“When I got here, you were doing something. Moving. Panting.”
There is a long moment of silence interrupted only by the screech of the bolt as I slide it free. “Exercising.” The word is filled with both faint defiance and sheepishness. “I cannot have my body become as enfeebled as my mind.”
I almost laugh at how closely his actions match my own of just a few moments ago. I wrest the hatch open, lie flat on my belly, and lower the sack down as far as I can. “Here.”
There is a faint whoomp as he catches it, then rustling as he unties the knot and retrieves his dinner: bread, cheese, two meat pies, a small game hen wrapped in laurel leaves, an apple and cheese tart. “This is a feast.” His voice holds a note of wonder.
I smile in pleasure. “It should satisfy you for at least an hour or two.”
As he begins to eat, I scoot closer to the grate. “How long have you been here?”
“Not sure,” he says around a mouthful of food. “I can remember the hot sun on my back and the smell of ripening wheat. But whether that was a year ago or two, I cannot say. And you?” His question startles me. “How long have you been here?”
I open my mouth, a lie at the ready, then stop. I am so tired of lying. Every breath I take, every word that crosses my lips has been a lie, and I am sick of it. Besides, he is alone in a dungeon, by all signs completely forgotten by everyone. Surely anything I tell him is no different than telling a dead man. “Just over a year.”
“And in all that time you have never wandered down here before. What brought you that first day?”
His deep rumble of a voice is gentle. It is a safe voice, a voice that is naught but darkness and breath. No face. No body. No past. No future in which to tell any of the secrets I might share. Only this moment when I do not have to wear a mask or dance to a tune I loathe. “Curiosity.” I do not tell him of the beating heart, or the promise of death that held for me, or the sense of dread that day.
“It is curiosity that brings you today?”
“No. Today it is anger,” I say without thinking. But it is not the whole of it. It is yet another lie.
In the darkness, all the words I have been unable to speak for months, nay, for years, press down upon me, heavier than the stone walls that surround us. “No, what truly brings me is pain.”
There is a faint whisper of movement. I cannot be certain through the murk, but I think he tilts his head, studying me. His regard is as tangible as a touch. “What hurts?”
“My heart.” I do not think I say it out loud, but somehow in the absolute quiet of the dungeons, he hears it.
“Ah.” His voice is full of sympathy. “Heart wounds are the hardest to heal.”
“Do they ever heal?” The question sounds small, like one a child might ask, and yet it feels like more of a risk than any I have yet taken.
“In a manner of speaking. But they leave a scar. How much of one depends on how well you tend the wound.”
I scoff in disdain. “How does one tend a heart wound? Poultices will not reach it. There is no salve that can be placed upon it, nor splint nor bandage.”
“Time,” he says softly. “Time is the best salve for heart wounds. Reminding oneself of the small joys and comforts that can still be found in the world. A voice in the dark, a friend, the smell of fresh apples. All of those, over time, can help.”
He is speaking of me. I am the voice in the dark, and it is I who smell faintly of apples. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I tell him, but the words lack heat. It is a far cry from the large, important things I envisioned doing when I first ventured forth from the convent. But it is better than nothing.
“Let us talk of anger, then, for anger can warm as well as any fire.” I can practically hear him rubbing his hands together, as if over a flame. “Who has earned your anger?”
“Everyone,” I whisper. “Every rutting one of them.” As soon as the words are out, I feel lighter, as if I have thrown off some heavy, suffocating cloak. “But mostly Margot.”
“And who is this Margot who has earned your wrath?”
She has earned it. “She is my . . . sister.”
“Ah, is there any relationship as complicated as that of a sibling? I think not.” There is a rustle of sound. I grow very still, ready to flee if he is making some attempt to see through the grate, but the sound quickly stops.”
“Do you have brothers or sisters?” I ask.
“Three brothers. All dead.” His voice is short, clipped. I remember the ghosts he spoke of and wonder if I have just seen a part of his own heart wound.
It is oddly comfortable, sitting in the dark sharing secrets. It is what my mother and aunts used to do after a long night’s work, when their customers had gone. They would climb into their beds and tell an amusing story, whisper some juicy bit of gossip, or some odd tidbit about one of their customers. It is as welcome and familiar as a small fire on a cold winter’s day.
For a moment, I am filled with homesickness, something I have not felt since I was seven years old and spent my first few weeks at the convent. But this homesickness is different. I do not miss the tavern with its creaky beds and bug-ridden straw. What I miss is that part of me that used to feel safe, that used to thrill in the exchange of secrets, that used to care enough to feed a starving cat.
Who are you? That question has haunted me since the prisoner first asked it. Tonight, I feel closer to the answer than I have in a long time.
* * *
Even though it is late when I return to the main floor, there is a surprising amount of activity. The kitchen is still bright with light and voices, and I pass three different servants rushing by me. When I recognize Marie, I reach out and stop her. “What is going on?”
She spares me a harried glance. “It’s Lady Margot, my lady. The babe is coming!” And with that, she bobs a curtsy and hurries on her way, arms full of clean linens.
And even though Margot has turned our friendship to ash and salted the earth beneath our feet, I murmur a quick, silent prayer to both Mortain and Dea Matrona for a safe, easy birth.
But maybe not too easy.
Chapter 19
Sybella
dress carefully in a black brocade gown for the audience with Viscount Rohan. Ismae has a similar gown that she wears so the two of us may stand at the duchess’s shoulder, a lethal reminder not to underestimate the future queen.
But first, I must see to my sisters’ safety. And to do that, I must face the followers of Arduinna.
Not only are those who follow the patron saint of love’s sharp bite noted for their ferocity and martial skills, but they have a longstanding animosity toward Saint Mortain and those who follow him. I can only hope their friendship with Annith and the role she and Mortain played in bringing peace to our land have gone a long way toward healing that.
I find the Arduinnites in a small chamber just off of the duchess’s solar. They, too, will be posing as ladies in waiting to the duchess so she will not be defenseless at the French court. Aeva is standing with her hands stuck out awkwardly at her sides, like some ungainly heron. Large swathes of beige and black silk are draped around her body, her legs braced as if she has just dismounted from her horse. When she sees me, her eyes narrow. “If you so much as smile, I will gut you with my knife.”
I bite the inside of my cheeks to keep from doing precisely that. “I would not dream of it.” The greeting is somewhat harsh, even for a follower of Saint Arduinna, but Aeva is one of the prickliest of them all. The younger Arduinnite, Tola, does not look fully at home in her new gown, but neither does she
look like she is within a hair’s breadth of yanking it off.
“Why are you here?” The challenge in Aeva’s voice is unmistakable. Whether it is because I serve Mortain or because it is simply more comfortable to challenge me than to be embarrassed over the gown, I do not know.
“Don’t scowl so!” I chide her. “I am here attending the duchess this morning. Besides, you look even more ridiculous in your fancy gown when you screw up your face like that. Here.” I step forward, dodging the beleaguered seamstress pinning up the hem. “Pull the sleeves down toward your wrist. It will free up more room at your shoulders. See?”
Glaring at me, she pinches the wrist of her left sleeve and gives it a tug. As she rotates her shoulder, the scowl lessens somewhat. She does not so much as grace me with a thank-you. “What other tricks are there to surviving such finery?” she grumbles.
“For one, you must move more slowly to give your skirt time to get out of your way.”
She opens her mouth to protest, but I talk over her. “Except when you must run. Then lift it up, like so.”
“How am I supposed to fight when I must hold up my skirts?” she protests.
“It is most vexing,” I concede. “My fighting tends to be less out in the open than yours, and for this assignment that will hold true for you as well.” I turn to the chair where she has set all her weapons, my hand hovering over one of the knives. “May I?”
“Why?” she asks warily.
“So I may see if it is possible to fit it under your sleeves like I do.”
“Very well,” she says, as if allowing me to pluck one of her teeth from her jaw.
“If you’d rather I didn’t . . .”
She scowls even deeper, and this time I cannot help but laugh. “You are easier to bait than a mad bear. I am only trying to help, but will leave you alone if you’d rather.”
“Stay. I will no doubt need all the help I can find in this monstrosity.”