Page 61 of Embrace the Serpent

We fell quiet. The stable hand did quick business, leading two sturdy horses and handing them over to a pair of travelers.

“We could go on horseback,” Rane said, “though I heard you’re afraid of horses.”

“I’m not,” I lied, too quickly. Grimney gave a rocky chuckle from my pocket.

“Really?” Rane said with a slow smile. “You wouldn’t mind if we went the rest of the way on horseback?”

“H-how far is that, exactly?”

“Oh, days and days. Weeks.”

Oh stars. My thighs were still bruised stiff from the last ride. “I can do it.”

He laughed. “You can trust me, you know.”

Amusement danced in his eyes, but I had the feeling that he didn’t mean it lightly.

I was saved from answering by a commotion from within the inn. A ripple went through the courtyard: the Imperial Guards were here.

Save for the pair manning the mail carriage, the rest moved ina shifty-eyed swarm toward their respective vehicles. “Let’s flip a coin, eh?” Rane said.

The next few days passed in a blur of the same. Bargaining for rides at random roadside spots. Plotting a meandering path south. But no matter where we went, Imperial Guards followed soon after, asking for a girl jewelsmith.

We couldn’t linger. I grew desperate for a bath. My skin was grimy with road dust, and yet I still smelled faintly floral and of sickly-sweet honey. The oils and soaps and whatever else Lady Incarnadine put in her bath proved their worth, but I wished they were not so potent.

Part of me just missed the smells I was used to. Smoke and wax and the slight metallic tinge that hung in the air after sanding and polishing.

I missed jewelsmithing.

A burst of laughter drew my attention. A man with a topknot clapped Rane on the back like they were old friends.

That was the other thing: Rane made friends with everyone. How did he do it? What could he possibly know about this man he’d just met, to even carry a conversation, much less whatever this was?

I mean, I spent years watching Galen butter people up, but that was all gossip, all smiles that hid a hiss and a claw. He never made anyone laugh like this.

Rane jogged back, a faint smile on his lips. “He’ll take us, he just needs about an hour.”

I bit my lip, hesitating, and then blurted out, “What did you say to him?”

“Uh, ‘please, could you give us a lift’?”

“Not that. The rest of it.”

He shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. Nothing, really.”

“But—you were smiling and laughing. He just started telling you his life story?”

“Well, I suppose I noticed the dye-work on his clothes. It looked like Pochampally style handloom work, which I’ve only read about, so I guess I asked him about it, if he lived there. And he told me his daughter visited and brought back some yards of it, and he couldn’t get anyone in his hometown to like it until a fashionable friend of his wore it to a wedding—then somehow we got to talking about the beautiful things that people don’t notice—” He cut himself off. “It’s all nonsense, really.”

“It’s not nonsense,” I said.

His cheeks pinked. “I dream about wandering, sometimes. Seeing all there is to see.”

“Why don’t you?”

“I know where I belong,” he said.

“Surely the Serpent King would let you go and travel.”