Authors: Kate Sparkes
I glanced up. A soldier in a red uniform topped with a gleaming golden helmet looked down at me, but said nothing. I kept walking. Voices and clattering noises drifted from beyond the wall, but they sounded impossibly distant.
The road led straight to a massive gate built of iron scrollwork, backed by panels of solid wood that blocked my view of whatever lay beyond. Smaller doors constructed of the same ironwork on a smaller scale flanked the gate, leading into stone tunnels through the wall. I stepped closer to one and rested my weight on one aching foot to give the other a break.
Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me.
“Hello?” I called, and didn’t have to try too hard to sound uncertain and lost. “I’m here because Lord Severn sent for me?”
Better that they thought I was a little stupid than be suspicious of me. Maybe they’d take pity.
A tall, broad-chested guard in scarlet clothing topped by a gold-toned breastplate stepped up to the left-hand door, and I moved a little closer. He squinted at me. “State your business.”
I just did.
“Hello. I’m a Potioner from Cressia. Lord Severn ordered me to come here, and the soldiers who were escorting me... well, they died.”
“Sorry. No one in or out without authorization.”
“But I’ve been walking for weeks! Could be longer, I lost track.” At least that wasn’t a lie. “Please, I have nowhere else to go.”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “What’s your name?”
Had the soldiers known my name when they came for me? If they had, I couldn’t very well lie. Better to be safe. “Nox,” I said. “Nox Dunfee.” It left a bad taste in my mouth to use my dead husband’s last name, but if they knew of me, that’s how I would most likely be recorded.
“Hold on.”
He disappeared, and several minutes later a similarly-uniformed and significantly smaller woman replaced him. She looked me over, clearly unimpressed. The gate creaked as she swung it open. I stepped into a short, dim tunnel, and she locked the gate behind me.
“You really should have gone home,” she said in a conversational tone.
“I don’t have one.”
“Pity.”
I matched her long stride, and we stepped out into sunlight. I didn’t have to feign my surprise at the sight and sounds of the city. Nothing Aren told me had prepared me for the majestic stone buildings, the clean cobblestone roads, the bright windows, and the bustle of the people in the streets. Hard to imagine they were preparing for war. A group of women in beautiful dresses sauntered down the street, parasols blocking their fair skin from the sun. Each of them wore an elaborate hairstyle. I wondered how early they had to get up in the morning to achieve that.
A great, black horse plodded by, pulling a wheeled puppet show that performed as he walked. Children followed behind, laughing, carrying candied apples on sticks. A moment later they were swallowed by the crowds.
This is where I was supposed to grow up.
My guide turned and signaled to someone behind me. Before I could turn, a forearm snaked around my throat, catching my windpipe in the crook of the elbow and pressing tight. White spots bloomed before my eyes, covering the wonder of the city. I didn’t dare struggle, even when another set of hands slipped a dark hood over my head.
“Told her she should have gone home,” the female guard said, and a man laughed.
Pain exploded in the back of my head, and I heard no more.
I
WOKE SLUMPED
in a hard chair with my wrists tied behind me, back and arms aching. My mouth felt parched and my brain wooly, and I wondered how much time had passed. Gentle hands pulled my hair back from my face as I struggled to sit up straighter, though I couldn’t see who they belonged to thanks to the bright light blinding me.
“Turn that down,” an unfamiliar voice said from behind me. An order, and one that was immediately obeyed, but spoken in soft tones. As the light faded I saw that it came from a man’s hand. Not a lantern in his hand, as I thought at first, but from his skin.
“That’ll do,” said the soft voice. “Actually, a little more.”
The hand brightened. My eyes adjusted, and I looked around as much as my tied-up state would allow, turning only my aching neck, straining against the ropes. The fellow with the light in his hand was small and thin, clean-shaven from scalp to throat, with a blank expression on his face. He didn’t move. If not for his light’s responses to the voice, he might have been a statue. He wore dark clothes, which only made his inhumanly white skin and the purple circles beneath his eyes stand out more.
“Perfect.” The man who had spoken stepped around from behind me, standing next to the light so I couldn’t look at him without blinding myself. “Are you comfortable?”
I twisted my head to see where he’d come from. A fire burned low and hot in a grate behind me—sufficient light, which made me think the other was only there to throw me off.
Not promising.
A long table to my right held a set of tools and a few papers. Other than that it was me, the two men, the chair, and a single wooden door.
“Not exactly comfortable,” I said. “Who are you? What’s going on? I thought I was wanted here. Lord Severn sent for me.”
“King Severn,” the speaker corrected. He moved closer, out of the light and into view. “People are having such difficulty with the change.”
Unassuming
was the first word that came to mind, and nothing else followed. Brown hair, long but tied neatly back. Thin mustache, pale-brown eyes I suspected I’d forget as soon as one of us left the room. Dressed in a shade of green that did little for his pasty complexion. Middling in height and weight.
Middling in everything, in fact. Forgettable. Nearly invisible.
“We’ll have you out of here soon enough,” he said. “Terrible business, this. We’re waiting on confirmation of your story. In the meantime, I thought we might talk. We aren’t getting many guileless visitors to the city these days. We should become better acquainted. Might I offer you a sip of water?”
Smooth voice, reassuring tone, friendly offer. And yet my heart pounded and sweat dripped over my brow. How he expected me to warm to him when ropes bound my wrists, I couldn’t guess. But then, I’d never cared for being tied up. Maybe the clean water and kind words worked to put other people’s minds at ease.
I started to wish I’d never come, and shut the thoughts away before Kel and everyone else could come to mind. I didn’t know what this fellow was capable of. Damned if I’d let him catch me that easily.
He held a cup to my lips, though I hadn’t accepted the offer. Cool water passed like silk over my dry lips and throat. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped a dribble from the corner of my mouth.
“How clumsy of me,” he said. I shivered as his gaze met mine.
“You can untie me,” I said, sounding as innocent and confused as I could. “I really didn’t mean any harm by coming here.”
“Hmm? Oh, no, I’m sure you didn’t, but we do need to be certain. I’m charged with many things, and ensuring the security of the palace and our king is one of them. If anyone tries to get too close, or arrives without anyone here knowing who she is... you understand, I’m sure.”
“I just want to help. I’m a Potioner. A good one.”
He poured another glass of water and sipped from it. “I’m sure you are.”
“What was your name again?”
“You can call me Dan.”
I didn’t allow my face to register my surprise. This was another of my half-brothers, and one I’d rarely heard spoken of, even when I was with Ulric and Aren. I could understand why. This man was a lukewarm shadow, lacking the charisma his younger brother possessed, and which I’d heard Severn practically embodied. Still, I didn’t doubt that he was good at whatever job Severn had selected for him.
A knock at the door. Dan answered, spoke softly to someone outside, closed the door, and turned to stare at me. “Bimby, I think it’s time to fetch Wardrel.”
I’d nearly forgotten about lamp man. He doused his light and shuffled from the room without looking at me.
Dan didn’t speak while we waited. The minutes stretched out, each longer than the last, but I didn’t dare break the silence.
The door slammed open and a monster of a man strode in, grinning. His eyes widened at the sight of me, and his tongue snaked out over broad lips. I held back a scream, but my entire body trembled.
This one, I had heard about. I remembered Patience’s burned feet, her missing eye, the way Aren wouldn’t talk about this brother unless he had to. But I couldn’t let these people know any of that. I ground my teeth together to stop their chattering and pressed my arms against the chair to slow the shakes.
Certainly a show of fear was justified, though, when faced with a man like this. Cut-off sleeves revealed rippling muscles and scars that would have faded if his magic had been stronger—or perhaps they’d been injuries that would have killed someone else. Something like lust burned in his eyes, but I thought that wasn’t quite right. What had Aren said?
He brings pain. That’s what he lives on.
With Bimby gone, only the hearth’s flickering flames lit the room. Dan went to the table and leafed through a few papers. “It seems nobody’s heard of you,” he muttered. “Quite a problem. Nox... Dumfry?”
“Dunfee,” I rasped, and spelled it for him.
Wardrel chuckled, though I didn’t see what was so funny.
Dan frowned, made a note on the paper, and passed it out the door. “We’ll see whether anyone remembers sending for you by that name, then. In the meantime, I just have a few more questions. Who sent you?”
I feigned confusion. “I... I sent me. I mean, the soldiers came to get me, but then they died, so I—”
“Wardrel?”
The monster stepped forward and grabbed my hair one massive hand, snapping my head back. With the other he reached for the water pitcher and dumped it over my face. Water burned down my throat and into my chest, but with my head tilted as it was I couldn’t cough hard enough to expel it. He released me, and I keeled as far forward as my bonds would allow, hacking until tears poured from my eyes. My breath returned in harsh, sobbing gasps.
I hadn’t thought I trusted Dan enough to feel betrayed if he turned on me. It seemed I was wrong.
“Tell me again who sent you?” Dan asked. His tone hadn’t changed. He’d ordered the attack, but still spoke levelly, calm and soft as before.
“Please,” I moaned. “I don’t know what else to tell you. I’ll leave, I shouldn’t have come. I’d heard there were opportunities here. I didn’t want to leave home at first, but—”
“Wardrel?”
“No!”
Wardrel reached behind the chair, grabbed my left wrist in one hand and my index finger in the other, and twisted the finger until the longest bone snapped. I screamed as pain shot up my arm.
“Who?” Dan repeated, voice as conversational as it had been when he offered me water.
House by the sea,
I thought before I could shut the thought out.
Survive this.
I moaned in response, as I assumed someone with no other answer to give would.
“Do you believe her, Wardrel?”
I looked up, ready to plead my innocence, and quickly realized that it made no difference to Wardrel. He wanted my tears, my pain. I calmed my mind. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of begging. Not unless I had to.
“I think she’s lying,” Wardrel said.
I barely caught the distaste-filled twist of Dan’s upper lip before it disappeared. “Of course you do. Try again.” Wardrel disappeared behind me, and Dan crouched in front of my knees so that I had to look at him. “Miss Dunfee, please. I don’t like this any more than you do. If there’s something you want to share with us, this will be a lot easier for everyone. He can go for hours. I can make it quick.”
“Why don’t you believe me?” I whispered.
“Because it’s my job not to.”
He backed away and Wardrel stepped into view, this time holding a red-hot fireplace poker. He tapped it against my forearm. Just a taste. I’d been burned worse before, but in my already-panicked state the pain was heightened. My heart slammed against my ribcage, my breath caught in my throat, and I struggled against the ropes. My broken finger screamed in protest.
Wardrel returned the poker to the fire. “Not hot enough,” he muttered. “Dan, get me more flesh.”
Dan’s lips narrowed into a thin line. Perhaps this wasn’t the job he’d signed up for. His fingers flicked delicately over the buttons on my shirt and he pushed the fabric back over my shoulders, leaving me covered only by my undershirt, which left far too much of my skin exposed to air and iron.
I made eye contact with Dan. “Please. Tell me what you want me to say to make him stop.”
He sighed. “The truth, my dear, is all we ask.”
“I’m telling the truth. Please. You have to—”
Someone knocked at the door. “Excuse me,” Dan said, and answered it.
Something moved near the back of my head, and I smelled burning hair.
“That’s better,” Wardrel mumbled, and held the hot metal before my face. “Last chance.” I leaned back against the chair, but the poker followed. “What do you think, Dan?” The poker hovered over my chest, so close it warmed my skin. “Start here? Or...” It moved, now nearly pressed against my cheek. “Not so pretty anymore if we do that. Or here.” He pulled my shirt up and aimed the hot steel at my belly like a sword, ready to stab. “If it burns hot enough, that might not kill you too fast. We could still have hours of fun.”
Tears I couldn’t stop streamed down my face, but I didn’t answer.
They’re guessing. They can’t know.
“Fine, I’ll choose.” The poker returned to my face. “Not so hot now. But it’ll do.”
His eyes glowed with anticipation as he brought the iron closer to my right eye, inch by inch, drawing it out, savoring my fear.
“Hold on,” Dan said.
Wardrel scowled and gave my cheek a quick slash with the poker before stepping back. Pain seared into my skin, sharp and bright. I gasped, and broke down sobbing as the shock opened the dam of emotion I’d been holding back. Dan stepped behind me and cut the rope. “She actually is who she says she is, or at least her story holds. They couldn’t find Dumfry in the records, but Dunfee’s there.” He stepped in front of me and shook his head. “I keep telling them that it’s essential to be precise in one’s paperwork, but they never listen. Now look what’s happened.”