Page 43 of Song of the Hell Witch

Twenty-Two

The cave’s mudstone and stormquartz gave way to amethyst and tidestone formations, purple and seafoam gems that glittered like glass in the Spectabras’ pale light.

While Puck dozed off and on, still recovering from both Florence’s and Paris’s handiwork, Prudence couldn’t sleep.

Her wings ached too much, and no matter how much she contorted, she couldn’t get comfortable.

She figured Arcadie had to be bored, rowing all alone. And if they were going to be alone together for a few days, with nothing but glowing stones and darkness to keep them company, why not strike up conversation?

“Last night at dinner, you said you help the Ladies because you owe someone something.” She knew it was sensitive territory—but she was too curious and too tired to care. “What were you talking about?”

The hotelier looked her up and down, suspicion etched deep in their brow. “Do you actually want to know, or are you simply filling time?”

“If I wanted to fill time, I’d ask you what your favorite color is … though I’m pretty sure I already know.” She eyed the black pinstripes lining their burgundy suit. “Come on. Tell me your story.”

“It’s not a particularly happy one.”

“I killed my husband a week ago. Ripped his throat out with my bare hands.” Eager to feel the Spectabras’ hum again, she dipped her hand into the water, played her fingers along the river’s surface. “Is it more terrible than that?”

“A different kind of terrible.”

“Try me.”

Arcadie shifted the oar once more. “Well. Thirty years ago, the woman I loved married someone else. When I asked her why, she told me we were impossible. That I was impossible. How I lived, how I dressed, who I wanted to be. She said there was only room for one kind of … well, she said a person was meant to be either male or female. That I had to pick one to be. She … she told me the Lightbringer would punish me in the next life.”

They sniffed, tilted their head to one side like they were working out a crick in their neck.

“Then, about a year later, she showed up at my hotel with two black eyes and a broken nose. Asked if I could help her. Said her husband was a monster and she needed him gone . Dead. And she told me about this group of women up in the Wild Fangs. Dark Daughters who could help her.”

“Ah. So she’s how you met the Ladies, then.”

“No. I told her she’d made her choice. That it wasn’t my problem.

” They paused, their gaze fixed straight ahead.

“About a week later, her maid came to find me. She said her husband had shoved her into a wall and fractured her skull. And because he’d convinced the Watch it was a domestic dispute, they didn’t arrest him when she died.

Apparently, husbands can legally kill their wives if they make them angry enough.

It says so in the Epistle of Light: ‘A wife must not anger her husband lest she face his wrath and lose the life he’s gifted her. ’ Fourth book, eleventh chapter.”

Fury, hot as fresh-forged iron, lit through Prudence’s blood.

She knew that part of the scriptures, had committed it to memory along with all the others that confined women to an obedient life.

Those were the words she’d repeated to herself as she’d watched Leora shrink on the horizon, the words that had convinced her to leave Puck behind.

Arcadie cleared the knot out of their throat.

“ That’s when I went looking for the Ladies.

They made quick work of her husband for me, and as payment for my cruelty, I vowed to protect the women in Leora in whatever way I could.

Sometimes it’s sheltering them in that secret corridor in my hotel.

Sometimes it’s helping them find a new home. ”

“So it’s penance?”

“Maybe. Except I can’t pay her back, can I? But … I suppose I can honor her. Save other people in her name. Perhaps that’s a better word for it. Honor.”

Prudence watched the light glint off the gems marbled in the rock, listened to the rush of the river beneath her.

And she thought of what Imogen had said about the baker she’d killed in the alleyway: that she was on a job.

“So the Ladies kill violent men?” Prudence asked.

“I like to think that they grant wishes. Sometimes they give a woman a safe place to stay, far away from her old life. Other times they offer vengeance, sometimes in the form of death. It all depends on the woman and what she wants. But there is a tithe all Ladies pay, Miss Merriweather, in exchange for shelter and family.”

“Tithe?”

“You must use your gift to serve those less fortunate.”

“By killing people?”

They guided the boat around the next curve with ease. “There’s more than one way to destroy a man.”

At that, Puck stirred, mouth yawning wide. Sleep-drunk, he sat up, his drooping eyes going wide as he took in his surroundings, like he was only just remembering where they were.

“What are you two talking about?” He was hoarse.

“Oh, just disemboweling the entire male species,” Prudence halfway teased.

“Mm. Honestly, have at it.”

There it was again, the worry that had almost defeated her a few hours ago. “You sound tired.”

He smiled up at her. “You going to kiss me better, Spitfire?”

She swore her heart did a somersault. “Ah. Delirious, too, then.”

“Sore, more than anything.” He shut his eyes and stretched out as best he could before the wound in his shoulder reminded him he couldn’t lift his arms above his head. Definitely delirious. “We close yet?”

“Afraid not, Mr. Reed,” Arcadie replied, pulling the oar so they drifted toward the right side of the bank, where the water was calmer. “We’ve only just started. But think of it this way: We’re closer than we were an hour ago. One hour closer to your girl.”

He closed his eyes in frustration, and Pru decided that perhaps now was the moment to offer comfort … or ask remarkably distracting questions.

“Thank you,” she told Arcadie. “For the story.”

“I hope it didn’t make you see me—”

She shook her head to stop them talking. “We’re human. We mess things up.” Her mind tried to tug her back to that day on the docks, when Puck’s boots beat against the planks like thunder, her name echoing across the harbor. “All of us.”

She stayed low as she shifted over to the other end of the boat. Puck lay with his head pitched up onto the right side, staring blankly ahead.

“Bea’s fine,” she told him as she took the seat next to him. “Loads better than us, I promise you.”

“We don’t know that.” He pressed his good hand to his shoulder like he could suppress the pain with pressure. “What if she’s cold? Or hungry? She gets cranky as fuck when she’s hungry. The angriest redhead you’ve ever seen in your life, and that’s saying something.”

“If she’s cold, Mari will get her a blanket. If she’s hungry, Mari and Florence are more than capable of feeding her.”

He stared down at his lap, flexing the fingers of his wounded arm before drawing them back in. “I really wanted to be there. The first time she spoke again. We’ve got things to talk about. Things we need to work through if we’re ever gonna … I don’t know, be us again.”

“Like what?” She wasn’t sure if he wanted to tell her or if he was merely speaking his thoughts out loud, unaware she could still hear him. “Something to do with that tattoo of yours?”

“No. No, that was before Bea, that was …” He picked his gaze up and found her again. “That was right after you left.”

“Oh.” The cold in the cave faded in an instant. “So then, did the two of you get in a fight before she lost her voice?”

“I can’t, Pru. Not this. Not yet.”

What in the Dark Mother’s name did you do, Puck?

“Okay.” She eased back against the other side of the boat. “Talk it out with her first. Just know I can still listen. If you need it.”

She wasn’t sure if the look he gave her was out of gratitude or suspicion. She suspected the latter. After all, why tell her anything? She’d abandoned him, told him she cared for him and then fled. He had no reason to confide in her. Not anymore.

“Want to tell me another one of your stories?” His question knocked her free of her little spiral. “Maybe with less pirate captains and more Vivichan food?”

She grinned, partially at his request, partially at the number of stories she had about basil-pepper biscuits, butter-fried gnocchi swimming in tomato cream sauces, the satisfaction of kneading her own pasta.

“You sure you want to hear about food when all we’ve got are some nuts and a bit of bread to hold us over? ”

“Please, Duchess Talonsbury.” His voice was velvet smooth. “Torture me.”

They made it through several sets of rapids without the boat splintering apart, though there was a moment when Prudence, off-balance because of her wings, almost tumbled into the whitewater.

Puck grabbed her in time, and they clung to each other until the waters calmed.

She told herself it was to keep the other from falling in.

She dreaded the waterfall Arcadie had so strangely dubbed Pete, but when they finally reached it, Arcadie took the five-foot plunge with a simple shout.

“You see?” they said, grinning like they’d won some kind of competition. “Nothing to it.”

The churning water at the base of the waterfall pushed them into a river cove. Arcadie propelled the boat up to the bank and jumped out onto the golden sand. A fence of stalagmites guarded both the left and right side of what Prudence decided was a beach.

“Halfway there, darlings.” Arcadie walked up the small slope to where the ground leveled out.

“Can’t we go on a little longer?” Puck pressed before immediately doubling over, clutching his wound as though he’d been stabbed again.

“We all need rest,” Arcadie said. “Especially you, Mr. Reed; you’re looking worse by the second.”

Puck looked at Prudence for confirmation, and she nodded. Even with all of his napping, he looked remarkably peaked.

He rolled his eyes. “Fine. But we leave as soon as we can.”