“This is an island of transport,” Brella says, “in and out. But we can’t go to the rest of the place.”
“The rest?”
“The place that’s hidden.” She draws her fingers up and down, doors and windows and walls. “Some fae live in the forest. Some live here.”
“How big is it?” you ask, because it looks like it could go on forever.
“It’s like time.” She kisses your forehead and you go warm all over. “It doesn’t work the same way for them as it does for us.”
You consider this. You think of hills and hills, rising and falling, and of houses on them. And maybe, if the town is full up, another hill can grow from flat ground for one more fae, in one more house, with one more smokestack to let the heat from their hearth escape into the sky.
You’re crying.
“Oh, you’re crying,” she says.
“I am not.”
“I can feel you,” she reminds you, and you’re hot and cold thinking about how she knows the way you see her. How she’s tall and broad and sturdy, like a tree. Like a home. How she knows the words of decrees like a song, decrees she claimed through slyness, so smart, so willing to bend a rule, or break one, because she’s so confident in her rightness. Her goodness. How she’s brave and hot-tempered and she defends all of her people. How you are maybe her people now, and, gods, how would it feel to have her stand for you? Safe, probably. Like a roof. And how she can’t abide death, or violence, because justice is living, and it’s for everyone.
“It’s okay to cry,” she says, and it’s so simple, but you believe her. So you do. You cry and cry. And you hear Vel crying, too, and James saying, “My sweet giant, my brave seamstress,” and that just makes you cry more.
Maybe you sleep, or maybe you don’t need to. It could be the air refreshing you, or the water, or the Sweets, little blue dots of magic in the fabric of this place. This place you never want to leave because there’s a settling in your skin here. There’s a restfulness. But this is a transit place, and so soon it’s calling you to move.
“A door,” Brella says, and there it is. “Are you ready?”
“No,” you say, because it’s true and you can only be true here. A lie would shrivel up and die, a sickly thing. “What if what’s next is painful? What if it’s hard?”
“I’m here,” she says. “And so are they.”
James and Vel, and James is calmer than you’ve ever seen him, his jutting elbows and restless legs still and serene. You’re in awe of him.
“Are you ready?” he asks, or she does, and finally you can say yes because you are, you are. Because, if nothing else, this place is something to fight for.
“Through the door now,” she says. “Through the gate. One, two . . .”
Chapter Thirty
Leaving the Between was like waking from deep, dreaming sleep. Scratch couldn’t remember for a few moments where she was meant to be. Her vision fuzzed, colors bleeding together in the dim light of whatever room she’d entered. Her limbs felt heavy, her body sluggish. She needed a glass of water or a good stretch. Probably both.
Instead, she got shouting.
“They’re here. Hold them!”
Someone grabbed her wrists with strong, calloused fingers and wrenched her arms behind her back. Her mind didn’t catch up with her body quickly enough for her to scream. Instead, she blinked her vision clear. She was in a plush sitting room with paneled walls and delicate settees. There were a few soldiers about. One tugged on a rope, presumably tolling a bell that would send more their way. The soldiers wore blue tunics and leather armor, their heads bare of helmets. Across their fronts, in a darker blue thread, was a crest in the shape of a flower.
“Koravia,” Scratch mumbled through dry lips. “We’re here.”
There came a whistle, piercing and shrill. Scratch turned to find Brella with two fingers between her lips.
“Brella?” someone asked. The voice was distantly familiar. “Are you okay?”
“I need them to stop,” Brella cried, her voice strained and creaking. “Get them to stop, Maisie.”
“What do you mean?” The speaker came forward. She was a woman Scratch had seen only once before in a dream. “They’re not detaining you, you balloon.”
“Yes, I know. Let the guards go.”
“Keyes and the other?” Maisie asked, scandalized. “No way in the infinite hells, Umbrella. Good job. You’ve done it. They’re going to the dungeons.”
“The other?” James wriggled in the grip of a Koravian soldier. “My name is Sergeant James Ursus. This is Scratch. I assume you’re Maisie?”
“Keyes goes by Scratch? This is—no.” Maisie shook her head as if to clear it. “Stop this, Brella. Anyway, it’s not my call.”
“It’s mine,” said a figure lurking in the corner.
Between this and her surprise appearance at Scratch’s thinking bench back in Ivinscont, it appeared that Princess Frances made a regular habit of dramatic entrances from dark corners. Her jewel-studded tiara twinkled in the low firelight like hot coals. She wore a red frock, roughly the Ivinscontian crimson, and her piebald hair was swept up off of her neck in some sort of elegant fashion involving pins. Scratch had never seen the princess look like this before. Not like a princess at all really. Like a queen.
“Your Highness.” Scratch attempted a small bow, though her arms were bound and a soldier breathed down her neck. “Our allegiance has shifted. Brella and I discussed—”
“Yes, please tell me what Umbrella told you.” Frances held her shoulders stiffly. She seemed tight and uncomfortable, like she could use a few puffs of Roselap. “This was a secret mission after all.”
“Your Highness.” Brella bowed clumsily, unable to keep the tension from her voice. “Yes, I did tell the Sergeant Major of your plans. But circumstances changed. She and James—”
“Stop.” Frances pressed a delicate finger to her temple. She was powdered and painted, so it was impossible to tell whether she flushed or paled, but her hand shook slightly. “This is a longer conversation than we can have like this. Umbrella, Vel, you will join Maisie and me in my parlor, and we will sort this all out. Until then, I have no choice but to put Keyes and Ursus in the dungeon.” She turned to Scratch, wincing slightly. “I am sorry, Sergeant Major.”
Scratch gave a bare smile. “It’s all right.”
“All right?” James squeaked. “We’re here to fight for you!”
Frances rounded on him. “You’re here as a gesture, Sergeant. You are my gift to the Koravian King, much akin to a bouquet of flowers or an artisan-crafted vase. You might be of use as a fighter for me, but until I make the decision to employ you in any way other than as a bargaining chip, your chief use is to be my vase.” She narrowed her eyes. “And you will refer to me as Your Highness. Is that clear?”
“Y-yes, Your Highness,” James replied meekly, his face going gray.
Brella came to stand beside Scratch. She vibrated with rage.
“I won’t allow it.”
“Brella,” Scratch implored in a low murmur. “It’s all right. Really.”
Brella flashed her with those eyes, burning hot and fierce. “She saved my life, Your Highness.”
Scratch coughed. “It was rather the other way around, actually.”
Brella made a throaty noise of impatience. “A bit of both then. But she’s done me a great service, and I can’t just stand here and let her get thrown in a dungeon.”
“Oh, Brella.” Maisie covered her face with her hands. “You stupid raccoon. Not this.”
“Maisie,” Vel warned. “Don’t.”
“You’ve slept with her, haven’t you?” Maisie hissed. “You incompetent frog. You’re all frothy about her being dangerous and, ‘Oh, we need to get her out of Ivinscont before she does more harm,’ and now you’re, what, her lover? You absolute paperweight.”
“I don’t think you should be lecturing me on whether it’s a good idea to share my bed with someone dangerous, you
daft marigold!” Brella shouted. The room went silent.
“Brella.” Scratch watched Brella pale as her words sunk in. “No.”
Frances drew in a sharp breath, stiffening her shoulders and clenching her jaw. “Enough. Brella and Vel, you will be shown to a room where you will stay until I decide otherwise. Is that clear?”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Vel put in quickly. Brella stood stock still, her lips pressed into a pale line. Scratch tried to feel for something in the blood bond, a little shard of that connection that opened their dreams, to push a good thought Brella’s way. She didn’t feel anything. She tried anyway. I have this. Don’t worry. Don’t make this a bigger mess than it needs to be.
Because it could be a mess. Brella wasn’t a fighter. She didn’t understand what could come of this meeting. The stakes, as Scratch could see them, were too high for anything other than calm, reasoned strategy. This wasn’t about her. This wasn’t even about Frances. Not really. This was about Ivinscont.
“Take Keyes and Ursus to the dungeons,” Frances commanded.
Scratch went willingly, not even looking back at Brella’s anguished cry.
Chapter Thirty-One
“Were I a poet,” James mused from the floor of his cell, “I might have something to say on this.”
Scratch huddled on her straw mattress and poked at the remnants of what could charitably be referred to as her dinner. “Soldiers aren’t poets.”
He gestured dramatically to the wet stone walls. “Do you see any soldiers about?”
Not as such, no. The guards who had thrown them into the dungeons hadn’t stayed for longer than it took to lock the bars behind them. Aside from James, the only soul Scratch had encountered in their night and day of incarceration was a meek kitchen maid who shoved a dish of lukewarm gruel under the grates and skittered away before Scratch could properly thank her.
“I’d say something about journeys,” he continued, unprompted. “About ending up where we started. Cycles, and all that.”
“A bit on the nose, don’t you think, darling?”
“Forgive me, Scratchalina. The conditions aren’t ideal for art.” He sprawled along the floor like a lazy, overbred cat. “Do you think she’s going to keep us in here long?”
“Not much longer.”
“What makes you so sure?”
She sighed, shoving her food away. “We’ve been here for a full day without interrogation. Any more and she’ll look thoughtless, wasting any valuable intelligence we may have on vengeance. Any less, weak. She needs us hungry enough to talk, but not so hungry that we’re delirious.” She shrugged. “It’s fairly obvious.”
“Clever.” He kicked a cell bar with an outstretched foot. It clanged dully in the echoey space. He hissed at the pain, and she politely kept from mocking him. “I’m surprised she didn’t send your Brella down here with us.”
Your Brella. Despite the chill—which James, irritatingly, seemed entirely immune to—the words warmed her.
It wouldn’t do to dwell. “Frances loves Maisie, and, for all their fighting, Maisie loves Brella. They’re sisters.” She stared at the drippy ceiling, hoping nothing vile decided to off itself into her eyes. “Even if you royally pissed me off I wouldn’t find joy in detaining any, uh, companion of yours.”
“Companion?” He beamed. “You’re so cute.”
“Shut up.”
“Never.” He chewed on his lip. “Have you planned what you’ll say to her?”
“Frances?”
“No, The God of Lizards. Yes, Frances.”
She thought of her last night in the castle, smoking Roselap with a princess she barely knew. Frances was different here. Tighter. There was a tension around her eyes that was entirely new. It made her look older.
“I might have,” she replied mildly. “I don’t envy her.”
“I do. I’d make a fantastic prince.”
“Hush.” She pushed herself onto her dirt-smudged forearms. Gods, she was filthy. “No, I mean, she’s in a difficult position. And to go from her secure life to living in someone else’s castle . . .” She shrugged. “It can’t be comfortable.”
“You used to eat apple cores out of trashcans and you pity an uncomfortable princess?” He tsked disparagingly. “You’ve gone soft.”
“Perhaps.” She ran a hand through her shorn hair. “And you as well.”
“Me? I assure you, Scratch, I’m as hard as ever.” He pursed his lips. “Well, perhaps not in this exact moment . . .”
“James?” she asked, doodling a mindless squiggle in the dust. “What do you want?”
“A bath.”
“And then?”
“Vel.”
“If you could take this seriously for a moment.”
He rolled his eyes. “How am I meant to take this seriously if I don’t know what you mean?”
“If you had a choice,” she explained through her teeth, patience thinning. “If the next phase of your life was open to any possibility, what would you choose?”
He eyed her narrowly. “Why are you asking me this?”
“Call it idle curiosity.”
“Nothing about you is idle.”
“Then call it curiosity.”
“I’m calling it off.”
“Cute.” She rose up to a seated position, dusting herself off. “Frances will speak to me. I will set my terms. Then, we will—”
“I’m sorry, your terms?”
She rolled her eyes. “Yes, James. Did you not think I had a plan?”
“Of course you have a plan, darling. I wouldn’t expect any less. I just wonder whether you’re in the position to dictate terms.”
“Regardless.” She waved him away. “If you could decide what tomorrow looked like, what would it be?”
He opened his mouth, then closed it again. It appeared he wasn’t going for the cute, quippy answer. His forehead furrowed, his thick brows drawing down.
“You know, Scratch,” he said after a long moment, “I only ever cared about being with you.”
“Me?”
“No, Hester.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Yes, you, you—what did Maisie call Brella? You paperweight.” He grinned. “I think Maisie and I will get along very well, don’t you?”
She shuddered at the thought. “Too well.”
“Anyway.” He sobered. With his shoulders hunched and his head lowered he looked strangely nervous. “I didn’t like my family. You know that well enough. They sent me away to the Academy and then you and I met and, well, that’s all there is.” He swallowed thickly. “You were my family. All I wanted was to be happy, and with you.”
Her heart raced. “But, the archery . . .”
He tilted his head in acknowledgment. “Sure. I liked that, too. But, Scratch, I’m only good at that because my parents spent hundreds of crowns on instructors. The only thing that I was good at of my own accord was being your friend.”
Her mouth was dry, all the moisture in her body apparently taking residence in her tear ducts. It was as though a little magic of the Between was wedged into the muscle of her heart. “You want to . . . be my friend?”
“Well, of course.” He squared his shoulders, bracing for another baring admission. “But I only got good at warcraft to stay with you. So you wouldn’t lose use of me.”
“I would never,” she cried. “It has nothing to do with ‘use’—”
He held up a hand. “I know that now.” He smiled crookedly at her. “You wouldn’t be able to get rid of me if you tried. But now I have Vel, too.” He scratched self-consciously at his elbow. “He actually asked me something similar. What would I want to do next? And I thought—all right, what am I good at? Shooting arrows. Loving you. Loving him.” He blushed, cheek to hairline. Scratch’s ribs squeezed. “Telling stories. I thought I might . . . write them down?” He turned away, preventing Scratch from catching more than a glimpse of the fervent, eager glint in his eyes. “We’re plotting an insurrection, after all. It would be a shame i
f no one bothered to keep a written record.”
“A historian?” Scratch felt her mouth drop open. “James, that’s a fantastic idea.”
“I thought so.” His blush deepened. “Maybe, if I learn the trade, I could work up to being her historian.”
“Her? Wha—oh.” Frances, of course. “Yes, I think you could.”
“I’m sure there are historians that are better trained than I am,” he babbled. “I shouldn’t expect to be a royal historian just because the royal in question is my lover’s sister’s lover. Or my best friend’s lover’s sister’s lover. Or—”
“James.” She wished they had been put in the same cell so she could clap a hand over his mouth. “I think it’s a brilliant idea. And who better? There are so many good arguments for it I don’t know which one I’ll lead with.”
“Lead with?”
“When I talk to Frances.” She spread her hands, gesturing to the absolute obvious. “You have just become one of my terms. Congratulations.”
His eyes widened. “Scratch, don’t jeopardize your plan with my little yen.”
Little yen her ass. James rarely waited—and, even more rarely, worked—for the things he wanted. It was a symptom of his coddled upbringing to strive only for the things he could easily achieve. When he wanted objects, he spent money. When he wanted men, his currencies were his well-bred looks and crystal-cut wit. He shot arrows, and the arrows always found their targets. This was the first time Scratch had seen him want something so desperately that the wanting was very nearly fear.
“I know,” she said in a near whisper. “I know how terrible it is to want something, Jamie. To hope. How it feels like nothing more than self-sabotage.” She swallowed. “We haven’t been able to desire things. Not really. We were told to fight, and we fought. And everything we wished for was within those lines, drawn by someone else. We desired the things we were told to desire. We valued what we were told mattered. Now we really get to choose.” She smiled at him. “Let’s.”
He met her smile, then let his fall. “If we get the opportunity. We’re in a dungeon, in case you’ve forgotten.”
Walk Between Worlds Page 18
