by Ruth Lauren
“You tried to kill me.” It’s somewhere between a statement and a question.
“It seems that way,” I say.
He gets up and comes around to the front of the desk, which he leans against with his arms folded, his head tilted. “Either you did or you didn’t.”
“I did.” I fight the rush of shame and look sullenly at the carpet. Perhaps that’s all he wishes to hear.
“I would like to know why.”
I look up at him then. His dark hair curls at the front despite someone’s obvious effort to stop it from doing so. It’s always done that. Once, I watched him during one of the long and boring ceremonies Sasha and I sometimes had to attend with our parents, and he spent half of the time trying to make the front of his hair lie straight. He’s not that little boy anymore, though. And the link between our families is severed.
I lock my hands behind my back, standing the way Katia does at her cell door each morning. “Your Highness, I believe you know why.”
“I would like to hear you say it.” He watches me sharply.
I square my shoulders. I’m starting to sweat. “Revenge,” I say. “Revenge on your family for putting my sister in prison for life.” The anger I feel when I say this is real. It’s even hotter and clearer than it was before, now that I know she’s innocent. I blame myself for not believing that right from the start.
“Yes,” he says shortly. “Your sister the thief.”
I say nothing. Let him keep believing she did it; the time for trying to protest anyone’s innocence is long gone. I can feel the bulk of the sheet wedged around my waist. If he orders me searched, if he even suspects I’m anything but a wicked prisoner, I’ll be caught with a stolen sheet, soap, and in my boot a metal pick that could kill someone.
“Do you know why she did it?” he asks, standing straight and moving closer to me. “I assume you saw the trial. You know she wouldn’t tell anyone where the music box was. Has she told you where it is?”
I keep my gaze fixed on the polished wood of the desk.
Prince Anatol stands in front of me. The golden fist clasping his cloak shines at his neck. “Your prince is speaking to you,” he says. “Do you know anything about the music box? Answer.”
I look him in the eye, hoping he can’t see that I’m shaking. “I haven’t seen my sister. I know nothing of why she stole the box or where she put it, Your Highness. Nothing at all.” Maybe it’s enough that I really have no idea where the music box is. I pray that it is.
Prince Anatol turns his head and stares up at the ceiling. “Your parents have tried to petition my mother at least three times already,” he says. “Don’t you care anything for them?”
“You know I do,” I snap, much too loudly.
“Then tell me what I want to know.”
“I … I can’t. I don’t know anything,” I say, misery filling me up and making my throat tight. “Are they well? Are my parents well?”
The prince’s mouth presses together. “They’re as well as my own parents. You’ve betrayed us all. How do you think they feel?”
I shake my head. I can’t speak.
“It would be better for you and your sister if you told the truth. I’m determined to find out one way or another.”
Whatever he means by that, it makes me shiver. I know his reputation well enough to believe that he won’t rest, like a hunting dog with the scent of prey in its nose.
“No answer for me?” he asks, his mouth still in that compressed line.
I say nothing.
“Then leave,” he says. “But I’ll see you again, Valor.”
I take a small step back, then another, then I flee down the stairs as fast as I can. The violin, the books, the chairs blur past, and I’m breathless by the time I reach the bottom, where Peacekeeper Rurik waits. I barely see him. All I can think about is the prince. He’s too interested, far too interested in the music box. Or maybe he’s interested in who else knows that it wasn’t my sister who stole it at all.
CHAPTER 9
The next day’s evening meal sits in front of me on the long wooden table in the ice hall. It’s some kind of potato and cabbage broth. I’m hungry, but I haven’t touched it yet. Katia is steadily eating hers. The bluish ice blocks around us make it look as though she’s underwater. She doesn’t look at me, but Feliks, sitting opposite her, wants to know everything about my trip to the tower and Prince Anatol’s questioning. Yesterday Peacekeeper Rurik hovered close after he returned me to the laundry, and I’ve had no chance to speak to Feliks since. Today we were rotated to work on maintaining the ice buildings with another group, and it was impossible to talk at all.
Katia is still sulking from watching me hide the things I stole in our cell. I put the sheet flat under my mattress, the soap inside a split seam, and the pick—well, I had no choice but to tie that to the underside of Katia’s bedframe using ripped strips of material. I would have put it on mine, but it wouldn’t have been hidden, and I can’t carry everything I need to get Sasha out around with me. I lay awake for a long time after that, wanting to ask Katia what she was going to do now that she knew my plan, but at the same time not wanting to ask in case it tipped her over into telling Warden Kirov.
“What are we going to do next?” whispers Feliks. We’ve perfected the art of using the shadows from the torchlight in the hall to cover our faces and talking while barely moving our mouths. I bet we look ridiculous, but it works.
I lean forward over my bowl, lifting my spoon. “I have to borrow a bunch of keys,” I say. “I already have soap to make impressions of them, and metal to melt down and make copies.”
His eyes go big with excitement. I can’t help but like the way he’s hanging on my every word, even if Katia is still silent.
“How are you going to get the keys?”
I hesitate. I need to steal them, but I’ve never stolen anything before, not from an actual person.
“I thought you had this all planned,” says Katia. She sounds a little bit smug, as though she’s glad I’m confirming that I don’t know what I’m doing.
“I do have a plan,” I say, feeling defensive. “Once I get the keys, I can get out of the cell at night, get to the tower, and find the tunnel. Then … well, it’s just a matter of timing.”
“Easy,” she says. “After you steal a bunch of keys from a Peacekeeper and get your sister away from the Black Hands.”
I take a deep breath, and then another while I think of something to say. But really, I don’t know how I’m going to do either of those things, and she’s putting doubts in my head that I’ll be able to pull them off.
“What’s that noise?” says Feliks.
We stop eating, and I notice half the heads in the hall are turned toward the door. Outside, there are footsteps running across the snow, calls between Peacekeepers, and, faintly, in the background, the howls of wolves.
The door bursts open, and the Peacekeeper with the chessboard tattoos fills the space. He thrusts a torch into the room and shouts, “All Peacekeepers to the wall. Get the prisoners back to the cellblock now!”
There are two Peacekeepers in the hall with us. One runs from the back of the hall, and everyone watches him, soldered to their seats by the fear of standing and earning an infraction. He joins the one who came to issue the orders and they both hurry away, the torch a bobbing flare of light across the prison grounds. They’re heading to the wall.
“Line up. Back to the cells now,” shouts our remaining Peacekeeper above the shocked murmurs in the hall. We all stand, hustle into our usual lines, and follow him out into the cold night. Torches burn along the top of the inner wall, blotting out the darkness in a ring around the grounds.
Heads are twisted toward the wall as we walk, whispers passing along the line. Everyone is shuffling slower than usual despite the cold. Along the battlements, the shapes of Peacekeepers move. The length of a bow juts above the crenellated wall. Wolves bay and howl out on the plains. I know the sound. They’re agitated.
They’re hunting. It raises the tiny hairs on the back of my neck, and I shiver.
I snag the coat of the person in front of me. “What’s happening?”
It’s Natalia. But right now, she’s too interested in what’s going on to ignore me. “I heard there’s a prison cart on its way, and the wolves are trying to attack. They’re saying Prince Anatol is out there.”
My heart beats faster. That’s what the Peacekeepers are doing—trying to protect the cart.
“I need to speak with Warden Kirov,” I say.
Natalia’s eyes widen. “You can’t.”
But I’ve already turned and lost my place in the line to go back to the Peacekeeper herding us into the cellblocks. Nicolai frowns as I pass him.
I’m out of breath when I reach the Peacekeeper, who’s reaching for the pouch at his belt to issue me an infraction.
“Wait. Please. I need to speak to Warden Kirov. I want to offer my services to help.”
“Prisoners need to return to the cellblocks,” he says.
“I’ve been trained for this,” I say, my pulse bounding. “If it’s true that there’s a cart out there and that I could have saved it and so could you, what do you think Warden Kirov will say if she finds out you stood in my way instead of using me?”
Then I see her, Warden Kirov herself, striding across the grounds toward the tower.
“Warden Kirov, I can help!” I call out.
She doesn’t break stride, but this is my chance to get Sasha away from the Black Hands, I know it. I run toward the warden.
There’s a shout from the Peacekeeper behind me. I run faster, my boots kicking up snow. A familiar whistling sound shoots past my ear, and an arrow hits the ground to my left. I flinch away, sliding on the ice underfoot. One of the Peacekeepers up on the wall reloads, his weapon pointed at me. “Halt!”
I skid to a stop, breath coming fast as a hunted fox. Boots crunch on the snow behind me, and my arms are grabbed on either side. It’s Nicolai and another prisoner. “Peacekeeper says you’ll pay for this,” says Nicolai grimly. He widens his eyes like he’s trying to tell me something. But I don’t know what it is.
Just ahead, the warden has stopped. “Bring her,” she calls.
Nicolai and the girl on my other side march me forward. We reach Warden Kirov at the bottom of the tower. “I might have known it would be you,” she says, and nods to my two captors. “Take her back to the cells. You will have extra rations, and she will be punished later for her reckless disregard for people’s lives when we need every woman and man on the wall.”
I curl my hands into fists. I know it’s more than pushing my luck to speak again, but I can’t stop now.
“You have to let me help. You need me. I’m the best shot here, and if you put a bow in my hands, I promise you that Prince Anatol will pass through the gates without so much as a scratch on his royal person.”
She barks a laugh. “Given the crime that put you here, I can hardly believe that. What does a promise from someone like you mean?”
I keep my voice level. “I’m already in prison. What would I gain from hurting the prince now? My sister, Sasha, is with the Black Hands. But if I saved the prince, you could let her out so I could see her sometimes. It’s my sister’s safety at stake. I have every reason to be honorable, and none to let you down.”
The warden gives one sharp shake of her head. “Take her away.”
“Warden!” The cry comes from the Peacekeeper who fired at me. “The wolves are closing in.”
Nicolai and the girl pull me backward, and the warden hurries into the tower.
“Valor, stop it,” says Nicolai in a low voice.
I barely hear him. “If he’s going to die anyway, then you have nothing to lose! Give me a chance!” I yell.
She stops. I point to the Peacekeeper’s arrow behind us in the snow. “They’ve already shown you how safe the prince is right now. I can do this.”
I wait, holding my breath.
She leaves it a beat too long, and my hope melts like snow in summer.
Finally, she says, “Come.”
I wrench my arms free and dart forward. Warden Kirov tracks snow up the winding staircase in the tower, and I add to it, rushing after her until we reach the room where Prince Anatol made me answer those questions. One of the dark wooden panels that make up the walls is open—a hidden doorway to the battlements. We sweep out onto the brightly lit walkway where the wind cuts through the notches in the crenellated walls.
There are six Peacekeepers standing at intervals along the wall, all armed with bows. Warden Kirov steps straight to the wall facing the plains. Her hands grip the rough stone, her face tight.
“Stop the wolves and allow that cart safe passage. If you cut so much as a button from his tunic, your sister will pay for it.”
I step to a rack of longbows and a barrel full of arrows on one side of the walkway. A thrill flashes through me. I love to shoot. I think about the last time I let an arrow fly. I wanted to miss my target then as much as I want to hit it now.
I take a bow and feel the shape and balance of it in my hands. I’ve missed this.
Along the wall, the Peacekeepers take aim. The cart is far off in the snow, but I can see the black horses running flat out even at this distance. I count sixteen wolves loping in a loose formation, some beginning to draw level with the horses, though they’re not yet close enough to attack.
A wolf lets out a bloodcurdling howl on the plain, and a Peacekeeper releases an arrow. It’s too soon. He must not know how far an arrow will fly, and I can tell without looking that he won’t hit his mark. His stance is wrong. There’s a sharp breeze blowing, and I doubt he’s taken that into account.
“They’re trying to surround the cart,” says the Peacekeeper next to me. He draws back his bow. I was right about the shot already taken. The dark dart of an arrow lies out on the snow.
I step behind him and take a look down the sights. “They’ll take the horses down first.”
He looks over his shoulder. “How do you know that?”
“I know about all the animals in the realm,” I say, then wish I hadn’t. I don’t want to talk about who I am or why I’m here.
“Bring them down!” The warden’s voice rings out over the wall.
Howls come from all over now. There’s more than one pack out there, watching. Their calls are wild, raising goose bumps all over my body. The cart seemed so solid when I rode in it, so final. Now it looks small and breakable, like one of Sasha’s old clockwork toys.
The Peacekeeper readies himself to shoot. I see the wolf he intends to hit, running at the front of the pack. Sleek and black, ruffed with white fur, almost as big as the horses. It’s gaining ground, snow flying in its wake.
I lean over and adjust his aim slightly. His shot would have been close, but mine will hit. “Trust me,” I say. He looks to Warden Kirov, and she nods. The arrow whistles through the air and the wolf drops, plowing a furrow through the snow.
One of the other Peacekeepers must have hit too, because another animal farther down the pack twists in the air, then falls and starts dragging itself along the ground.
I open my mouth to say “Finish it,” but the Peacekeeper has already reloaded and let his arrow fly. The wolf slackens like a puppet with its strings cut, but the other animals haven’t slowed. Their bodies are sleek and strong, muscles rippling as they run. One of them nears the blindered horse on the right. Its paws pound the ground, throwing up sprays of snow. A snarl rips from its mouth as its jaws open to attack. The horse rears, whinnying in terror, its flanks shining with sweat against the snowy backdrop.
A barrage of arrows fly out, but everyone is too scared of hitting the horse, not willing to be the one who brings down the cart instead, and the wrath of Warden Kirov with it.
The cart is close enough now that I can see a much smaller figure seated next to the man who brought me here. It’s true, then. The figure clinging to the cart, unprotected as it thunders toward t
he prison, is Prince Anatol. Warden Kirov stares intently at the scene, still gripping the wall.
Two more wolves are down, but the rest are still hunting; twelve, maybe thirteen of them are left. They must be desperate.
I load my bow, the weight of it in my hands so familiar it’s like an extension of my arm. My body goes still as I take aim, factor in the wind, judge the distance. I breathe out and release my first arrow, relishing the feel of the bow in my hands. A wolf goes down. Swift as a hare, I fire another, and another. The animals fall, and my focus never wavers.
The wolf running by the horse has dropped back slightly. I think it’s tiring, but then I see the direction of its gaze. My blood freezes. Peacekeeper Rurik is the new target. It’s worked out that if he falls, the whole cart does.
“Valor!” Warden Kirov sees it too, sees the bloodbath that we’ll be watching if one of us doesn’t hit that wolf.
It has to be me.
I take aim. I watch. I breathe. I wait. I wait.
I fire.
The arrow wings the wolf, catching his shoulder and spinning him around. I reload faster than anyone has ever reloaded and shoot again, and again. Every arrow hits its mark.
Darkness seeps into the snow around the still body of the wolf.
The cart comes thundering into the last stretch with still more wolves chasing it, and I hear the gate opening far below. The prisoners’ terrified faces are upturned to us, staring through the bars of the cage on the cart. One of them steadies herself, her cuffed hands wrapped around the bars above her head. She looks straight at me, eyes wide, face pinched with fear.
My hands move, fluid as dancers, taking aim, feeling the cutting wind. There’s only me and the cart and the wolves stopping me from getting the one thing I want most of all—Sasha next to me. I shoot and shoot, again and again, until the cart disappears underneath us with a scraping noise, whinnying from the horses, and cries from the prisoners in the cart.
I stop. The snow below is littered with the lifeless bodies of wolves. Dark stains mat their fur and blot the snow. I bow my head for a second, and when I turn, Warden Kirov is stock-still, staring at me. The Peacekeepers circle her, and everyone is looking at me.