Page 21

“I hope,” Jax began, “that we can find our way to a mutually beneficial arrangement. I can’t release you from this engagement, Alie, but please know I would never force a closer relationship than you want.

If you’d rather live separate lives once we’re married, that’s fine.

I will do whatever I can to make you happy. ”

There was nothing to say to that, really. She wasn’t Lore, with her biting remarks and acerbic wit; there was no way for Jax to make Alie happy, and they both knew it. Drawing attention to the fact would do nothing but make them both feel worse.

Jax offered his hand. A heartbeat of hesitation, and she placed hers in it. He had calluses, which she supposed was to be expected when you’d spent your formative years conquering most of a continent.

“We are at the tipping point of a whole new world,” Jax said. “We can make the most of it, you and me. We could be something good. Good for us, good for Auverraine, good for the Holy Empire.”

He kissed her hand. Then he left, closing the door softly behind him.

Alie chewed on her lip. Then she wiped the back of her hand on her wrinkled skirt and poured herself another glass of wine.

So they knew who she was. Jax and Apollius both. They knew, and were content to leave her be. Far from comforting, it made her even more fearful. There was some larger plan here, one she couldn’t fathom.

She poured the rest of the bottle.

The rose was right where Lilia said she’d leave it.

Stuck in the front door of the Citadel, woven between the hinges.

By the time Alie saw it, it had been nearly shredded by the door’s opening and closing, apparently unnoticed by anyone else.

But she knew what it meant. The former Night Priestess was ready to search the Citadel for the missing Fount piece.

“Dammit,” Alie muttered, picking up her skirt to stride out into the southern green.

If Lilia had managed to get inside the walls of the Citadel, Alie was fairly certain she could search it without her help.

But an agreement was an agreement, and she didn’t blame Lore’s mother for wanting a measure of protection.

An unknown woman alone in the Citadel would raise suspicion; an unknown woman with the King’s half sister would be assumed new hired help.

Lilia had told her she would wait in the South Sanctuary. It seemed like a risky place to be, given what she was, but Alie wasn’t in a place to critique her plans. They were all doing the best they could, under the circumstances, and the circumstances were uniformly terrible.

Pushing open the Church doors, Alie gave a demure nod to the bloodcoat waiting just inside and walked toward the Sanctuary, trying not to run.

The former Night Priestess stood in front of the altar, as close as the velvet ropes blocking it from the pews would allow.

There were no such ropes in the North Sanctuary—noble penitents could get as close to the lectern as they wanted.

The braziers were already lit, clouding the air with fragrant smoke.

Alie stepped up to Lilia’s side, followed her eyeline. The older woman stared at the small, circular stained-glass window set into the arch of the Sanctuary, one Alie hadn’t paid much attention to before. A white-skinned hand, holding a knife. Jeweled blood dripped from its point.

“It’s funny, really,” Lilia murmured. “How we were ever convinced He was kind.”

She wanted to say she’d never been convinced, but that wasn’t exactly true, was it? Before all this, Alie had never given much thought to Apollius, but when she did, she assumed He was good, because that’s what she’d been taught.

With a shake of her head, Lilia turned away from the window. “Come on.” She set off for the doors.

Alie scampered behind. “There are hundreds of storerooms in the Citadel,” she whispered. “You’ll have to be specific about which one you mean to search.”

“Whichever one the King was using to keep the art pieces he was selling before Apollius took over.” Despite her quiet words, Lilia seemed to know exactly where she was going, and she walked with such purpose that the bloodcoat by the door didn’t give them a second glance.

Lilia waited to continue until they were outside on the green, bathed in morning sun.

“I intercepted a letter that mentioned specific instructions to notify the King on arrival, and for the parcel indicated to go directly into storage without being opened. The letter mentioned the specific room.”

“How did you manage that?”

“Did some paperwork for the postmaster—he wasn’t picky about employment history, barely even asked my name. He didn’t keep letters in a particularly safe place.”

“And you think this parcel was the Fount piece?” It was plausible. If the piece had previously been kept away from the Citadel, Apollius might want to bring it closer.

“I don’t know what else it might be.” Lilia fell in behind Alie as they approached the Citadel doors, sparing only a glance for the shredded rose in the hinges. “It’s the only lead we have.”

“Seems to be a pattern,” Alie muttered. “Keep your head down. If anyone asks, you’re my new chambermaid.”

The storerooms of the Citadel were a warren beneath the structure, much like the sealed prophecy rooms under the Church, and mostly used for things deemed too valuable to be kept within the Wall.

Back in the summer, when Bastian was still Bastian and she didn’t have any trace of magic, Alie had helped catalog some of the art pieces he’d wanted sold, grouping them all in one of the few rooms that was previously empty.

According to Lilia’s stolen mail, that’s where this shipment was headed.

She turned left after they crossed the foyer, down one of the smaller, less-used hallways. Servants used these corridors around the edges of the Citadel far more often than the nobles did. Alie relaxed a bit, sure that they wouldn’t run into anyone.

So when she saw Olivier, it was a bit of a shock.

It’d been ages since she’d seen her old friend.

His sister Cecelia’s sickness had worsened, and she’d gone back to their family’s holdings in the countryside.

Olivier had planned to go with her, but then their father had passed, and since their mother had been dead a long while, it fell to Olivier to fulfill their obligations at court.

None of which entailed wandering through the back passageways, as far as Alie knew.

She froze when she saw him coming, her hand instinctively snapping backward to stop Lilia. The other woman walked into it with a huff of air, loud enough to make Olivier look up from the floor. “Alienor?”

Her smile felt painted on, painfully false. “Olivier! How are you?”

“Fine,” he said, an inane answer for an inane question, when she knew perfectly well it was a lie. His eyes were tired, shadows deep around the sockets. “Didn’t expect to run into anyone back here.”

Alie almost said she’d expected the same, but didn’t want to make it seem like she was hiding something. Her false smile widened. She probably looked mad. “It’s nice to find somewhere quiet,” she said, continuing her inanity.

Behind her, Lilia stood close by the wall, head down. For Olivier, who was used to seeing servants as sentient furniture, she was as good as invisible.

“Indeed,” he said softly. He raked his hair back, huffed a small laugh.

“I find myself walking back here often, looking for somewhere quiet. I’ve found it, certainly, but I can’t bring myself to stop moving.

” He tried to smile, but it didn’t have enough scaffolding, and it fell from his face half formed. “So I walk.”

“I’m thinking of Cecelia,” Alie said. “She’s… she’s in my prayers.”

Lilia shifted on her feet.

Olivier didn’t pick up on the hesitation.

“Thank you,” he said sincerely. His fingers worried at something on his chest—a gold pendant.

An Apollius medal. Most noble children received one upon their Consecration, but Alie hardly ever saw one worn.

“She’ll be healed. I’m sure of it. Apollius will wipe away her sickness, all in His good time. ”

He smiled at the god’s name, wide and beatific. He spoke with such conviction.

Alie smiled back, though she couldn’t quite smooth the line between her brows. She’d never known Olivier to be pious. “I certainly hope so.”

“I know so.” He rubbed at the necklace again. “He always takes care of His most faithful. He always fulfills His promises.”

“Of course.” Her smile went strained.

With a nod, Olivier continued down the hall, still holding his pendant.

“Your prayers?” Lilia murmured when he was gone.

“I didn’t know what else to say,” Alie answered, not looking at the other woman.

A beat of quiet. “I understand,” Lilia said.

They walked on in silence, finally reaching the stairs that led underground to the Church storerooms. At the bottom, long hallways lined in numbered doors, gilt-painted, because of course they were.

The room Alie remembered from the summer was painted with a 71 . Behind her, Lilia grimaced. “Seventy-one rooms filled with enough riches to feed the whole damn continent.”

“The whole world, probably.” The door was locked. Alie fished a pin out of her hair and wiggled it in the keyhole until the mechanism caught. “And there are over a hundred rooms, actually.”

“Enough riches to feed the whole world, and they don’t even have a dead bolt,” Lilia muttered.

Opening the door was like opening a mausoleum. The only light was what managed to seep in from the dim hallway, barely illuminating giant shapes draped in white muslin. Gaudy statues, huge paintings. Most of them had a number pinned somewhere on the fabric.

A click; flame leapt from a lighter in Lilia’s hand. “The letter said number two oh seven.” She shielded the fire with her hand as she peered at the numbers on the ghost-lit shapes. “And I assume it’s something small.”

“It could take ages to find it in here.”