Page 13

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I hunched my shoulders, keeping my head down, as I followed Marya through the castle halls. I should have been glad to have some distance from Aric—we’d left him in the arboretum’s derelict stable half an hour or so before—but my relief was tempered both by Marya’s ill-humored presence and the risk of being caught. I’d changed from my bloodstained dressing gown into a shirt, jacket, and trousers Marya had unearthed from another box in the stable, so at least my attire didn’t draw attention. But my visage was all too exposed for anyone to see. And the entire court had gotten a long look at my face during the wedding yesterday.

Hard to believe it was only yesterday. The alarms had mercifully ceased along with the rain, and the afternoon bells for three o’clock were chiming now. Less than twenty-four hours since I’d married Aric, but it felt like an eternity.

Marya stopped, so suddenly I almost ran into her, and held out a warning hand. I peered over her shoulder in time to see a duo of castle guards march by, halberds braced across their chests. No doubt searching for me, Gildenheim’s evil queen-to-be. I hastily ducked behind Marya, wishing she were taller.

The guards walked past without looking in our direction. I let out a sigh of relief as the echo of their footsteps faded.

“Ludicrous,” Marya muttered. “I’m hiding from my own soldiers like some sort of criminal.”

She scanned the corridor and waved me on. I scuttled after her, clinging to the shadows as tightly as a spider to her web.

We passed three more patrols on our way to our destination, and I was grateful for Marya, even though the feeling clearly wasn’t mutual: without her quick reactions, we would undoubtedly have been caught. I didn’t even know my way through the castle’s halls. I could all too easily have walked straight into the guards’ ready hands.

The ambassadors’ suites were on a separate wing, in a part of the castle I hadn’t yet seen. The hallways here were decorated to pay homage to other nations, hung with ceremonial banners and artwork in the bold and colorful styles of the Mobolan Alliance, the flowing lines of the Zhei Empire’s many member states, and the jewel tones of my own country. My steps slowed as we passed an image depicting the Virtue of Strength—in this version, a woman with her hand resting on her chest and a knowing smile on her face.

My hand drifted to my own chest, where the locket rested above my heart. I sent a quick prayer to the Virtue to bless me with that same quality. I certainly needed it now.

“Keep up,” Marya hissed. “Before I change my mind about all this.”

I’d expected Marya to lead me directly to Ambassador Dapaz’s door. Instead, she abruptly veered into an alcove, ducked behind the Damarian flag hung on the wall, and disappeared.

I followed, and found a hidden passageway behind the banner. Marya pressed herself flat so I could slip past her, then slid a panel shut, concealing the entrance. The narrow aisle was barely wide enough to walk through without my shoulders brushing against the walls. It was clear of dust and cobwebs, indicating frequent use.

Intrigue and anger wrestled for dominance at the revelation that the Gilden castle had spy passages leading to its ambassadors’ chambers. Would Aric have ever informed me of their existence if the assassin hadn’t forced matters?

Marya made a preemptive shushing gesture and slid past me. Her footsteps were as quiet as a still night. She’d clearly used this spyway before.

Murmurs of conversation drifted from both sides as we moved down the passage, sometimes accompanied by pinpricks of light from spyholes. I caught a few words in one of the Mobolan languages, a snatch of Zhei in the formal register. It wasn’t just the Damarian ambassador the court was spying on—it was all the diplomats. Perhaps that should have made me feel better. I wasn’t certain it did. Though perhaps my indignation was hypocritical: while I’d never engaged in espionage myself, Damaria’s noble Houses were infamous for their private networks of intelligence. Knowledge was power, my mother liked to say, and blackmail was control.

I wondered what she would have made of the assassination attempt. Knowing my parents, they would already be fully confident of who was behind it had they been in my place.

Finally, Marya stopped and pressed her ear to the wall. She listened in absolute stillness for several long moments. Then she peered through one of the peepholes, her eyes narrowed against the brightness of the room beyond. A thin sliver of light illuminated her iris, making it glow like dark amber.

Apparently satisfied, she twisted a small lever in the wall. A panel slid aside, dropping a shaft of light into the spyway. Marya stepped through the opening, and I followed.

I emerged into a sitting room stuffed to the brim with an eclectic array of ornaments, vases, and statuary, much of it infused with the deep blue of Damaria. In the midst of the clutter, Ambassador Evito Dapaz sat at a writing desk overflowing with papers, quill in hand. He rose to greet us, looking rather less surprised than I’d expect him to be at the sight of two women emerging from the wall of his private chambers.

“Your Grace,” he greeted me in Damarian, bowing. “Thank the seas you’re safe. Are you well?”

My thoughts went straight to my condition, but for once it wasn’t my primary complaint. Lacerations from the window glass burned on my shins. A dozen bruises were making themselves known, some in inconvenient places. I curled my hands, remembering the strange golden marks from the shattered lantern.

“I’m well enough,” I hedged.

Evito’s shoulders relaxed ever so slightly. “Virtues’ mercy. I’m afraid I don’t have proper refreshments to offer you, but perhaps you’d care for some wine or hothouse oranges?”

Marya glowered at him before I could answer. “You knew about this passageway.”

“I’d surmised its existence, yes.” If Marya was a brewing storm, Evito was a torpid summer day. “Some of your people are less discreet than others, and I always know exactly where I left my things. Would you like to sit?”

“We can’t stay long,” I cut in before Marya could offer to impale Evito, too. “Ambassador, I need your help to get a message to my sister.”

He raised his brows slightly, inviting me to go on.

“I take it you’re aware of what happened this morning?”

Evito’s lips thinned. He flicked a look at Marya. “I’ve heard rumors, but there are guards posted at the door of these chambers. They dissuaded me from investigating the matter in as much depth as I desired.”

Marya and I both glanced at the door. I lowered my voice.

“I’ll be brief,” I said. “There was an assassination attempt in the royal chambers at dawn. I fought the attacker off, but they evaded capture. The heir apparent and I escaped out the window and found a safe place to hide, but he is now… in an unfortunate condition.”

Evito’s eyes focused on my face, as intent as a scholar reading a rare text. “The heir apparent? Is his life in danger?”

I hesitated, considering how much to tell him. Despite Evito’s position, and my reliance on his help, I didn’t want to explain the full situation. If word of what I’d done got out—even if it became common knowledge only after the spell was reversed, which, Virtues help me, Tatiana could accomplish quickly—it could wreak considerable damage. I knew how rumors spread, whispers of flame that appeared as harmless as candles but turned into an all-consuming blaze. And if the news reached the wrong ears, especially while the assassin was still at large and whoever had sent them could all too easily dispatch another…

No. I would not tell the ambassador, or anyone who didn’t absolutely need to know, that I had accidentally turned my husband into a horse.

“He’s in no more danger than I am,” I said. “But we’ll both be in hiding for a few days, until the assassin is caught and we learn who they’re working for. In the meantime, I need to send a message to my sister. One that won’t be intercepted by Gilden intelligence. I believe this is something you can help with, ambassador.”

“Of course,” Evito said at once. He’d been sending sensitive messages to the Council for years, including the terms of the treaty that brought me here; my request was simple by comparison. He slid another glance towards Marya. “Would you like me to encrypt it?”

Though Marya wasn’t who I was worried about, the offer was tempting—another assurance that my message would not be read by the wrong eyes. But it would mean letting Evito read the message in full, as I didn’t know the codes well enough to write an encrypted message myself, and it would take too much time. We’d already dallied long enough.

“That won’t be necessary,” I said. “I’ll use my personal seal. I trust you to take the greatest care of it.”

There was a warning in my words. If Evito heard it, it didn’t affect his composure. He stepped back, gesturing to his desk. “Everything I have to offer is at your disposal.”

I chose a piece of vellum, worn thin from multiple scrapings, and penned a quick note to Tatiana, explaining in brief that her defensive spell had gone awry and I needed her help to reverse it. I would meet her at the border and tell her the rest in person. There was an inn commonly used by messengers ferrying international correspondence only a few miles from the actual boundary; she would know the one.

I paused before signing the note, wondering whether to be more detailed. If I told her I was bringing Aric in horse form, she might be better prepared to help me.

A droplet of ink fell and splattered on the vellum. I set the pen aside and blotted my message. I’d taken long enough already. It was Tatiana’s spell. My sister was as clever as she was unconventional; she would figure it out. She had to.

I folded the note over, dripped blue wax over it from the stick Evito had ready, and sealed it with Tatiana’s locket. The impression gleamed up at me from the cooling wax: a blooming lily, a simplified version of my House’s sigil. Something my sister would recognize.

I handed the letter to Evito. “I’m going to be leaving the castle for a few days for my personal safety. Can I count on you to keep me updated of any developments here?”

The ambassador took the missive, inclining his head. “As always, your Grace, I am at House Liliana’s disposal.”

“The castle correspondence will be watched,” Marya cut in, scowling. “They’ll check all the outbound messengers, and they have hawks for the pigeons. How precisely are you intending to send it?”

Evito gave her a withering look. “My dear. I was handling sensitive messages before you could even talk.”

Marya glared. Judging by her expression, she would have been glad to skewer the ambassador right then and there. “I’m not the one who will be monitoring outgoing messages, you pomp bucket. My king’s life is at stake here. I deserve to know how you’re planning to—”

“Damarian secrets and magic are both proprietary,” Evito said, his own composure unblemished. “Look to your own jurisdiction, captain.”

“I’m sure Ambassador Dapaz can be trusted to handle the correspondence,” I said hastily, trying to smooth things over before Marya erupted. “You could even give him messages yourself, Captain Dai.”

A look passed between Evito and Marya that told me, without a single word being uttered, that she would rather cut off her own thumbs and hand them to him on a string.

“It will be taken care of,” Evito said. “Your Grace, will the heir apparent be accompanying you?”

I hesitated. As ambassador, Evito ought to be my closest ally in the castle. But he was also deeply immersed in the Gilden court, which meant he had his own interests and alliances. I trusted him to send a discreet message, but I wasn’t sure how much I trusted him to keep his mouth shut. Relations between Gildenheim and Damaria had been anything but tranquil of late, and a single wrong word could wreak more damage than a cannonball.

“No,” I said. “He’s staying hidden on the castle grounds.”

“We should go,” Marya said. “Before someone thinks to search these chambers.”

“Already done,” Evito said, his lip twisting.

If his room had been searched already, we had a little more leeway than I’d thought. But Marya was right—time was not a luxury we had to spare. “Thank you, ambassador. For everything. I must be on my way.”

Marya was already heading back towards the spyway entrance. Evito took my hand and bowed over it.

“Be careful, your Grace.” His eyes held a warning. “Don’t let your guard down.”

Marya made an impatient sound. I withdrew my hand from Evito’s.

“I never do,” I said, and followed the captain of the guard into the darkness.