Something else was growing too. She felt every breath that Armand took and every breath that she took. She felt the tiny space of air between their knees. She felt the way his head tilted, the way light glanced off his jaw, the way his eyelids flickered as he looked down at the yarn, and up at her face.
She thought it was just the same curious peace she felt when Amélie did her makeup, because like then, the world had narrowed down to her and Armand and tiny scraps of sensation. Then her hands overshot the pattern, and she nearly jerked the yarn out of alignment. She caught herself, but her wrist brushed against his, and a tiny shiver went up her arm.
Their eyes met. Her face felt hot. Her hands, though gripping the yarn, felt empty.
She thought, This is not the way I feel about Erec.
She thought, I think I love him.
The words slid into her head between one breath and the next, and she couldn’t deny them any more than she could pretend she wasn’t breathing.
She loved Armand. It was a simple, absolute feeling, as if her heart had turned into a compass that pointed toward him. Suddenly it didn’t matter that she was dying, that she didn’t get to keep him, that she didn’t get to have him in the first place because he would never feel about her the same way.
He was here. She stared at the line of his jaw, listened to his breathing, and wrapped yarn around his glittering fingers. He was here, and she could drink in his presence like cool water and fresh air. For this one moment, just seeing him was a miracle, and it was enough.
“It’s pretty,” said Amélie.
Rachelle flinched and turned. Amélie stood behind her, next to one of the little tables, on which rested a tray bearing a silver pitcher and three cups. The warm, rich smell of hot chocolate wafted up from them.
“That’s the first time you didn’t notice me walking into the room,” said Amélie.
“I was busy,” Rachelle said stiffly. Her fingers shook as she wound the last few loops in the pattern. Then she ripped the yarn from its skein, tied it off, and pulled the piece loose from Armand’s fingers. “There. All done.”
“Pretty,” said Armand, looking at the floor.
Amélie leaned in closer to look. “What’s it for?”
Rachelle’s heart thumped. “To keep Monsieur Vareilles safe,” she said, because if she told Amélie about the lindenworm then she’d have to tell her about the door and Joyeuse and the Devourer—and she wanted to keep her friend free of that darkness for just a little longer.
“It’s awfully big,” said Amélie. “Is he that much trouble?”
“You have no idea,” said Rachelle, and Amélie’s grin made the lie completely worth it.
“Well, then you deserve chocolate,” said Amélie, and handed her a cup.
“Do I deserve any?” asked Armand. “Even though I’m trouble?”
“I don’t know, does he?” Amélie looked at Rachelle.
Rachelle looked at him as she took a deep breath of the steam from her cup.
“Yes,” she said. “This time he deserves it. Yes.”
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The next day, Rachelle woke up and thought, Tonight we get Joyeuse. Or die.
The morning was busy with attending the King, and Rachelle found it harder than usual to pretend to be respectful. Armand, too, seemed tense. Finally, when the bells were tolling two o’clock, Rachelle turned to Armand and said, “I don’t care if we get in trouble. I can’t stand this a moment longer. If there’s a place you like in the gardens, tell me now, or I’ll just drag you out any which way.”
Armand smiled and said, “There is a spot, actually.”
Fifteen minutes later, she was following him on a narrow ghost of a path between hedges, wondering if this was an elaborate joke. Except Armand—unlike Erec—did not seem particularly interested in teasing her.
They rounded two little hills and went through a gate in a hedge—and then Rachelle stopped. Before them was a miniature lake, studded with lily pads; on the other side was a small country cottage, red tiles on the roof and dark wooden beams crisscrossing its white plaster walls. Roses cascaded over one side of the building; on the other was a low, open stable that housed no horses—but chickens wandered clucking in and out among the piles of straw. It looked like a house from her own village as described by la Fontaine; any moment, flounces would start to appear on Rachelle’s coat.
“What is that?” asked Rachelle.
“The Trebuchet,” said Armand. “Built by the King’s late father for his mistress Marie d’Astoir.”
“Why did he name it after a siege weapon?” she asked.
“He didn’t. But Marie d’Astoir only accepted him after he built it, and the Queen retaliated with an epic poem of rhymed couplets, describing the siege of Marie’s virtue and calling this cottage the trebuchet that brought down her walls. Marie was humiliated and swore never to associate with the Queen again. It was the great scandal of the day.”
“I can’t see why that would be scandalous,” said Rachelle. “Since apparently everyone does it.”
“Oh, it wasn’t her sleeping with the King that was a scandal, it was her fighting with the Queen. And yes, that doesn’t make a bit of sense, and no, the court hasn’t changed. Guess what the Bishop talked about in his sermon last Sunday.”
“Everyone in this court is mad,” Rachelle said, trying not to think about what else the Bishop might have said, or what Armand might have thought of it. But then she realized with a sudden, sick clarity that she did want to know. She was desperate to know what Armand was thinking.
They had come to the stable—if it could be called that, since on closer inspection it was clear that it had never been meant to house horses, but simply to have the same vague outline as a stable and provide a resting place for all the hay bales that were now infested with chickens. The cottage, too, was subtly different from the ones Rachelle had known—windows too large, hall too long. It was like the entire building had been sketched from somebody’s nostalgic, drunken memory of a farmhouse.
“What else did the Bishop talk about?” she asked.
“Oh, you know, the sins of the court and so forth.” Armand’s voice was light, his face slightly angled away so she couldn’t quite read his expression. “There has not been such hypocrisy since the Imperium, when they fed men to lions for amusement, yet called themselves righteous because of the sin-eaters they kept chained at their doors.”
“And let me guess,” Rachelle bit out, “I’m one of the sin-eaters.”
“You’ve said so yourself, haven’t you?” Without waiting for a reply, Armand strode forward into the shade of the not-stable and seated himself in a pile of straw.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Sitting down.” He poked at the straw and slid his silver hand under an egg, cradling it neatly. “Catch.”
Rachelle’s hand snapped out. She caught the egg easily, but too hard; it crunched in her hands, yolk running out between her fingers.
“You,” she said furiously, and then Armand looked up at her half grinning, half fearful. Memory sliced through her chest: Marc, her little brother, one morning when they were supposed to be gathering up the eggs carefully for Mother. They’d started tossing the eggs instead, and when Marc threw one too hard and it cracked against her hand, he’d looked at her just like that.
The forestborn had marked her the next day.
She stooped swiftly, grabbed an egg from among the straw, and threw it at Armand. He got his hand up in time: the egg crunched against the metal of his palm. He rocked backward with a laugh.
“What is wrong with you?” asked Rachelle.
He looked at the egg dripping down his hand. “I was wondering if you would snap and kill me.”
His voice was light, but with a strange alertness. And Rachelle felt like she had been kicked in the gut as she
realized that he meant it.
“What is wrong with you?” she repeated.
“No talent for survival, but you already knew that.” He rubbed his hand awkwardly in the hay. “That will take a while to clean off.”
Rachelle knelt beside him, grabbed a handful of hay, and started wiping away egg. “Did you really think I might kill you?” she asked quietly.
He went still. Then he looked up at her and said, “You’re angry, but you’re never vicious. You’ve been kind to me, and I’m very grateful. I don’t think you would kill me unless you received orders.”
“An assassin.” Her voice was thick and rough in her throat. She shouldn’t have felt betrayed, and yet she did. “You think I’m an assassin.”
“Isn’t that what all the bloodbound are?” His voice was very quiet. “People speak out against the King and then they vanish. Everyone knows how it works.”
“I have never done that.”
“Have you?”
“No, damn you, I have begged Erec to keep me away from those missions, and if you don’t think that was a sacrifice, you haven’t ever owed him a favor. I hunt woodspawn. I save the lives people like you are too weak to protect. That’s all.”
“But you are the King’s bloodbound,” he went on quietly, relentlessly. “You serve him and support his rule, even if you let the other bloodbound kill for you and be your sin-eaters.”
“You support his rule,” she snapped. “And wear silks and live in palaces because of it.”
“So now I’m not a prisoner? That’s lovely. Do you mind if I get up and leave now?”
Rachelle was drawing her hand back to strike him before she even knew what she was doing. Then she saw him bracing himself. Feeling sick, she dropped her hands. How had they come to this so quickly?
“You know what I am,” she said. “You knew when we were in my village and you said—” She couldn’t force the words out. “I have saved your life how many times now, and you still don’t trust me?”
“You’ve said how many times that it’s only because I’m useful?”
He did have a point there.
“Why are you so desperate to hate me?” she asked quietly. “Why now?”
His mouth tightened and he looked away from her. Then he said quietly, “Because I am terrified to trust you.” He let out a shaky laugh. “I was ready for any kind of jailer but you.”
And the worst thing was, she understood. She had told him, right from the start, that she was a bloodbound and dangerous, that she was his jailer and didn’t want to protect him. He was only trying to listen to her. And yet now—even now, he was biting his lip and looking sideways at her.
“You shouldn’t trust me,” she said. “You shouldn’t.”
He looked suddenly distressed. “Rachelle—”
“Do you know who was the woodwife who trained me, whom I killed to save my own life? She was my aunt. I loved her more than my own mother. She told me and she told me to be careful in the woods, but I thought I was clever enough to speak with a forestborn and outwit him. So he marked me. And I was too scared and ashamed to tell her until the last day, and when I did— When I finally ran to her for help, the forestborn had gotten there first.”
Then her throat closed up, and for a moment she couldn’t speak. She had spent so long trying so hard not to think of that day, but the memories were as sharp as ever and they shredded through her.
“He took his time. There was blood everywhere.” She could smell it even now, and her stomach roiled. “Do you know, when people are cut up enough, they don’t look human anymore? They look like . . . like dolls that were sewn by a monster. But she was still alive. She saw me, and she whimpered.
“Then the forestborn said he’d found a worthy sacrifice for me. I couldn’t move. He said this was the bargain I had made, and she whimpered again. He said he could make her live for days longer if he wanted. I would die screaming of the mark and her agony would go on and on before he let her die. Or I could kill her quickly and live.
“So I did.” Rachelle clenched her teeth for a moment, then went on, “She still tried to escape. Do you see this scar?” She held up her hand, showing him the tiny white mark in her palm. “She stabbed me in the hand with a needle—he’d found her making charms; there was thread everywhere—but she was so weak. And so horrible. I couldn’t bear to look at her. I hated her the way you hate a spider when you’re killing it. I cut her throat and I hated her for being hurt by me.”
She dared to look at him then. Armand looked steadily back at her, his eyes solemn, and said nothing.
“Well?” she demanded. “What are you going to say? It’s all right because at least I tried to resist? Everyone tries to be good until it stops being convenient!”
“No—”
“Or are you going to tell me it was a kindness to kill her? That it wasn’t so bad, because at least I ended her suffering? I was there. I know exactly how bad it was, and not all the suffering in the world could make it right.”
She realized her eyes were stinging, and she scraped at them with the back of her hand.
“No,” said Armand after a moment. “It’s not all right. You should have died first.”
She had been dreading those words. She had expected they would break her. But instead, she only choked on a laugh as her hand clenched around the scar. “If I ever want to be driven to despair, I’ll go straight to you.”
“If I’d said you’d done right, you would have throttled me,” he said.
“I thought you didn’t have any talent for survival.”
“Maybe you’re teaching me.”
“And what do you want to teach me?” she asked wearily. “I already know I ought to be dead.”
“No, you shouldn’t,” said Armand. “What good would that do?”
“At least then I’d get what I deserved. Like your precious Bishop says.”
“You know,” said Armand, “my mother used to say that if we all got what we deserved, we’d all be dead. And yet somehow God refrains from smiting us. Whatever you ought to have done then, dying won’t undo it now. And I’m glad I got to meet you.”
“You,” said Rachelle, “are insane.”
“You,” he said, “are not the first one to tell me that. And one more thing. I don’t believe you’re damned.”
“Then what am I?”
He let out a breath. “I think . . . you are not content. You have power and beauty and strength that others could only dream of. You could be immortal. But you are never content. Not when you’re at the center of the court and not when you’re riding with the Wild Hunt and not when you’re cutting down your enemies with a sword. So you cannot be damned.”
Her throat tightened. It was unfair—it was absolutely unfair that his voice could make her heart beat with jagged, idiotic hope.
“Pretty words,” she said. “But a bit heretical. I don’t recall hearing that any of the damned were content.”
“They’re content to stay in their sins.” He grinned at her, and it felt like there was no space or barrier at all between them, like his smile was happening inside her heart. Without meaning to at all, she smiled back.
They were both fools, perhaps.
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As soon as the sun set, they slipped back down to the wine cellar. Rachelle laid her hands on the floor, and the door appeared before them.
Armand got to his feet. “So how do we use the charm?”
“Normally we’d hang it over somebody’s bed.” She pulled out the charm, which had been hung like a scarf around her neck. “Or we would if this were a regular sleep charm. I suppose instead we throw it over the lindenworm’s coils.”
“That sounds strangely easy,” said Armand.
“Well . . . this sort of charm needs to be awakened.”
“And that means?”
“A lot of things that I spent years learning. But what it comes down to is that I have to hold the charm in place and concentrate for a moment.” And now that she was saying it out loud, her heart was finally starting to pick up speed.
“While the two heads try to bite you?” Armand asked dubiously.
“Last time it took a moment to wake up. As long as I awaken the charm faster, we’ll be all right.” Rachelle hoped that the words didn’t sound as stupid to him as they did to her.
Armand shrugged. “Well, I don’t suppose it will be the craziest thing I’ve ever done.” He pulled back his sleeve with his teeth. Rachelle shifted the charm to her left hand and drew her sword.
The door swung in. Darkness fell.
Instantly Rachelle lunged forward, flinging the charm while clinging to one end. She let herself feel the soft fibers against her skin, and inside her mind she reached as she tried to awaken the charm. For one moment she had it—she could feel the power humming through the charm—
Then she remembered the way Aunt Léonie had smiled at her the first time she managed it, and the way she had shuddered when Rachelle laid the knife against her throat, and the power was gone.
Four eyes opened.
There was no time to think, only move. Rachelle drew her sword and slashed, cutting off the nearest head, then dodged to the side and tried to cut off the other. But she moved at the wrong angle; her sword only got halfway into the creature’s neck and got stuck. The lindenworm screamed and reared up, tearing the sword from her hands—and then the other head was already grown back and surging toward her.
Rachelle ducked just in time. At least she still had a hold on the sleep charm.
“Armand!” she shouted. “Distract it!”
She didn’t noticed if he did or not; all her attention was on the lindenworm’s two swaying heads—and her sword, stuck in its neck. When the head with the sword lunged at her, she was ready. She rolled to the side, grabbed the sword, and wrenched it free. The next moment, she had sliced off the head, but the other was hurtling toward her—
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