Oracle lifted her chin. “I spent my whole life training to be a Grace. I was perfect. But that’s not why the Superior chose me. He chose me because I was smart.” She paused, gathering herself. “And he knew that breaking a willful girl would be more satisfying.”
“Breaking you?” Suddenly, Serina saw Nomi’s defiant glare in her mind.
“He can have anything he wants,” Oracle said. “But he’s not interested in things that are easily given. It’s a game to him.”
Serina remembered the ice in the Superior’s voice when he’d delivered her sentence. The way he’d asked about Nomi.
Oracle continued, unguarded emotion flashing across her face. “When I could no longer bear it, I fought back. I knew he would kill me, as he had killed other girls. I knew death was my only escape.”
Serina couldn’t erase the images flashing through her mind.
“But I couldn’t die. I saw the blows coming. I’d learned his patterns. I avoided the killing blows. It was his guard who knocked me out—it was his fist to my eye that did this.” Oracle pointed to her blind eye. “If he hadn’t stopped me, I would have killed the Superior.”
“So they sent you here,” Serina whispered. Treason, attempted murder. Nothing so inconsequential as reading a book. Did the Superior consider reading as dangerous as attempted murder? Or were the requirements for being sent to Mount Ruin subject to the fickle whims of the magistrates handing down punishment?
“So they sent me here. I’m happy you didn’t suffer as I did,” Oracle said, her eyes boring into Serina. “A life in this prison, for all its dangers, is preferable to the Superior’s hell.”
“My sister… my sister was chosen, instead of me,” Serina said. She shivered, thinking of the Superior’s icy stare. “But she’s a Grace for the Heir. Surely, he’ll be different; he won’t be as bad as his father.…” Her voice petered out at Oracle’s look.
The woman stared at her, her pity clear. “In my experience, sons are worse. Pray your sister is easily broken. It’s the defiant ones who suffer the most.”
With a sickening jolt, Serina thought of Nomi and her secret knowledge, her lack of obedience. Why else would Malachi want her, if not to crush her spirit? Serina had been too docile, too obedient. Just as she’d been raised to be.
Fury and fear the likes of which she’d never felt before rushed through her with the force of a tidal wave.
She gazed out toward the ocean, its distant sparkle just visible through the trees. Her sister was a captive in silk and lace, suffering at the hands of the Heir. Unwilling.
Then and there, Serina made her choice. Mount Ruin couldn’t have her. And sure as the fire eating this island from the inside out, she wouldn’t let the Heir have Nomi either. She would escape. Somehow she would escape. And she would save her sister.
TWENTY
NOMI
NOMI LISTENED TO Angeline’s steady breathing with her eyes closed, the darkness pressing down on her with an almost physical weight. Asa had said to meet when the moon was high, but tonight the clouds that had lingered for days sulked in the sky and hid every scrap of moonlight. Nomi feigned sleep until she was sure her heart would burst. Until she’d counted one hundred of Angeline’s inhales and exhales. And then she counted a hundred more.
At last, she rose and slipped a silk dressing gown over her nightdress. She didn’t bother with shoes. Angeline’s breathing never changed, even as the door snicked open. Nomi peeked into the hall. Hastily, she closed the door, resting her forehead against the cool wood.
The Superior’s man was still there, at the end of the corridor.
She waited one minute. Two.
Peeked again. His sturdy form had disappeared.
Nomi took a deep breath, held it, and slipped from the room. She leaned against the door, the carved doe pressing into her back, and listened.
For the past two days, she’d stayed up later than usual, feigning insomnia. In truth, she’d been watching the men who roamed the Graces’ chambers. Most of them left when the Graces went to bed, but two remained at their posts all through the night, pacing the corridors, inspecting the terraces, stomping through the empty dining hall and ballroom. Their circuit took about five minutes. Sometimes the men walked together. Sometimes one took an alternate route.
Nomi prayed tonight they stayed together.
She clasped her dressing gown closer to her body. If she were caught, she’d say she was sleepwalking. She’d act confused. Frightened.
The last wouldn’t be too hard.
She tiptoed to the end of the hall. The men usually inspected the terraces first. She should have time to sneak the other way. It wouldn’t do to wonder what would happen if her luck didn’t hold.
She’d almost made it to the circular receiving room when she heard the thud of a shoe behind her. She ducked inside the doorway and froze, breath held.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Suddenly, she couldn’t remember which direction the guards went after the terraces. Were they coming here or heading down the corridor to the baths? Her pulse clamored in her ears, so loud she couldn’t be sure she was hearing footsteps and not the pounding of her own heart.
She made a choice and bolted for the door on the opposite side of the room, the door that led beyond the Graces’ chambers.
Her hand touched the knob. No one raised the alarm. Another second, and she was on the other side. The hallway outside was dim, lit at long intervals by flickering lamps. She hurried around the corner and down to the wall of glass.
All the partitions were closed. The darkness beyond was absolute. She couldn’t tell if Asa waited for her. With trembling fingers, she slid the glass open just wide enough to slide through.
A gust of wind blew through the gap, sending the hem of her dressing gown fluttering behind her. A hand gripped her wrist and pulled her outside.
She drew in a breath to scream.
“Hush.” Another hand covered her mouth in the dark. “It’s only me.”
Nomi sagged with relief at the familiar voice.
Asa reached around and shut the glass partition. “I’m sorry I startled you,” he murmured. “I was afraid someone would see you.”
Nomi tried to calm her racing heart, but it was difficult with the wind and the night and his body so close.
She took a step back to give herself space to breathe.
“What would happen if we were caught, Your Eminence?” she asked. Her eyes were adjusting to the dark. She could make out the shadow of his face now, turning toward the glow of the hallway beyond the glass.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “I’ve never done this before.”
“If a person can be sent to Mount Ruin for reading…” Her voice trembled.
“No, Nomi. I would not let that happen to you,” he said earnestly. He bent toward her. “I promise.”
All the frustration, guilt, and grief she’d been holding inside, in silence, threatened to spill out. “I can’t stand this. Serina shouldn’t be there,” Nomi said, the words tumbling over themselves. “It isn’t fair.”
“You’re right—it’s not fair.” Asa led her over to the railing, farther from the light filtering through the glass. “Nothing about Viridia is fair.”
“What can I do? Surely there’s some way to persuade the Superior to free her?” Nomi knew she was grasping at straws. But she couldn’t let Serina suffer for her. Not anymore. Not if she could do something, anything. “Maybe, if I said I was the one who took the book, if I was the one who could read…”
She hesitated. Would he realize she was confessing? She wanted to confess. She wanted everyone to know her sister was innocent, that she didn’t deserve to be punished. Imprisoned.
But Asa shook his head. “Absolutely not. Father would just punish you both. He and Malachi…” She felt his shudder through his hands, still joined with hers. “The slightest infraction can be deadly. Father is always merciless, but Malachi is worse.… He’s volatile. One day, he offers mercy. Th
e next, agony. I fear what he’ll do as Superior. His unpredictability could endanger all of Viridia.”
Nomi’s stomach twisted. She remembered that first day in the hallway, when Malachi had cornered her against the wall, so angry, only to choose her as a Grace not two hours later. Volatile, yes. And this was the man to whom her life was forever chained.
“So there’s nothing we can do?” Nomi felt the burn of tears. For Serina. And for herself.
His grip on her hands tightened. “I’m so sorry, Nomi. I wish I had more power. Any, really. There’s so much I would do.” His gaze lost focus, turning inward. “But there is one thing, at least,” he continued, his voice a mere murmur, so soft she had to lean closer to hear. The wind blew at her back, urging her, the hem of her nightgown fluttering toward him like reaching hands. “I can help you escape.”
“What?” Shock reverberated through her. “Why would you do that?”
Asa ran a hand through his hair. “I see you, Nomi. You were never meant to be a Grace, never wanted to be one, and he chose you anyway.”
“Why did he?” Nomi still had no idea. Malachi didn’t seem particularly interested in her, certainly not more so than the others. She didn’t understand why she would have appealed so much more than all the beautiful prospects who wanted to be chosen, who’d been groomed for this life.
Asa didn’t answer for so long, she thought maybe he wouldn’t tell her, or he didn’t know. But, at last, he said softly, “I think he did it to punish you. He could tell you weren’t cowed by him. You had power when you stood there that day, telling him where the lavatory was. He will try to break your spirit, like one of his horses.”
Hearing it laid out so plainly was horrifying, but Nomi found that she wasn’t entirely surprised. It made sense, really. The Heir had been angry. He’d wanted to hurt her. For Nomi, being chosen as a Grace was like being sent to prison. She’d spend the rest of her life serving a man she hated.
Asa gripped the railing with both hands and stared out into the cloud-dark night. “No one should be made to feel broken or powerless. Not you, not me. Not anyone.”
Nomi had never heard anyone talk like this before, not even Renzo.
“Where would I go?” she whispered.
“Wherever you want.”
Her mind balked at the vastness of the prospect. Wherever you want.
He was talking about freedom.
“It wasn’t always like this,” he muttered. “Before the Floods…”
Before the Floods.
Nomi’s breath caught. Had it been Asa who’d left the book? She didn’t dare ask, didn’t dare confirm that she had a book in her possession. Or that she could read it.
“What happened before the Floods?” she asked carefully.
He shrugged. “I just… I think we could do so much more, so much better than we’re doing now. If my father could see what this country really needs, if we had a visionary leading us, instead of a merciless old man… or my brother…”
“What do you think this country needs? If you were the Heir, what would you change?”
Asa leaned against the railing and sighed. “Honestly? Everything. I would choose no Graces. I would let women read.” His glanced at her, his face softening. “I would free Serina.”
The answer tasted like chocolate and burned like fire. It was sweet. Seductive.
Dangerous.
He chuckled wryly and shook his head. “I talked to my father about it once. Made my case for me to be the Heir instead of Malachi. Tried to convince him I would be the better son for Viridia.”
“He wasn’t convinced?”
Asa smiled sadly. “No, he was not convinced.”
“I wish you could be the Heir,” Nomi said wistfully, staring down at the black-and-silver waves.
Asa laughed. “Me too. But unless something happens to Malachi, we’re stuck with him when Father dies.”
Nomi thought about Queen Vaccaro, who’d overthrown Cardinal Bellaqua with nothing but her smile and her poison perfume. The history book had made it sound like the worst kind of treachery, but to Nomi…
To Nomi it was hope. Women had once been powerful in this country. Maybe they could be again. Her mind spun, teasing out delicate, dangerous strands of possibility. Guilt drove her, and grief. But beneath that, always burning, the fury. Women were not lesser beings.
“What if something did happen to Malachi?” she asked, so softly the wind stole the words.
Asa shot her a calculating look. “I won’t have my brother killed.”
“No, not killed.” Within her mind, the threads tightened, the possibilities knitting themselves into a crooked pattern that might be a plan. Scandal. Subterfuge. Just like Queen Vaccaro, save for the murder. “If he was framed for a crime, maybe…”
“He would be punished for something he didn’t do,” Asa replied, but he sounded thoughtful, not outraged.
“You said there are things he has done. He is not innocent,” Nomi said.
Asa put his hands on her shoulders and turned her gently to face him. “A plan like that takes time. There’s uncertainty. Risk. A lot of risk.” He brushed a strand of her hair off her cheek and suddenly, Nomi was aware of their two bodies so close in the darkness. There was risk in that.
“You could just escape,” he said. “I could help you leave the palace, find a place for you to live. A new identity. A contract to a factory or a job as servant. Whatever you prefer. You could choose.”
“If I did that,” she said softly, “nothing would ever change.” And it wouldn’t save Serina.
He bent nearer. Even in the dark, Nomi could see the spark in his eyes. “So what do we do?”
Nomi and Asa spent half the night fine-tuning their scheme.
“The crime has to be something that directly impacts the Superior,” Asa said with a touch of bitterness. “Or else my father won’t care. He’d probably celebrate.”
“Maybe Malachi could plot a war?” she wondered.
“Too many moving parts. Hard to feign. We’d have to really start a war to make it convincing.”
“An assassination attempt?”
“Of the Superior? That might work. Father is very ill, but he’s got fight left in him. Maybe Malachi’s impatient to lead, so he decides to help Nature along.”
She thought of the first queen’s perfume. “Would he use poison?”
They now sat on one of the chaises, huddled together as the cool wind buffeted them. “Poison is difficult to procure, and no one would believe the threat without the real thing. What if he were to hire someone to do physical violence?”
“And you thwart the attempt at just the right moment, exposing the plot and saving your father.” To Nomi, it sounded like a fairy tale.
All the anger seething through her blood had brightened into joy. She was going to change things. She and Asa would give Viridia back its heritage. They would make it into the country it was meant to be.
And they would free Serina.
“It can’t be a real assassin,” Asa mused. “I won’t have my father actually killed. That’s important. It has to be someone who understands the subtleties, who knows we need a performance, not an actual threat.”
“So, someone we trust. Someone we can protect from punishment.”
“Yes,” Asa agreed. “Without immunity, why would they help us?”
“Do you know such a man?” Nomi asked.
“There are several palace guards I believe to be loyal to me,” he said. “But all are recognizable within the palace. Everyone knows them as my personal guard and couldn’t fail to make the connection.”
“I don’t know anyone at all, except my family.” Her heart stuttered. Renzo.
No. She couldn’t involve him. The risk was too great.
“How would we protect our false assassin?” she asked. “It would not be enough to urge your father to be lenient. You said he is merciless.”
“You’re right. We’d have to engineer an escape, maybe a disguis
e.…”
Nomi sat up straighter. “The Heir’s birthday. The Graces have been talking about it. Someone said it’s to be a masquerade.” It would be the night the Heir could demand her in his chambers if he so chose.
Not if the Heir is arrested.
“It is. That’s perfect.” Asa sounded excited. “A disguise and means of escape. Our conspirator can remain unknown. Slip in, perform our deception, and then disappear. No danger, no way of getting caught.”
No danger.
She turned to study him. The clouds had finally cleared, and a sliver of moonlight now shone on Asa’s boyish face. “You can think of no one to help us?” she asked again, praying.
But after a long moment, Asa shook his head. “The only people I know are guards and courtiers. With a disguise, perhaps a guard could do it, but they’d be working during the ball. It would be difficult to avoid exposure. And there isn’t a single courtier I trust. But don’t despair. I’ll keep thinking.”
Nomi shook her head. “No. I know someone who can do it. Someone I trust implicitly. My—” She broke off abruptly. “My cousin.”
She had to be smart, safe about this. This was Renzo’s life.
“A cousin is good,” Asa said. His hand lightly rubbed her arm; she wasn’t sure he was even aware he was doing it. But she liked the soft touch, the contact. “Where does he live? How do we reach him?”
“I can reach him,” Nomi said. She didn’t want to tell him more about Renzo than she had to.
“How? Does he live in Bellaqua?”
“I—” She paused. How could she reach Renzo without telling Asa who he really was? Where he lived?
Did it matter?
She had already trusted Asa with so much. He could have her sent to prison based on this conversation alone. Still. She would risk herself, not Renzo. She took a deep breath. “I will write to him.”
Asa went still. “So you can read and write.”
Nomi turned to him, suddenly desperate that he understand. “Yes. I’m the one who taught myself. I’m the one who stole the book. Not Serina. Ines saw her with the book in her hands, but it was mine. I don’t know why she didn’t tell the truth. But you see? She shouldn’t be in Mount Ruin. I should.”
Grace and Fury Page 13
