by Barb Hendee
Really, this was not at all what Céline would have expected from Damek’s brother. Anton seemed almost softhearted. But he certainly voiced no doubts that his brother was capable of murder.
Then his eyes narrowed, almost in anger. “You’re speaking the truth to me? You really are a seer?”
This was shaky ground. The first time she’d spoken to him, she’d had no idea he was the prince of a great house. If he ever suspected that she’d been faking…
“Yes,” she answered standing straight, “like my mother before me.”
The anger in his eyes faded, replaced by what looked like pain. “But you told me to marry Joselyn. You told me I’d be happy.”
At that, Céline had to call upon all her skills. Something had gone terribly wrong in his life, something to do with Joselyn, but when he spoke her name, only pain and sorrow rang in his voice, not anger. That suggested Joselyn had not made him miserable, nor had she run off with one of the castle guards.
He was in mourning.
Joselyn was dead. Céline would have staked her life on it.
Standing even straighter, she challenged, “And weren’t you happy?”
His expression collapsed inward, and he looked away. “Yes,” he answered after a long moment. “I was happy.”
Abruptly he stood up and faced her again. All traces of sorrow were gone, and he was the haughty prince once more. Without another word, he turned and strode for the door, jerking it open and walking out.
At a loss, she followed him. Only a few paces into the great hall, he stopped and said over his shoulder, “You are free to go.”
Go where? she thought in sudden despair, looking across the hall at Amelie.
But as Anton began walking toward the exit again, Jaromir stepped forward and stopped him. “My lord, I had another thought.”
He leaned in and began speaking quietly in the prince’s ear. Anton frowned at first, but then he began listening in earnest, and finally he turned to glance back at Céline.
“Very well,” he said slowly. “But you’ll have to show them everything.” He paused, as if somehow the words Jaromir had whispered in his ear were beginning to take hold. “Show them the shop first, and then arrange a room for them in the castle.”
He walked out.
What shop?
Jaromir smiled at Amelie, and Céline had a sinking feeling in her stomach. He wanted something more from them.
* * *
Amelie kept close to Céline as they both followed Jaromir back through the bustling town, but she almost couldn’t believe how much her life had been altered in less than a full day. Their home was gone, and since she’d spent half the night unconscious, she had no idea where they were or how far they’d come.
Besides, after Damek’s attempt to kill them—and her stabbing one of his men in the throat—they couldn’t go home, even if someone there might take them in.
Worse, that bastard Jaromir kept smiling at her, as if sooner or later she’d find him charming. She wished she could run her dagger through his throat. Just thinking of how he’d knocked her out so easily and then trussed her up made her blood run hot. If he weren’t so damn strong, she’d have gotten away from him outside the moat this morning.
But…since coming inside the walls, her opinion of the situation itself had altered. Cows, goats, and chickens added to the noise of people doing business here, and everyone seemed warmly dressed and well fed. This was nothing like their drab home village, nor was it like the grand city she’d seen on her one visit to Enêmûsk, which had been sharply divided between the rich and the starving.
She’d never seen anything like this place.
No one seemed afraid of the soldiers, and many people either nodded or called a greeting to Jaromir as if they liked him. He stopped in front of a solid one-story wooden building that had been stained a rich brown, with yellow painted shutters.
“This is it,” he said.
Amelie barely glanced at the building and had no idea why he’d pointed it out, but then he opened the door and stepped inside. “Come on.”
Once inside, Céline sucked in a sharp breath, but it took Amelie a moment to realize why. They were in the front room of a shop. There was a sturdy counter running half the length of the room, and the walls were lined with shelves of clay pots and jars. A dusty wooden table was littered with pestle and mortar, brass scales, small wooden bowls, and an open box of tinder and flint. A large welcoming hearth comprised the center of the south wall.
“This way,” Jaromir said, and he led them behind the counter and through a set of swinging doors into a storage area. “There’s a large bedroom through there,” he said, pointing to a closed door, “but the best is out here.”
He opened the back door of the shop and held it for Céline to see outside. She drew in another sharp breath, and Amelie looked over her shoulder at the remnants of what had once been a thriving herb garden.
Divided into eight large separate beds, the herbs were now either overgrown or dying from lack of care: cumin, fennel, mint, lovage, sage, rue, savory, foxglove, pennyroyal, rosemary, lilies, and roses…Amelie lost count. Faded red poppies lined the back fence, and an apple tree graced one corner.
Céline stepped out and knelt down in what was left of the foxglove patch. “Many of these plants are still alive,” she said. “This could be brought back to its former state.”
Céline had always loved herbs. She loved healing. But this was cruel, letting Céline sit like that in someone else’s herb garden when her own was lost.
“Why did you bring us here?” Amelie demanded of Jaromir. “Why would you show this to her?”
“Because the owner’s dead,” he answered. He was standing so close she could see all the soft hairs of his goatee, and she backed up. “He died last summer,” he went on, “and we’ve had no apothecary since. Ownership reverted to the prince, but the place has been standing empty.”
Céline’s eyes were sad. “Lieutenant, I hope you don’t think we can purchase this place from your prince. We’ve no money hidden away.” She sighed. “At present, this dress is all I have left to my name.”
He shook his head. “No, I’m well aware you lost everything last night. But the prince has given me leave to offer this shop to you if you can solve a problem for us.”
Amelie stepped around him. “Offer us the…you mean let us live here, as members of his own people?”
Céline stood up, equally shocked.
This was a prosperous community, and the people here had goods to trade and money to spend…and daughters who’d be begging Céline to read their futures, daughters with coins in their purses.
And the shop was perfect, far superior to their old home. This was too good to be true. But nothing like this came easily. Amelie crossed her arms over the top of her canvas jacket. “Exactly what problem does he want us to solve?”
Céline listened with rapt attention, but for once, Jaromir didn’t look even mildly amused. He’d gone deadly serious.
“I can’t just tell you. I have to show you.” He paused. “And I warn you, the sight isn’t pretty.”
That didn’t sound good.
But Céline looked around at the large, neglected herb garden and then up at the beautifully stained wooden exterior of the shop. “Show me.”
* * *
Céline stood amid countless barrels of ale in a cold-storage room below the castle larder, staring down into what had once been the face of a teenaged girl.
“I warned you,” Jaromir said.
The girl’s body was lying on a table beside two others in the same state. All three had been desiccated—shriveled down to skin and bones. Two were dressed in fine gowns, but the third wore plain homespun. Their long hair was spread around them. As a healer in a village like Shetâna, Céline had seen her share of dead bodies, but she’d never seen anything like this.
“Was it plague?” Amelie whispered, standing beside her.
“No,” Céline answered, a
nd some of the numb feeling from the night before was returning to her hands. She needed time to recover between the fears and horrors and losses she’d experienced, but they just kept coming. The dead girls looked so fragile, so brittle, lying there with their hair spread around.
“How did this happen?” she asked Jaromir.
He, too, just looked down at the bodies, and Céline thought that even for him, a hardened soldier, this sight was difficult. “There was a fourth…I mean a first,” he said. “She just vanished one night, and her father found her in the stable, hidden beneath some hay. He sent word to me because he did fear plague and thought I should know. We burned the body. Days passed and no one else got sick…but I still wondered what could do this to a girl her age. She was only sixteen.”
He sounded so frustrated and so bereft that in spite of everything, Céline wondered what it would be like to live in a community where the people could report a death to the soldiers and someone like Jaromir would take charge, would actually care.
“But then it happened again, about a week later,” he went on, “only this time, the girl was found in her own bed.” He pointed to the girl in the homespun. “She kissed her parents good night and went to bed, and they found her like this the next morning. At that point, I reported both deaths to my lord, and he ordered me to store the body. We have a royal physician at the castle, Master Feodor, and Prince Anton had him examine the body, but he could tell no more than me. The poor girl was just a dried husk.”
Céline stared down at the body and shook her head. “But it happened twice more?”
“Again, about a week apart,” he said, “and only at night. They’d just go to bed, and someone would find them like this the next morning. Only these two were from…wealthier families, merchants’ daughters, but all of them were sixteen or seventeen years old and said to be uncommonly pretty. I managed to keep this hushed up for a while, but rumors are starting to spread.”
Then his tone changed, and once again, he sounded like a soldier. “Sub-Prince Damek is known for his penchant toward brutal strength. As cruel as it sounds, his father, Prince Lieven, respects that. Anton is known as a good leader who takes care of his people. His father respects that, too, but I don’t know which quality holds the most sway. I only know that if Anton loses his standing as a leader able to protect his people, it could destroy his chances of being named heir.”
Céline shook her head. “What is it exactly that you wish me to do?”
“Use your powers,” he said. “I can put together a list of young women this age who are thought to be pretty, and you can read their futures. If you can touch upon the next girl to die and see who or what is killing her, you can tell me. I can’t fight what I can’t see, but you can see for me.”
“Read their futures?” Céline asked. “Won’t that just set a blaze to more rumors?”
He hesitated. “I have a few ideas where we can make it look like a game…entertainment being provided by the prince.”
“A game?” Amelie said, glancing at Céline. “That might work.”
“You can do this, can’t you?” Jaromir asked Céline, unashamed to be voicing doubt. “I mean, I know Prince Anton believes you are a true seer, but he has a trusting heart.”
She looked down again at the three dead bodies, but Jaromir wasn’t finished.
“Here’s the bargain,” he said. “If you solve this for us, help me put a stop to it, the shop is yours unconditionally. You can live here and conduct business under Anton’s protection for as long as you like.”
“And if I fail?”
“Then you’re no seer and no use to us here. You can leave and go your own way.”
Céline closed her eyes and saw the pretty shop with its yellow shutters and the herb garden out back. She imagined living in a world where the soldiers actually protected people and the prince cared for their welfare. She remembered the flash of ugly reality that had hit her when she’d read Rhiannon. Would it happen again? Had she inherited her mother’s gift? And if it didn’t happen again, how would she go about finding out whom or what was killing the young women here?
She only knew that she wasn’t going to pass this chance by, and if she had to, she’d start looking for the cause herself…leaning upon her ability to read people and see the secrets beneath their faces.
“Can you do it?” Amelie asked, and Céline saw that her sister wanted to stay as badly as she did.
Céline looked straight into Jaromir’s eyes. “Yes,” she said. “I can do it.”
CHAPTER 4
Céline hurried down an upstairs passage behind Jaromir, with Amelie following. It seemed that once the bargain had been struck, he was in a rush to get on with other business.
After leading them up from the cellars, where the bodies were stored, to the main floor of the castle, he’d bypassed the great hall and led them into a stairwell inside the north tower and then up three flights before stepping off the landing there and striding at a rapid pace down the chill stone passage, making several turns, until Céline felt hopelessly lost. This entire experience was making her more aware of just how little of the world she’d seen.
“Lieutenant,” she breathed, trying to keep up. “Could you slow your pace?”
He stopped. “Oh…pardon.” But he still looked distracted. Perhaps he wanted to report the bargain they’d made to Prince Anton. “Over there,” he said pointing to a door. “That is an empty guest room. I’ll have someone finish preparing it for you immediately. Go on in.”
“Thank you,” Céline answered for lack of anything else to say.
Without waiting to show them inside, he brushed past and headed back the way they’d come.
Amelie raised her thin black eyebrows at Céline. “Well, at least he’s gone.”
Uncertain if that was a good thing or a bad thing, Céline walked over and opened the door. While the room could hardly be described as “empty,” it was certainly unoccupied, and she stepped inside.
Amelie followed her, drawing a loud breath. “Is this for us? He might have made a mistake.”
“I don’t think he makes many mistakes.”
A four-poster mahogany bed waited across the room, covered in a sunflower yellow quilt. Interior shutters over the long window were open, letting misty light filter inside. Céline walked to the window and looked down, realizing they must be on the inner side of the tower, as they had a view of the courtyard below.
She turned back to take in the rest of the room.
A full-length mirror with a pewter frame stood in one corner and a mahogany wardrobe stood in the other. Dainty damask-covered chairs had been placed in front of a dressing table that sported silver brushes and a porcelain washbasin. A three-paneled dressing screen offered privacy for changing clothes. Best of all, the room contained its own small hearth.
Céline had never seen a room like this, much less been invited to sleep in one.
She walked over to the dressing table and noticed a miniature portrait leaning up against the mirror, of a lovely woman with chestnut-colored hair. Something about it made the room feel less their own, so she put it in a drawer. Then she touched one of the silver brushes, hoping for a few moments of peace, deciding she might not be able to handle even a mild event or encounter added to the long line since last night. And now…she had four deaths to solve. But she was also tired, sore, and hungry, having neither eaten nor slept, and she was sure Amelie must feel as weary as herself.
“Maybe we should rest?” Amelie said, as if reading her thoughts.
There was little else to do anyway. Even if they wanted to go in search of food, Céline doubted they could find their way back to the great hall. The only solid detail she could remember from the rushed journey up here was the sight of Jaromir’s back.
“All right,” she said, “but I’ll have to sleep in my shift. I don’t have anything else to—”
Without a knock sounding, the door burst open, and a stocky, stooped old woman came inside carrying a
surprisingly large load of folded blankets and drying towels, with a wooden tray of food balanced on top, complete with a porcelain pitcher.
“Ah, here ye are,” she announced. “His lord majesty lieutenant told me you were already in the room, but you never can tell with men. Half the time, they’ve no idea what they’re saying.”
At the irreverent reference to Jaromir, Amelie turned with some interest and took in the woman’s measure. Céline followed suit, but the aging creature rambled on.
“Blankets I can see a need for, but there’s no tub in sight, so what do you need with drying clothes, I ask? Men. Never know what they’re about. Now, you both come and have some of this bread and cheese. He said you’d not eaten either. But Helga’s here now. She’ll feed you.”
She appeared to be at least in her seventies, with thick white hair up in a bun that was partially covered by a green kerchief. Her wrinkled face had a dusky tone, and she wore a faded homespun dress that might have once been purple.
For Céline, another mystery of this castle was figuring out exactly who was who in the order of things. For one, Jaromir’s rank was that of lieutenant, not even captain, so why did he appear to be second to the prince in the command structure here? This aged woman…Helga, appeared to be a lowly servant, but she’d called Jaromir “his lord majesty lieutenant” with enough sarcasm that it could not be missed.
Who was she?
“Don’t just stand there, my girls,” Helga went on. “Come and eat.” She set the blankets and towels on the bed and brought the tray to the dressing table. Picking up a generous slice of soft, yellow cheese and placing it on a piece of white bread, she held it out to Amelie.
Céline had tasted white bread only a few times in her life, as it was a delicacy afforded only by the wealthy. “I…,” she tried to say, at a loss. “I…”
Amelie appeared equally uncertain, but she reached over and took the offered food.
“Two seers,” Helga murmured, prepping the next helping of bread and cheese. “Good, good, just what the castle needs now. From the line of Fawe.” She nodded in approval. “How many years apart were you born?”