goes for you and your mum.”
I roll to my side and prop my head on my hand. “What are you saying?”
“I was just thinking if that’s your excuse, maybe you should rethink it.”
My feet dangle as I maneuver off the bed. Frustration at her judgment kicks through me. “That’s easy for you to say. What things are you not doing because you’re stuck in the past?”
Orli’s eyes widen with hurt, and instantly I wish I could pull the words back in.
“You’re right,” she says, abandoning the window. At one time, she would’ve hit back with harder punches. She would’ve made me look at the truth. Because that’s what we used to do for each other. Always tell the truth. How is it we started skirting around the difficult issues? Why have we stopped asking hard questions? Is it because we’d have to answer them ourselves?
“Do you have your da’s letter still?” Orli asks out of the blue.
“I do.” It’s been in the bottom of my boot since it came. I never follow his orders to burn them.
“I could try to locate where he was when he wrote the letter.”
It’s impossible not to stand there and gape. She hasn’t used her Channeler magic since her return. She waited outside the showcase auditions because the number of Channelers there made her uneasy. Who is this girl, standing before me now?
“It takes too much energy,” I say, immediately searching for ways to protect her. I realize what I’m doing and press my lips together. Since when did I become her guardian?
To be fair, my argument is valid. It takes an overwhelming amount of magic to locate a letter’s origin. Also, it might not be that helpful because Da might have left the area. Still, it should be her decision, not mine.
“Seeing as I haven’t been using much energy, I have some to spare. Besides, I want to help with the oil. There’s no way to know where he is now, but the blood charm used on your letter is made from land magic. If there are any threads of energy left, I could locate where he was when he sent the letter. Maybe if you know where he was, it will help you find whoever is responsible for the oil.”
I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before. It takes an incredibly powerful Channeler to perform a blood charm, and we know that a powerful Channeler is responsible for the oil. Could it be that it’s the same person? Da always fulfills his side of a bargain, but what if he stopped looking into Sanguine because he didn’t want to implicate a friend?
And even if it’s not the same person, I haven’t seen Orli this determined in months. She’s finally willing to use her magic again. I don’t want to stand in the way of that. I dig the letter out of my boot and hand it over.
When she apologizes again for not coming tonight, I nudge her shoulder. “You’re already doing something to help me. I’m proud of you for taking this step. Don’t worry about anything else. I like being a carriage driver.”
“Then why’d you bring the dress?” She points at the green material poking out of my bag.
I shrug, and then blush. The truth is I’d hoped Aodren would see me in it, but all I tell her is, “In case a change was needed.”
Orli snorts. “Sure. Tell your king hullo from me.”
Your king. I like the sound of that too much.
* * *
I go to the cathedral on the cliff early, armed with ale, sweet cakes, and Beannach water. If Leif is suffering as Baz did, he’ll need some distractions to take his mind off the Sanguine.
Sneaking into the castle at this hour is much more dangerous than early in the morning or late at night. The number of times I’m forced to slip behind a curtain or duck around a statue is twice that of other times I’ve roamed these halls.
When I reach Leif’s room, however, it’s obvious any risk taken to get here was worth it. He’s a sweating, fidgety mess. Leif paces from one end of the room to the other. He doesn’t even notice I’m here until he’s walked past me a half dozen times. And then he startles and curses.
“Shhhh,” I hiss, mindful of the guards who walk the castle corridors. It was difficult enough to maneuver around them. Drawing their attention now wouldn’t be good.
I cross to the table and pull the items out of my satchel. “I don’t know if these will help, but they might.”
He holds up the ale and snorts. “Should I change one problem for another?”
I know he’s never been much of an ale drinker, and I can see now ale isn’t the best thing. “Don’t be rude. I was only trying to help.”
He rubs a hand over his ruddy cheeks and then flings away some sweat. “Thanks,” he mutters, and paces away. “I wish I never had any of that damn oil.”
“The first bottle saved your life.”
Leif spins around and smacks the post of his bed. “I meant the bludgering fake stuff.”
I don’t respond. He’s more volatile than the last time we spoke. It’s clear by his bare feet and rolled trouser legs, he’s staying in for the night. A good decision, all things considered.
“Why do you look like a scrawny boy?” he asks. His nostrils flare, and for a moment I think he’s going to spout off something meaner, but he reins in the anger and takes a steadying breath. It’s the oil talking.
“It made sneaking in easier.” I shrug.
“Thank you. I’m sorry for acting like a massive scrant.”
“It’ll pass. Usually you’re only a small one.”
Leif smiles. It’s warm and kind, a break in the storm clouds. Even if he is relaxed only for a minute, I’m grateful to have him back. The glimpse of the true Leif saddens me, though, because it proves how damaging the oil can be in such a short amount of time. “Good luck today, Lirra.”
After saying goodbye, I take the servants’ walk to sneak down to the lower floors, but I only make it one level before footsteps and clanks clatter ahead. The aromas of roasted duck and freshly baked bread hit my nose, and I know it must be servers approaching with a meal.
There’s nowhere to hide. I go back up the steps and dart out of the passage into the grand hall, where I hide behind a pillar. But there are guards nearby, so when the servants pour out of the passage, I use their distraction to rush around the pillared rim of the room and lunge for the nearest open door.
Blue and gold flags, Shaerdan’s colors, hang from the ceiling and drape the sides of the corridor. If the servants’ entrance is in the same location as in Akaria’s quarters, I know how to find my way out.
“Where are you going?”
My stomach leaps into my throat, and I slowly turn around to face whoever has discovered me.
No one is there. I spin around to check the empty hall and tiptoe forward a fraction of a step, testing to see if someone is watching me. No one? I huff out a soundless chuckle. I walk another couple of steps and see a door cracked open a sliver. The person who asked the question is in that room. I must’ve overheard part of a conversation.
Male voices rumble from the door. One sounds like Judge Soma. I turn and scurry away, but I pause. Judge Soma has secrets. I can tell by the way he watches others. This conversation might have some information I could use later. Da always said I should make the most of every listening situation.
I wedge behind the nearest draperies. That is when a man’s voice—one I don’t recognize—growls, “Sanguine’s not gonna help with added skill.”
I draw in a silent breath. Sanguine.
A third man’s response sounds irritated. “Sod off, Folger.”
Folger Falk, Otto Ellar, and Judge Soma?
A chair scrapes the floor and then the judge says, “Then don’t take it for yourself. Give it to the Kolontians.”
A man chuckles. “Eliminated Bal
troit easy enough.”
I swallow a gasp.
“I didn’t know . . . It shouldn’t have happened,” a response comes, quieter than the others, stitched with remorse. Maybe Otto?
I need to flee this area and be gone long before they have a chance of finding me, but the need to know what’s going on grounds me in place.
“He was a fool. How many bottles did he swallow?” This comes from Soma.
“Eight. Must’ve drank them all in one day. He was spun. I coulda told Baltroit that Judge Auberdeen had his sister the night before, and he would’ve attacked the chief judge.”
Baltroit was set up on purpose. They meant for him to start a fight so he’d be eliminated. Otto might not have thought it would end in Baltroit’s death, but what of the others? Did Folger and Soma mean for him to die? My chest somehow feels too tight and at the same time hollow, and my heart is banging so loudly.
“Keep it quiet, men,” Soma says. A chair scrapes again, and the door hinges creak. I flatten myself against the stones. “Nothing comes back to me, understand? I don’t want anyone knowing I’m feeding you oil.”
They agree, their voices moving closer to my location, until footsteps clatter on the hall floor. They’re leaving. I shrink even farther into the wall, not daring to breathe until the air shifts from the corridor’s door swishing open and closed, and no more footsteps can be heard.
The roar of blood rushing through my veins is dizzying. I wait another minute or two, until I’m certain they’ve left.
This is proof Soma is the supplier. It makes sense. Prudence said one of the men was tall, and Soma certainly is that. He has a history in trading. And his position in the kingdom would make this dangerous enough for Da to not want to be involved. I have to tell Aodren. Once he knows, we can go together to the chief judge and stop the imposter Sanguine from ruining any more lives.
I dart into the empty hall and rush toward the servants’ passage. My arm catches on something. I trip backwards, cap tumbling off my head, and slam into someone’s body. It’s Judge Soma. He has an iron hold on me. I yank away, trying to free my arm, and his fingers tighten, his grip bruising.
“Lirra Barrett, you aren’t supposed to be here.”
“Let me go.” I thrash to free myself. He twists my arm behind my back until pain screeches through my shoulder and I stop.
“You shouldn’t listen to private conversations.” It’s a deadly low whisper that sends a blast of alarm through me with hurricane force. “Guards!”
* * *
A sheen of nervous sweat dampens my tunic, as the guards drag me down to the holding chamber. I can barely breathe. I cannot go in the cell again. The darkness ahead reaches for me. It clogs my throat. We march closer, but the guards don’t stop. We don’t stop at the holding chamber. Why aren’t we stopping? They’re not going to free me.
Anxiety scuttles down my spine. Whispers across my neck.
“Where are you taking me?”
They don’t bother to answer. Instead they open a door, wherein their lantern light falls on a half dozen torture devices. I start to kick and yank away, but their grip is too strong. I twist my hands, drawing on my Channeler magic. We’re not ever supposed to use it to harm, but right now it’s a necessity to protect myself. I conjure a wind, pulling it to me, and forcing the men to struggle against the gust. I jerk out of the guard’s grip.
“Stop her,” he shouts.
I change tactics, not wanting them to alert any other guards, and I call the air from the man, creating a vacuum so he struggles to breathe. His eyes widen, and he tries without success to suck in air. I won’t do this too much longer. Just until he passes out.
A hand slams my face. My head whips to the side, and I stumble, pain bursting across my cheek.
“You scrant,” the second guard curses.
Splotches blink across my vision. I clutch my face and groan.
“We’re going to let you rot down there.” His spittle wets my cheek. “You used your magic to hurt a man. That’s against the law.”
He drags me past the tables to a small door at the rear of the room. The guard I pulled the air away from pulls the door open, and light from his lantern spills into the space beyond.
He curses at me. “Get down there.”
It’s a narrow room; at least, from what I can see of the rounded walls, it doesn’t seem as if it’s more than a body’s length in diameter. But it’s deep. So deep I cannot see the floor. It could be three stories deep, or ten.
The guard chuckles darkly behind me, the sound echoing down into the hellish hole.
This is an oubliette.
This is the room in the castle, where criminals are left to rot. Every child in Shaerdan has been scared into finishing their chores by threat of the oubliette.
My legs lock up. I twist and try to jerk away while focusing my energy into my palms. But the guard smacks me again, and my lip splits. The metallic tang of blood coats my tongue.
The men shove me so that I stumble forward, falling halfway over the edge. I cry out. I scramble to grasp the rope ladder, and my heart turns frantic and tries to punch free. The guards laugh. One tells me to climb down before he loses patience and tosses me to the bottom.
Bastard.
The ladder twists and sways with my descent. The anticipation of being locked in here has me breathing like I’ve scaled a mountain. It saps my energy, making it feel like I’ve gone a league before I reach the bottom of the oubliette. I try to convince myself it’s nothing to fear.
The moment the ladder is out of my hands, the guards tug it upward, leaving me no way to climb out. Then they slam the door.
I shudder and stare at the residual lantern glow peeking around the door’s edges. A hand squeezes my lungs, and icy fingers walk across my neck.
I breathe in and out and in and out, keeping the rhythm the same until I’m calm. Calmer than the time I fell into the neighbor’s dry well. In hindsight, the well wasn’t frightening. I made it out alive. I tell myself that this oubliette is just like the well, so there’s nothing to be panicked about. Nothing at all.
The light snuffs out.
An exhale rattles out of me. I suck in, but the air is too thin. It doesn’t fill my lungs. I try again: in and out, in and out. Why is there not enough air?
I’m not afraid. I was fine in the dry well. I’m fine here. Finer than if they’d hanged me. There’s space to sit. Space to curl up and sleep. There’s air to breath, I just need to slow down. I’m fine, really I am.
I sit down and pull my knees to my chest. My foot hits a stick. Were prisoners of old allowed to build fires? Any fire in as tight a space as the oubliette would have to be really small. My fingers grope around and find something hard and round and made with holes and teeth and—ohgodsohgodsohgods. The skull falls from my hands and clatters against other sticks. Sticks that are actually bones.
I prop my head on my legs and fight for a semblance of calm. Focus. Panic isn’t going to help me escape the hell out of this hole.
Chapter
31
Aodren
SEGRANDE AND I GO TO THE KINGDOMS’ Market hours before the start of the Channeler showcase. Leif stayed behind. He didn’t look well. I wonder if he pushed himself too hard after coming so close to death.
We wind through the crowds, guards at our sides for protection. Picking up stray information is almost impossible with a group this size. But since the meeting we had with the Guild and the Akarians, Segrande has found a distraction from the pain of his son’s death. His desire to catch the supplier has become his sole focus.
When we reach the north end of the market, we pause by the tavern tent.
The Akarian, Kolontian, and Plovian competitors saunter off the tournament field, their scuffed and sweaty attire attesting to the time they’ve spent sparring today. The swordfight takes place tomorrow, and two days after that, it will be the Channeler showcase. People cluster closer, until the crowd has grown so large the competitors cann
ot pass. Two of our guards rush ahead to help break up the crowd, but their efforts aren’t needed after a carriage arrives. The crowd parts to make way.
Folger and Otto emerge from the carriage and follow the others into the champions’ tent.
“Didn’t you say Otto gave the oil to my boy?” Segrande’s hunched shoulders might appear defeated to anyone else, but I see the way his chest moves up and down and the heavy blow of his breath parts his beard. He’s barely containing his fury.
“That’s what I heard.”
He lunges forward, but my hand seizes his arm, halting his stride. If I let him go in the tent, he will kill Otto.
“Let me go,” I tell Segrande. “He may know who the supplier is.”
“He is the reason my son is dead.” His voice sounds hoarse and out of breath as he says this.
“No,” I tell him, lowering my voice so the guards don’t hear. “We don’t know if he knew the oil would kill Baltroit. For all we know, Otto may be just as misinformed. I will go and speak with him.”
The fury Segrande showed a second ago is gone. Now he seems lost. “Go on,” he says. “I’ll wait.”
The guards split, some remaining with Segrande and others trailing me to the tent. It takes some convincing, but I manage to get them to stay when I dart around the back side.
“You look like you could use something to pick you up.” A voice comes from ahead. I peek around the corner, seeing Otto talking to Hemmet.
Hemmet snorts and props his hands on his hips, making himself even broader. “You’re talking to the wrong man. I showed up to spar today. Where were you? Perhaps you should take your own pick-me-up and shove it—”
“I was busy. Other things going on. How’s your head?” Otto asks, as if he and Hemmet are comrades. Which is a feeling obviously not shared by the other man.
Hemmet grunts.
“Look, I’m just trying to help a fellow competitor out. If you want something better than the Beannach water, something to get rid of the pain, come talk to me.” Is he offering Sanguine?
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