“Yeah, I guess,” I said, trying to play it cool. “You must have your pick of performers here in the palace.”
“Not exactly,” he said. “The troupe girls usually come from other cities, and when their year is over, they head home. They don’t belong to me. They belong to the people. And so…we’re all tired of the ones who live in Capamere.” He laughed. “The princess is feeling tired. Maybe you should take her back to your room.”
“Is she okay?” I asked. Himika looked kind of droopy and pale. She didn’t notice me staring at her, but leaned her head against a pillow.
He lowered his voice. “To be honest, I am concerned about her condition. I have sent messengers to Gaermon, asking for her personal physician to come to her, because my old healer isn’t familiar with her situation, although she’s trying her best. I want to know how her condition was diagnosed there. The princess seems to know very little about what’s wrong with her, and she said she didn’t take any medicines.” He paused. “It’s odd.”
He actually sounded like he was genuinely concerned, which I didn't expect. I remembered that there was a time when he seemed like a hero to me. I suppose he had some admirable qualities.
“She’s had a lot of commotion tonight,” he said. “I’m glad to hear her laugh, but now I think she needs rest. She’s a very delicate young woman… Phoebe, please take good care of her for me, will you?”
“Of course.” All my easygoing mood drained out. “I mean…she isn’t…dying, is she?”
The healer came up behind me. “I think she will be fine with rest.”
“Do you know what’s wrong?”
“Not exactly, but I will say this. I don’t think it is a natural illness. Maybe it’s not an illness at all.”
“Are you implying that someone in Gaermon has been poisoning her?” Leonidas asked.
The woman bowed to the emperor. “Unfortunately, that is the most obvious explanation, although I don’t understand why it would be so, especially from such a young age.”
Leonidas motioned to a guard. “Carry her to bed.” She was slipping in and out of sleep. I had never seen her seem this sick. Usually she was pretty normal. “Sleep well,” he told her.
“Mm…” She barely stirred.
I didn’t know what to think. No one put the shackles on my feet, and the guards left the window open, like Leonidas was starting to trust us.
“Himika?” I nudged her shoulder. “How do you feel?”
“Just…weary.” Her face was white in the moonlight. She managed to look more beautiful the worse she felt, which was an enviable trait. When I was sick, I just looked washed-out and grumpy. Princesses, man.
“Do you ever feel like this at home?” I asked.
“Yes…sometimes. I have good days and bad days. You hadn’t seen a bad day yet. Well…here you go. Enjoy. Now you can see why Rin wanted to leave.” She glared at the ceiling.
“Nah,” I said. “He never complained to me. I don’t think he left because of anything you did. He was probably just young and horny.”
That almost put a smile on her face. “Yes, he was that,” she said. “The healer here said he thinks I’ve been slowly poisoned since I was a little girl.”
“He told me that, too, but it makes no sense. Wouldn’t your family have realized?”
“You would think so. But he said the only other explanation is that I have been cursed by some cruel magic. Either way, there is something they didn’t tell me. Now, my father is dead and my kingdom belongs to the empire.”
“But you can’t trust Leonidas. I have this weird feeling he’s tricking you. Remember how angry he looked when you wouldn’t pledge loyalty to him?” I felt a duty to her brother to make sure she stayed strong.
“Yes…,” she said. “He’s also the first person to ever ask me about my sickness, and question whether I could get better.” She shut her eyes. Wretch padded over to her on the bed and flopped down against her arm. Himika slowly stroked her head. “I’m so weak, Phoebe. Just stay with me. I’m scared.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said.
Which turned out to be the big lie of the night.
Chapter Three
Sir Forrest
Phoebe…
I could always feel her just out of reach. We all could, but I liked to think I felt it more than the others. I was her first guardian, watching over her even before she knew who I was. My entire life had been devoted to her from the day I left the Black Army.
The last time I saw her, Commander Abel himself was carrying her away from me. The sight of her, sluggish from the half-completed ritual, in the arms of that man…
I tried to go after her. I would have cut down anyone in my path. I would have cut down Abel himself. But Niko and Gilbert held me back. We fought off the soldiers and escaped back down into the old sewers, only for Niko to lead us out a different way from where we had come.
“Phoebe’s scared,” I said. I could feel her fear and all I wanted to do was kill as many men as I could, to fight my way to her side or die trying.
“Forrest.” Nike grabbed my shoulder and stared straight into my eyes. “Patience, or you’ll get us all killed. Abel is stronger than we are right now. We need a strategy.”
“We won’t get any stronger without Phoebe,” I said. I could practically feel the heat of magic that poured out of her and into me when we joined. It was burned into my memory.
“Not true,” Niko said. “Perhaps your only definition of strength is straightforward, but I’ve gotten plenty strong without Phoebe.”
“I’ve seen what the Emperor does to nations, to entire armies. And we’re no army,” Rin said, sounding grim. “I don’t know how to outsmart them now.”
“Well, it’s a good thing I do,” Niko said impatiently. “The two of you don’t need to be the brains.”
Gilbert wasn’t saying a word. The bard just looked uncomfortable. I’d noticed that when Niko spoke, Gilbert tended to defer to him, even though Rin was his lover and I was the first guardian. Niko was nothing but bossy. I was getting damned sick of it.
“Gilbert, you said you’ve been to the Imperial Palace,” I said.
“Yes…”
“Niko, you have one day to figure out a plan or I’m charging in there. If Gilbert won’t follow me, he can at least draw me a map. I know where Phoebe is. I’ll find her.”
Niko gave me a smile that would suit a serpent. “All right, Sir Forrest. One day.”
The next morning, he walked into the room where I was eating breakfast alone and sat down at the table, uninvited. He was holding coffee and dressed in a robe. I was staring out the window, gnawing on a pastry without tasting it.
“Forrest, you don’t care for me,” he said.
“I don’t care for the man who barges in on me and acts like he doesn’t give a shit about the girl we’re supposed to protect? Well, you don’t say.”
Niko paused. “Who ever said—“
“You don’t even know her.”
“In a way, not yet. But…I feel the bond between us, the same as you.” When I didn’t say anything, he added, “I saved your lives earlier. I was the one who had my spies keeping an eye on you, and I was the one who acted immediately when you didn’t come back. I found a passage into the temple. Before Abel took her, I gave Phoebe the dice I have had as long as I can remember.”
“Dice.” I scoffed.
Niko was clearly a superstitious guy. I’d known the man for a handful of days and he didn’t seem to make a single move without considering his ‘fortune’. “You know the very idea of fortune telling was invented to make a buck.” I couldn’t resist saying it.
He rapped his fingers on the table. “And I’ve made quite a few. Forrest, I don’t pretend to know the explanation, but as long as I roll the dice first, I’ve had good luck.”
Coincidence. Niko was both gullible and cocky. It wasn’t a combo I trusted. But I wouldn’t argue. “All I care about is the end result. Phoebe’s safety.
And not just because of the sigils.”
“Because you love her,” Niko said. “And you hate that I am meant to love her too.”
“I accept my fate.”
“No. You really don’t. But it’s all right.” Niko got to his feet again, slowly, in a way that I think was meant to keep me calm.
“The thing about the fortunes,” he said, “is that I’ve learned to trust them. My fortune teller told me to wear this band to cover my sigil.” He pointed at the slender band of silver that circled around his head and covered the sigil on his forehead with a flat disc. “Maybe she knew that this fate would not bring me good fortune. But from the moment Phoebe showed me the truth, I knew I couldn’t turn back. Even if it brings me pain. Even if I die.” He looked at me. “I want her every bit as much as you do.”
“I understand, yeah, I just don’t want to talk about it.”
“You can trust me with her,” he said. “I ask nothing of you, except that you believe me in this.”
I didn’t. Not really.
I had tried my best to court Phoebe like a girl I would marry someday. I would never have dreamed of having sex with her on the very first night, even after watching her for years. But on the very first night, she told me, Niko expects to spend tonight with me.
And so he had. Niko got what he expected. Niko and Gilbert both spent the night with her, as it turned out. I had the feeling even that was under Niko’s control. If Niko had control of Gilbert, then it was two against one.
Two against one what? We were supposed to work together. We had to share her. I was the failure here. I didn’t know how I could stand to let her love a man like Niko.
I had never liked men like this. He operated outside of the law, with his business smuggling women out of the city and off to new lives abroad where life was more free. Some might say that was noble of him, but all he wanted was money. No man could have this much money and not be corrupt. I’d seen it too many times. And fortune telling? That told me he was a man who didn’t know his own mind.
“I am waiting on a man who works in the palace,” Niko said, snapping my attention back. “He’ll tell me where she’s being kept and how she’s guarded, and as soon as I know, we’ll move. It will probably be another day. But it’ll be worth waiting. We’re a team, aren’t we?”
“Sure.”
Chapter Four
Phoebe
I was vaguely aware of a sound in the room, and I opened my eyes just in time to get something shoved in my mouth, muffling any sound of protest I might make.
“Mmm!” Obviously, I panicked.
“Shhh.” It was our attendant. Roa. I glanced at Himika. Still sleeping, with Wretch curled up beside her.
“Mmm?” I made an urgent sound.
Wretch was definitely stirring awake. She spread her wings and growled.
“Mm,” I pleaded. Please don’t hurt her.
Roa lifted a stone with a faint red glow and pressed it against my arm. It burned my skin with an immediate, searing pain.
“Mmm!” What the hell was that for?
“I wanted you to know that I’ll hurt you if I must.” The stone was the only light in the room besides the moonlight, casting a tortured red glow on her face. She barely resembled the familiar handmaid. “Come with me.”
As my arm throbbed, I immediately thought of Abel’s scar. Someone tried to burn off his sigil when he was a child. The pain must have been intense. That was why I had never been able to sense him clearly. But when we were close, I was still able to stir his sigil to life.
That was when he had turned into a dragon. A stunning dragon, who looked like he was shaped from ice. It frightened him in the moment, and he had sent me here, but surely the incident must never be far from his mind.
I thought about him now, trying to sense where he was. His own estate was not far at all from the palace. And he was awake. I just knew he was awake.
Abel—please. Help me. I tried to project the vision of what I was experiencing. I knew some part of him wondered why his sigil had been burned away, and why his family lied to him.
Abel was only one man. And he should be my enemy. Whatever else happened, he had still killed Elder Dion and been the Emperor’s lackey for many years. But I felt like everything would be okay, if I could only get him to trust me.
I saw Himika’s eyes open, a gleam in the night, just as Wretch flew at Roa.
“Mmm!” I did my best to warn Himika before I took a shot at Roa, kicking her. She pulled out a knife along with holding the stone but I had been around some real warriors long enough to see that she wasn’t one.
She slashed at Wretch, who flew out of the way. I didn’t want to lose my cat now that I had her back; I tried to grab her. Roa seized the moment, snatching a pillow and shoving it in my face. I stumbled back, bumping into the bed. Roa wrapped her arm around Himika’s neck.
“Oh!” Himika gasped. She still looked so weak.
My eyes skimmed the room, looking for something I could use as a weapon, but there wasn’t much here. During the day, our attendants brought food, drink, and amusements, but they were taken away before bed. We didn’t even have glasses of water during the night. “Let her go.”
“Take one step closer and I will crush her fragile bones.” She put one of her boots on top of Himika’s foot.
“Who do you work for?” I asked.
She smiled. “The Elders.”
“The Elders?”
“Fuck it,” she said. She stomped on Himika’s foot, and Himika let out a horrible scream. Everyone must have heard it, but the fact that the door stayed shut indicated that either the guards were on her side, or they were down for the count.
Wretch flew at her with a hiss, and Roa swung at her with the burning stone. She had put the knife away before grabbing Himika.
I remembered the chamber pot under the bed, grabbed it and pitched it at her, showering her in piss. Himika got hit with some of it too, and her howl of pain took on a tone of utter disgust.
“I’m a maid,” Roa said. “I’ve already dealt with a lot of piss in my life. But I can’t blame you for trying. Shall I do the other foot?” She was still holding Himika, who seemed to be trying to get ahold of herself, but the pain must have been intense. Her foot, bare for sleep, was quickly swelling up huge and bruising, way more than a normal person’s foot should just from being stomped on. She really was fragile.
“Wait!” Himika’s eyes were overflowing with tears of pain. “Fine,” I said. “I’ll go with you.”
“Get your cat out of my face.”
“C’mere, Wretch.”
“Phoebe…,” Himika said. “She might kill you. You need to survive.”
“I’m trying my best!” What else was I supposed to do? I grabbed the furious ball of fur and feathers that was Wretch out of the air and clamped my arms around her wings. She bit my hand.
“Shh.” I tried to soothe her. She remained wriggly. “I forgot how irascible you are, Pumpkin…”
“Quiet,” Roa hissed. “Go to the servant stairs and open the door.”
I assumed those were the back stairs where we had originally come from. I opened the door. A guard was slumped on the stairs.
“Go past him and walk down,” she said.
I felt the heat of the stone get close to my back and I quickly started moving. “I don’t understand,” I said. “The Elders want me to become the priestess, don’t they? Why would you be working for them?”
“I said, shh!”
“I was just at the Temple of Stones, and you don’t look like an Elder to me.”
At the bottom of the stairs, a guy suddenly appeared out of the shadows and grabbed me. Wretch sprang out of my arms as he covered my mouth. That got my heart going even faster. He was a big, muscular guy with a deep voice as he said, “I’ve got her. Man, she’s just a kid. I sure hate this.”
“I know,” Roa said. “It’s unpleasant but it has to be done.”
Oh gods, it seemed like a really ba
d sign when your bitchy enemies didn’t even like whatever they had planned. I didn’t even bother protesting that I was not exactly a kid. I guess the “nightgown and sleep-rumpled-hair” look wasn’t great for projecting maturity.
An old man walked up behind the other guy. Leonidas’s advisor, in the robes.
“Hello, priestess,” he said. “I’m very sorry. I want you to know that I am aware none of this is your fault. The priestess is just the tool of the Elders. I wish I knew a better way to undo what was done.”
“You’re an Elder?”
“I was an Elder. I work for Leonidas now.”
So, it was just as I thought all along. Leonidas was trying to kill me. For a moment, I actually had started to doubt.
Why did I ever doubt? Because he sounded so sincere?
Lesson learned. It was in my nature to trust people. I couldn’t do that anymore. Not the Emperor I used to revere, not the handmaiden who seemed kind. No one but my guardians and the Elders.
And even then…
A hand slapped me and my eyes flew back open.
“What are you doing?” Roa demanded. “Magic?”
“No, I was—uh—freaking out.”
They didn’t trust me either. But I really wasn’t doing anything. I was out of options. I had never had any magic of my own. I could only lend my power to my guardians. For a second, Himika had made me feel better about that, but now a surge of frustration and bitterness ran through me. I didn’t want to be helpless.
I heard Himika screaming upstairs. “Leonidas! Guards! Anyone!”
“Never mind her. Bring the priestess downstairs,” the old man said. “We’ll begin.”
“Begin what?”
“A few experiments.”
“Experiments?”
I don’t think anything pleasant had ever come out of someone telling you they were beginning experiments on you. But if they killed me, all my guardians would die. That was what the book said. I had to stay alive as long as possible even if they tortured me. My eyes tracked Wretch, who was crouched on the floor wriggling her ass, about to pounce. But I didn’t want her to fight for me. They might kill her.
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