Sam could barely move. She could barely breathe. Was her augmentation fading? Could Alec tell?
Thoughts of Tray had faded, but now she thought of him again. “Where is Tray?”
The princess frowned. “Your brother? He was brought here as a way to draw you here.”
Sam tensed. Did the princess know that Tray was a Theln?
Maybe she didn’t. Maybe Tray was still safe.
“Why not simply ask me to come?”
“Because your connection to Marin is problematic. Still, you have potential. There are few enough Kaver and Scribe combinations. And some of the ones in the city work for the Thelns. They have a network, but we have failed time and again to infiltrate it. The last time we tried, we nearly lost my Kaver.”
Sam glanced over to the window again where the Kaver still sat. What could she learn from someone who knew how to use their abilities? It had to be much more than simply what she and Alec could discover fumbling around. Without a willing instructor, they were limited. Marin had begun to share, but she worried more about Tray than about teaching Sam.
Would the princess do something to him if she refused? “Don’t hurt Tray.”
“We had no intention of hurting Tray. Your… brother… is perfectly safe.”
Sam tensed. Why did she say it like that?
“And what of Alec? He’s the reason that you still live. Without him—”
“Your Scribe is safe attending the university. It was quite clever of you to encourage him to go there.”
Sam flushed. Clever wasn’t something that many people called her, and in this case, it wasn’t fitting. “I’m not sure that encourage is quite the right word.”
“Without the Thelns, we never would have found you.”
“You said that before. I’ve been in Caster my whole life. I’ve never been lost.”
“That, Samara, is where you are wrong.”
That came from the Kaver sitting quietly near the window. The woman stood and approached slowly. She had a narrow face and a sharp jawline. Her black hair reminded Sam of her own. There was a resemblance between them, and Sam wondered if it came from the fact that they were both Kavers.
“What do you remember of your mother?” the Kaver asked.
Sam frowned. “I know that my mother was killed by Thelns.” It made her hate them—and fear them—even more. “I hadn’t known how she died until recently, but that’s what I’ve been told.”
“Who told you that your mother was killed by Thelns?” the Kaver asked.
Sam glanced from the Kaver to the princess. Marin would have to know them, wouldn’t she? Why would she hide that from her?
Then again, Marin had attacked the Kavers. And the princess had mentioned the danger her Kavers had been in. Could this all be about Marin?
“Marin. She was my mother’s friend. She’s the one who explained to me that I was a Kaver.”
The princess and the Kaver glanced at each other, but neither said anything.
“Your mother wasn’t killed by a Theln,” the Kaver said.
“If she didn’t die because of the Thelns, what happened?”
“She was betrayed. Someone who was supposed to be her friend attacked her. The same person who has been attacking the Kavers who returned to the city, reducing our protections.”
Sam trembled, thinking of everything she’d seen over the last few months. Marin’s disappearance. The danger she alluded to. The attacks on the Kavers. “Marin? Is that who you mean?”
The Kaver nodded slowly, but it was the princess who answered. “Marin betrayed my family. She has always wanted more. Whether that was power or easar paper or… Many things. We had thought she was gone. Dead. We had thought that her treachery had led her to the Thelns and that they had taken care of her for us. We were wrong.”
Sam’s mind was racing. Was that why Marin hadn’t wanted her to come here?
But why would Marin have told her anything about Kavers?
“Marin helped us heal you,” she said. “She has helped raise my brother and me.”
“You don’t have a brother,” the Kaver said.
Anger began to rise in her, and Sam stood. “Trayson is my brother. My mother was lost when we were very little. And—”
The Kaver stepped forward. “You were not as young as you think when you were lost.”
Sam shook her head. “No. Let me have Tray, and we will return to Caster.”
“Samara. You were lost eight years ago. We thought you were dead. The fact that you live, and the fact that you have no memory of it, tells me that Marin must’ve used the easar paper to eliminate your memories.”
Sam was shaking her head, and she was trembling. Weakness from her injury started to wash through her. Were the augmentations fading? Was the healing suddenly fading?
“That’s impossible. Marin isn’t always pleasant, but she’s always wanted the best for me. She’s worked on my behalf.”
“Marin betrayed your mother,” the Kaver said.
“How do you know?”
The woman stepped forward and frowned. A mixture of emotions crossed her face before fading, replaced by a stern expression. “Because I am your mother.”
Epilogue
The night air was cold, and Sam stood at the edge of the canal, debating what to do. Her head swam with what she had heard, and she no longer knew what to think. She wrapped her cloak around her, shivering, inhaling deeply.
A figure approached out of the shadows, and Alec slipped his arm around her shoulders when he neared, saying nothing at first.
“So, my mother’s alive.”
Alec turned toward her and stared. “Are you sure. You saw her?”
“Not entirely sure, no.” That made it harder, but the more she thought about it, the more she began to wonder why the princess and her Kaver would lie to her. They had no reason to do so. And if they weren’t lying, then the woman—Elaine—was Sam’s mother. And Marin had betrayed her.
It was that which was the most difficult.
“They tell me that Tray is not my brother.” They had released him, and Sam had seen Tray head back into the city, alone and unharmed. She had stood at the window in the palace, feeling a strange sense of unease, standing where she was, watching her brother return to Caster. “Apparently, Marin only wanted me to believe that he was my brother. The princess claims that he’s Marin’s son, but that doesn’t make sense. Why would Marin have wanted me to think he’s my brother.”
“If you betrayed them, she might’ve been worried about his safety were she caught.”
Sam squeezed her eyes close, nodding slowly. “It still doesn’t make sense. None of this makes sense. All I know is that Tray is my brother.”
Whatever else, she felt that deep within her bones. He may not be blood—and she still didn’t know whether to believe that or not—but he was her brother.
“Apparently, Marin was the one trying to find easar paper, trying to steal it from the city. She’s the one who’s gotten in ahead of me, taking supplies of the paper before I have a chance to get to it. And she’s been attacking the Kavers as they have returned to the city.” She looked over at Alec. “She has been practically preparing the city for another Theln attack!”
“And that’s why she didn’t want you to be involved,” Alec said.
Sam looked up at him. “As strange as it seems, Marin was trying to keep me from the Kavers.”
“But not trying to hurt you,” he said.
Sam shook her head. “If she was trying to hurt me, she could have done so easily. I… I need to find her and see what she’s doing. I need to understand what this is all about.” She turned toward Alec and wrapped her arms around him. She felt strange, helpless. Weak. They were feelings she hated. “I thought the princess had been poisoned by the Thelns, but what if it was Marin?”
“I don’t think so,” Alec said. “She seemed as surprised as anyone when we revealed the princess’s poisoning. I think that whatever else happened, it wasn�
��t because of anything that Marin had done.”
“I have to find her.”
“You do.”
“They tell me she’s probably gone from the city. That’s apparently what she does when she disappears.” Sam couldn’t believe it, but Marin did completely disappear at times. “They think that when I fell, she was there.”
That hurt more than anything else. Thinking that Marin might have left her to die. That was painful. But then, maybe Marin had been the one to bring Tray to her.
“What about your brother?”
“I can’t tell him,” Sam said in a whisper.
“At some point, you will have to. He’s caught up in this the same way that you are. As far as he knows, his mother died when yours did.”
Sam sighed. It seemed ridiculous—and impossible—to believe that she would now have to lie to her brother to keep him safe, but what else could she do? He was her brother.
And she had already lied to the princess. She hadn’t revealed how Tray was part Theln. Maybe that was the reason Marin had forced a connection between Sam and Tray.
“I can’t tell him, because they don’t know. The moment they know that he’s part Theln…” That was the worst part of it. She might be able to learn what it meant that she was a Kaver, but she would have to keep Tray concealed from them.
Only… she didn’t know how.
“I didn’t get the chance to tell you that I was promoted,” Alec said, changing the subject. “I’m a senior student physicker now.”
Sam smiled. “I’m not surprised. You probably should have entered the university a long time ago. Selfishly, I’m glad you didn’t, otherwise, we never would have met.”
Alec glanced back at the university. “I’ve been struggling with what I’m meant to be for a while.”
“I know.”
“I think I understand now. With what I can learn at the university, and with the easar paper, I can help more people. I think… I think that’s what I’m meant to do.”
Sam smiled and said nothing. He was right, but that left her with more questions about herself. She wished she had Alec’s self-awareness.
“What now for you?” Alec asked, feeling a sadness at the question. It was basically acknowledging that their partnership would not continue.
“They said I can come to the palace and study. That it’s where Kavers study.” She gave him a thoughtful look, almost expectant. “It means that you and I can continue to work together. You can study at the university and I can study…” She looked over at the palace, finding it difficult to believe that she would be able to go there and learn, a lowborn suddenly at the palace.
“As much as that should thrill you, given that I think you’re saying we could continue to work together, to see each other, why do I get the sense that you’re not entirely thrilled by that idea?”
“Because I’m lowborn. At least, I always thought I was lowborn.” She looked up at Alex then once again turned her attention to the palace. Hadn’t she always longed to be more than a lowborn? Why did she hesitate now? “And now? What am I now, Alec? I’ve been wondering that since meeting you, and then you were called to the university. I wanted to be something more than a thief and thought that maybe I never could be.”
“What are you saying, Sam?”
“You know what you’re meant to be, but I—”
He hugged her tight, pulling her close. He was strong—stronger than he admitted to himself, a trait that Sam had found endearing. “You’re Sam. And that is enough.”
Grab Poisoned: The Book of Maladies 3.
Betrayed. Broken. Poisoned.
No longer alone, Sam and Alec struggle to find time to continue their studies together. Sam knows that she is more than the lowborn she’d long believed, now living and training in the palace, but still doesn’t feel as if she quite fits in. Worse, it seems as if Alec has moved on without her, preferring his new life in the university.
Alec has quickly risen in rank, but that only draws attention to him. Learning from master physickers has its benefits, but there are dangers and he’s not certain whether he can trust the new friends he’s made. Evidence continues to mount of a conspiracy within the university, and it’s one he’ll need Sam’s help in understanding.
While Alec tries to reach out to Sam, she searches for Marin and answers that might unlock her full potential. What she finds instead is a threat to the safety in the city, protections that have long prevented the Thelns from reaching Verdholm, if they haven’t already breached them.
Together, they are the key to stopping Marin, but can they master their new places in the city in time?
Poisoned
1
Staff Training
Sam leaned over, resting her elbows on her knees, slowly trying to catch her breath. She ached all over from the countless blows that she’d sustained, a mass of bruises blooming all over her abused body. She managed to look up, her dark hair hanging in front of her face, and stared at a woman she had long thought dead.
“You still react too slowly,” her mother said.
“Too slowly? I’m practically flying with my canal staff.”
Her mother took a step back, tapped the staff on the open lawn, and casually soared twenty feet, landing in a quick roll. She bounded back to her feet and shot Sam a satisfied expression.
“Like I’ve told you before, I need my augmentations to manage what you’re doing.”
Elaine shook her head. “You need no such… augmentations. All you need are your natural abilities. You are descended from Kaver blood, and you don’t need augmentations to grant you your abilities.”
Sam wasn’t about to argue with her mother. In the months since they had been reunited, she’d learned that her mother was fairly rigid with her beliefs. She had no tolerance for Sam’s attitude—which often wasn’t nearly as compliant as Elaine preferred. Then again, some of that attitude was well-deserved. Sam had thought her mother dead.
This time, it made no sense to argue with Elaine. She’d seen the way Marin could jump the canals, managing to do so with amazing deftness, her skill putting anything Sam could accomplish to shame. Sam had a similar ability when augmented, though with Alec continuing his studies at the university, they had fewer opportunities to work together to practice those augmentations.
“If you would only show me how to do that, then I wouldn’t need my augmentations.”
Her mother approached slowly, the slender canal staff gripped lightly in hand. It still impressed Sam that she could break her staff down so that it was no longer than her forearm. Each piece slid neatly into the other, hollowed out, and still was sturdy enough for her to balance on. And here Sam had thought her two-piece canal staff something to be excited about. She kept waiting for Elaine—or the princess, though she rarely saw her—to offer her a staff made similarly, but they never did.
“You’re learning slowly, Samara.”
Sam let out a frustrated sigh. Slowly. Always slowly. It seemed the theme for her. She’d never been tall enough, or strong enough, and now it seemed she wasn’t even smart enough.
“Well, maybe it’s because Marin made a mess of my brain,” Sam said, slapping her canal staff into the hard-packed earth.
She still couldn’t believe that Marin had wiped her mind, convincing her that her mother had died, making her believe that she was alone—and that she had a brother. What sort of augmentation had she used on Sam? If she ever managed to reach Marin, she was determined to find out. The problem was that since learning about her mother, Marin had essentially disappeared. There was no sign of her at her home, her belongings having been packaged up and taken… somewhere.
Her mother’s hardened expression seemed to ease, albeit barely. “You can’t continue to blame her for what happened.”
“Not blame her? Who should I blame? She took me from you. Why aren’t you angrier?”
Sam had so few memories of her mother, something she should have thought strange before. Since being reu
nited, her mother had yet to show much emotion—at least no positive emotions—almost as if she had been happier when Sam had been out of her life.
Had she not wanted Sam?
She tried not to think that way. Doing so only left her with mixed emotions.
“Angrier? You don’t think I was angry? I spent years searching for you, Samara. Years when I thought Marin had stolen you from the city and taken you to the Thelns as a bargaining chip, and ultimately had come to terms with the fact that you had possibly already died. There are limits to a Kaver’s ability. Finding you was all I wanted, but not something I ever thought I would succeed in doing. Instead of focusing on your own anger—or questioning my lack of it, you should concentrate on our reunion and how relieved I am to have found you once more.”
Sam swallowed the lump that formed in her throat. She had wanted to hear words like that—needed to hear them. It wasn’t that she didn’t think her mother was pleased to see her again, but she’d begun to ask herself whether she had wanted to find her for the sake of finding her daughter, or if she had wanted to find her to use her in some way.
“We will find Marin,” Elaine said. “We will uncover what she did. And we will help you unlock your true potential.”
Sam could only nod. At least Elaine had said we. It meant she wasn’t abandoning her. She didn’t expect that she would, but a part of her had wondered whether they would be more interested in using Sam to track down Thelns than allowing Sam to participate in the search for Marin.
“Tray deserves to know,” she said.
Elaine furrowed her brow. “Trayson does deserve to know but knowing in his case places him in a unique position. Once he learns what happened—and how you were used as part of Marin’s plan—how will he react? Will he assist you? Or do you think he will side with Marin?”
The Book of Maladies Boxset Page 52