by Taft, Nicole
Once I dried off, I spied the extra bucket of water and after a few more moments, emptied Wolf’s coat pockets and gave the garment a thorough scrubbing. When it was clean enough to my liking, I wrung it out and hung it near the fire to dry. I hoped when I came back from dinner, it would no longer smell like him.
I dried my hair by the fire, brushing it thoroughly again, before rifling through the dresser drawers. I scoffed at all the dresses. Did women not wear pants at all here? I glanced at the mirror again and considered my options. I settled on a forest green dress that shimmered gold in the light. The dress was simple, sleek, with thin shoulder straps and made of a silky material without any embellishments. Though I wasn’t too fond of my scars, wearing a dress that presented them would show others that I’d been in my share of fights. In my search for undergarments, I found a golden belt. I set it aside.
Once I dressed, my feet in knee-high boots of soft gray leather, I called to Alex again. He got up from his spot where he’d been laying at the window. I carried the golden belt over to him.
“Trade you.” I took the key from him and tied it around my leg, letting it slide into the boot and back into place over my ankle. I fastened the belt around Alex’s neck.
“I remember this from a story,” I told him. “The sister put a gold collar around her deer so she’d know it was him and no one would hunt him. Something like that. Just in case you have to go outside, they’ll know not to hurt you. You never know.” I patted his neck. “All right. You ready to do this?”
He nodded his big antlered head.
“Then let’s go.”
I opened my door and shouted in surprise. Martock stood there, his hand up to knock.
“My apologies,” he said.
“It’s okay,” I said. Then I pointed at him. “I could use some pants in here, by the way. There’s nothing but dresses, and I don’t like it.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “I’ll see if I can find something to suit you.”
“Good.”
He gazed at me for a minute, his eyes traveling up and down my body, gauging me in some way. His focus settled on the scars on my arm and shoulder for a moment before he finally turned and strode through the halls.
Alex and I followed him back to the throne room. We emerged into the vacant throne room, out of the darkened halls and back into the light. I thought I heard a faint gasp behind me and paused, looking over my shoulder. But I heard nothing else and Alex hadn’t reacted to anything. I started forward again, keeping my senses open to everything. I hadn’t noticed before, but the throne room and the dining hall were actually together in one huge chamber. One long table was positioned near a massive fireplace open on four sides with the flue rising in the center. Heat radiated out into the room. But my gaze fixated on the food on the table. The scent of roasted meat, buttered vegetables, and freshly baked bread made my mouth water. A feast set in silver dishes awaited us, sliced fruits glistening with juices, creamy orange soup with steam floating lazily toward the ceiling, and bronze mugs with etched designs filled to the brim with foamy drinks. My stomach growled in anticipation. God, how long had it been since I’d eaten a real meal? I resisted the urge to leap into my chair and shove handfuls of food into my mouth.
Dunstan Hood sat at the head of the table, wearing a fur-lined cape and a serpentine smile. I went on the defensive again. Did he have poison tasters? He wanted to know where Marianne was—would he try something here?
“Sit,” he said, gesturing toward the seat at his right. A Sentry pulled the chair out for me and then pushed it in again once I sat. Being this close to Dunstan made me want to squirm, but I held my composure.
“He eats with me,” I said, indicating toward Alex. Dunstan nodded judiciously and the chair beside me was removed to Alex could stand in its place. I felt rather like the princess with the frog when he demanded he eat with her. Too many fairy tales in one place and not enough of them telling girls what to do with werewolves around.
“Aren’t you a vision,” Dunstan said, locking his fingers together.
“Thank you,” I said stiffly.
His eyes roved over my figure in a way that made me want to smash my fist into his face. Who the hell put this asshole in charge, anyway? I glanced over to the far end of the table where Martock stood like a butler. He stared at the floor.
“So,” Dunstan began, reaching forward and dumping food onto his plate, “tell me about these werewolves you encountered. Where did you find them?”
Alex was eyeing the soup hungrily, so I ladled some out into a bowl for him and then myself. Dunstan ate without any reservations; if he wanted information from me, poison wouldn’t be the right way to go.
“There’s a fortress out by the sea,” I said, “the place where the wolves are impounded. There’s a female werewolf who knows the art of magic working out of there now. She liberated the wolves there and uses it as her base.”
I took a sip of the frothy amber beverage and almost groaned in delight. Sweetness like caramel and butterscotch danced over my tongue with the sharp burn of alcohol rolled down my throat to curl in my belly. I licked foam from my lip and caught Dunstan eyeing me.
“Taken over the Impound, you say?” he said, though he didn’t sound the least bit worried.
“Yes. She marked all the wolves there with ankle collars. They allow her to communicate with them over great distances.”
“Wolves can’t perform magic, my dear.”
Goddamn senile old goat. “I beg to differ, sir, but they can. I’ve seen it. As the girl’s Guardian, she intended to lock both of us away using magic. And she’s protected herself with it as well. I’m not sure how well versed in it she is, but it’s effective enough.”
He grunted. He didn’t believe me. I swallowed a warm spoonful of soup, momentarily relishing the creamy texture and bold flavor. Beside me, Alex greedily ate up the contents of his bowl. He was doing remarkably well when it came to not spilling.
“And why is it that everyone believes wolves are incapable of doing magic?” I asked, doing everything in my power not to wolf down my food out of sheer greed.
“It’s a simple truth,” Dunstan said. “They tend to…react poorly. Some say it’s because they’re already cursed.”
He didn’t sound like he cared either way. But his words made sense. The wolves were cursed here, whether or not anyone knew it. Still, the Mistress had found a way around that. Werewolves were already severely twisted wolves. Maybe that made it easier.
“You told my Sentries that you were a sorceress as well,” he continued. “They said you produced fire from your fingers.”
“Something like that. I know what I need to be a sufficient Guardian.” I gestured to Alex with a piece of bread. “Obviously some spells are beyond me.”
“Indeed. So where are these werewolves now?”
“I don’t know. Still out there looking for us I suppose, though I can’t be sure. I’m inclined to think that if they really wanted to find us, they could have.”
I left out the fact that we’d been looked after by a few wolf packs. I still wasn’t comfortable not knowing what the werewolves’ plans were, but I figured the Sentries could deal with them should they show up.
“I find it amusing that they believe they could overtake me and my Sentries with their inferior numbers,” Dunstan said, tossing a bone onto a separate plate.
“They invaded your impound and set all those wolves free. You don’t think they’d willingly join her ranks after that?”
He grunted. “They’d have to become werewolf.”
“So? They’ve been hunted by people, condemned to death by people. You don’t think they’d gladly do what is necessary to become werewolves?”
Alex huffed in agreement and then stole my bread from my plate. I frowned at him and broke off another piece from the loaf.
“Very insightful thinking for a young lady who claims not to be a part of my kingdom.”
“It’s common sense,”
I countered. I decided it was time for a few questions of my own. “Why don’t you have any magic users of your own here?”
He didn’t respond. I pressed on.
“I would think that having one or two people skilled in magic would be useful to have on hand.”
This time he cleared his throat loudly. “I don’t have any sorcery in my keep because magic is unstable and corruptive. Everything that needs to be done is done through hard work.” Then he glanced at Alex. “And obviously it doesn’t always have beneficial uses.”
Point taken. But it still struck me as weird. Especially with the strange, latent magic that lurked in this place, always seeming to be under my feet.
“What do you intend to do with Marianne when she arrives?”
Suddenly his interest skyrocketed and he stopped eating for a moment. “Is she coming?”
I took a long drink, gauging his reaction as I made him wait. I wiped away the foam with a napkin. “She will come when I summon her, and not before. I want to make sure she won’t be in harm’s way when she does.”
“I assure you miss, she will be guarded with the utmost care when she arrives.”
My ass. “I’ll be the judge of that.”
He tried to hide a twitch of his eye by turning back to his meal. I snuck a few furtive glances around the hall. The Sentry that had seated me was no longer behind me. A few stood off near the wall, but were too far to see anything. Martock still stared at the ground, but I got the distinct impression he was listening to every word we said. I slid my hand over the table, grasped the sharp knife that lay beside my plate, and slipped it over the side, lifting my leg just high enough to slip the blade into my boot.
“I fail to see,” Dunstan said once he recovered, “why you are so intent on keeping her from this place. This is her rightful home, as you must know.”
So Marianne was from the House of Red.
“Then I would have thought that your Sentries would have gone down to her village to protect her family as they made their way up there.”
“That would have drawn attention to her.”
“And you already knew that the werewoman was searching for Marianne?”
“Precisely.”
“All the more reason to send as many Sentries as you had to secure her.”
He closed his mouth, his face flushing in embarrassment. I tried not to smile. I’d just one-upped the Steward of the Kingdom of Red.
“Why don’t you just tell us where she is?” he said, exasperation coating his words.
“I will when I feel it’s safe enough.”
We spent the remainder of the meal in relative silence. A few times I caught Martock stealing glances at me, an intense look in his eyes.
Once dinner was over, we were escorted back to the room. The sun had set during our meal, only a grim light filtering through the window, leaving the room to be lit mostly by the fireplace. Wolf’s coat was nice and dry, and I put all the objects back into their respective pockets, lingering for a moment when I touched the vial of lavawort flower extract. Then I turned my attention to the fire and stoked the flames so they rose higher, then began pacing the room.
“There’s something wrong here, Alex,” I muttered.
From his place on the ground, Alex watched me as I stalked back and forth, swinging the fire poker while I thought.
“There aren’t enough people here. The Sentries look cowed. That Martock guy might actually be okay, but it’s like he’s the Steward’s butler or something.”
I considered the things men always did while under orders. A lame excuse in my book, but they did it anyway. It’s what soldiers did. What workers did. Even if they knew the things they were doing were wrong.
“He’s lying about the magicians.” I shook the poker in Alex’s direction. “I can feel the magic in this place. It’s…God it’s so frustrating! It’s all over the ground or something. And it’s weird. It’s protective or…something.” I grumbled at my own inadequacies when it came to ferreting out the magic, or putting it into words.
The day disappeared completely, leaving the window black and the room coated in the flickering firelight. I continued to pace, too worked up to even think about sleeping, as amazing as the bed looked. Everyone in this place simply acted too bizarre. But how the hell was I supposed to figure out what their problem was? The place crawled with nothing but Sentries who watched my every move. At least I’d managed to pilfer a knife. I carefully reached inside my boot to extract it. Sharp and serrated. It would do if I had to protect myself.
Alex had his head resting on his forelegs, his eyes still watching me move back and forth. I wished he could at least talk. Then we could exchange ideas and try to figure out what to do. Maybe if I got Martock on his own and grilled him with questions, he’d let me in on the secret of this place. They obviously wanted Marianne, but their desire for her felt misplaced. Like they wanted her for all the wrong reasons. If she was a descendent of the House of Red, shouldn’t she be here to rule? Or at the very least, rule in the future? I looked to Alex.
“What do you think?”
Suddenly his head rose and he faced the door. I was about to ask, “What?” but kept quiet and listened instead.
Soft footsteps down the hall. Men whispering.
I pointed at the window. Thank God we had a room on the first floor. Alex leaped to his feet as I threw open the latch. He nudged open the glass, and I ruffled up the bed, throwing pillows under it to look like a body. With a few sharp pokes at the fire, I scattered the logs enough to darken the room, snatched up Wolf’s coat, and then turned and jumped out the window, landing on a flower bed a few feet below and scuttling around to hide under the slight ledge where the shadows were darkest.
I couldn’t see where Alex had run to in the dark, but had the feeling he wasn’t far away. I held the knife ready. If anyone followed us out the window, I’d bury it in his back. In the room, the door latch clinked open and two or more men came into the room. They stepped lightly on the stone, whispering to one another. Fabric rustled. Wood creaked from time to time.
“What are we looking for?” someone muttered. He received an unintelligible answer.
“You don’t really think she’d leave something that important hidden in here, do you?”
More responses I couldn’t discern. Who was in there? I longed to peek over the ledge and through the window, but that might be a mistake. Did they really believe that I was in the bed asleep?
“Where d’you suppose she is?” one of them asked as if to answer my silent question.
“Wandering around, likely,” answered another. “And looks like her beast was let outside. Doesn’t matter.”
I frowned. They thought I might be wandering around the castle and they didn’t care? Hell, in that case maybe I should have. Then I’d find the armory and swipe a few more weapons.
After a few more minutes, they left. I waited a little longer before swinging myself over the windowsill back into the room. I stalked around, knife at the ready, but the men were gone, the door shut behind them. The room, for all their searching, looked untouched. I quickly revived the fire and examined the place more thoroughly. They’d moved around the items sitting on the table and dresser, but replaced everything as neatly as possible. The clothing in the drawers wasn’t as tidy as before. I was surprised to see a pair of black pants sitting in one of the drawers. Apparently Martock had made good on his word and must have had them delivered during dinner. The bed was a little mussed, as though they’d looked under it if only to see if I were there. I stood there, hands on my hips. Obviously they didn’t want me. Did they guess Marianne was an object? Maybe they thought that if Alex were a stag, Marianne was something else, something I could hide.
Well, she was. But were they really stupid enough to think I wouldn’t keep her on my person? One of them hadn’t at least.
The clack of Alex’s hooves alerted me to his presence. I looked at him over my shoulder.
“We’re sleep
ing in shifts tonight.”
Chapter 22
Sleeping four hours apiece proved unnecessary, but I didn’t want to take any chances. I wished fervently that I could spend just one night in the luxurious bed without being woken by Alex’s cold deer nose on my shoulder or face.
I faced myself in the mirror the next morning. Dark circles under my eyes revealed my exhaustion. I scowled. At least they made me look meaner when I did that.
I donned the black pants and then pondered what to wear above the waist. The dresser didn’t contain any shirts; just finely folded dresses. I eyed the knife I’d stolen at dinner.
Fine.
I pulled out a sapphire dress, as sleek and beautiful as the green one I’d worn the night before. It dipped down in a V-neck, with short sleeves that held only a whisper of a ruffle at their edges. I laid it flat on the ground and took the knife to it. Alex made a grumbling noise.
“Be quiet,” I muttered. “They didn’t give me any shirts and mine is gone.”
I sliced the dress in two, making a t-shirt from the top and slipping it over my head. I slid the knife in the waist of my pants and hid the handle with the hem of the shirt.
I ran the brush through my hair a few more times until it was straight and silky. I spun around in front of the mirror.
“What do you think?” I asked Alex.
He gave his head a brief toss. I slipped into Wolf’s coat. Outside it was spring, but inside the cold stones kept it chilly and I wanted to stay warm if I planned to wander all day.
“Never trust a guy to be a good judge of fashion.” I stuck my tongue out at him.
The door suddenly banged open and Sentries swarmed into the room. Alex reared, trumpeting in anger. I spun around, bringing back one fist, ready to strike. Several Sentries threw lassos around Alex’s neck to hold him down while the rest held their ground, their crossbows leveled at us. Then Martock swung into the room, his face stony.
