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Albrecht sits back and I wonder if he is now satisfied, but he simply picks up his goblet and eyes it with annoyance.
“Why is this empty?” he snaps and servants rush to rectify the situation. The king drains the goblet in greedy gulps before turning his attention to the long row of fellow prisoners. With plenty of grumbles and complaints, Albrecht makes his way down the line and doles out sentences, stuffing his face with rich meats and fresh fruit as he condemns poor villagers stealing food for their starving families. He’s harshest to those he feels have personally wronged him, ordering a spate of immediate executions. Thatch’s expression grows bleaker with every condemnation.
But I notice another pattern—lighter sentences for those who can offer bribes as “reparations.” Money, property. I glare with rage at the man who offers up his daughter to Albrecht like she’s chattel in order to get him out of an embezzlement charge, and burn with even more anger when the king accepts it.
Finally, it’s our turn. My thoughts whirl, calculating how this will go. I could just wash my hands of Thatch—say that he was making up his claims. I wasn’t involved in the poaching, so there’s a chance the king might let me go…but Thatch would definitely be executed.
I shudder at the thought.
We’re not friends, but it’s hard to stomach the thought of letting him die if there’s anything I could do to save him. And besides, even if I turned against him, who’s to say whether I’d actually be freed? The king doesn’t seem to pay attention to little details like who’s actually guilty.
All he cares about is what he can get for himself. If Thatch and I are going to survive, we’ll need to promise the king something he wants, like gold…but I don’t have gold. Not yet. And if I promise it to him and don’t deliver, I’ll be lucky if all he does is kill me. He seems like the type to enjoy making me suffer before I die.
There’s so much at stake either way. I feel myself break out into a sweat as I swallow against the lump in my throat. The time is now. I have to decide.
The soldiers start to explain Thatch’s crime, and his claims about me. They dangle the pendant into Albrecht’s outstretched hand and he scrutinizes it, searching for the flaws.
It’s only a matter of time before he finds them, which means I have to decide, right here and now, whether to step back and play it safe…or step forward and risk everything.
“It’s not real gold,” I say. The king and Thatch both twist their heads towards me. It’s hard to hear my own voice over the pounding of my heart. “But I could make you some, Your Majesty, if you wish.”
I have his attention.
“What do you mean?” he says and I fight to keep my spine straight.
“I mean, I have found a way to make gold—a unique, special gold. A precious metal made of true alchemy, such as no king has ever held before. I will make it for you, Your Majesty, and repay my friend’s debt.”
Hope rises in me as I see his eyes sparkle with greed. He likes the sound of that. Even with all his riches—wrenched from his suffering subjects—he still wants more.
“And what do you need to make this gold, woman?”
I check the light through the window. The sun is still up. If they hurry now, they can reach Maidar’s stall before the market ends.
Of course, this all relies on me being right—that I’m just one experiment away from finding the right formula. But now, with the resources of a king at our fingertips, seems as good a time as any to test that theory.
I try to ignore the body of the cook still lying on the floor as I explain what I need.
After all, the only thing at stake is our lives.
Chapter 4
Ilay out my equipment across a huge oak table in the castle’s guest rooms. As terrifying as this moment is, it is nice to have enough space to really do my work properly. Small blessings, I suppose.
I focus on the task ahead of me. They brought augium ore back from the market by the wagonful, and a sack of it sits in front of me now, glittering with anticipation. The fires are hotter here, the tools bigger and stronger, and what has taken me months of careful calculations, trial, error, and waiting for another market day, I can now finally tie up in a matter of hours. I’m almost certain that I’ve landed on the right formula. This could be it—the moment I’ve been waiting for for years.
Or it could be another failure that will lead almost immediately to my death. I won’t get a second shot at this. It has to work, and it has to work now.
My hair is plastered to my face with the heat of the fire, my eyes itch from the fumes, but I tweak my quantities for what I hope is one last time.
Easy now, I tell myself to calm the jittering nerves as I watch the solution bubble away. Just like you do it back home.
I lift the crucible, the heat of it blazing against my face even from this distance, and eke out a drop.
The substances combine, thicken, and I watch a swirling pool of turgid, dense metal breaking down and finding a new form. I hold my breath.
A sheen forms across the surface, and an unmistakable glimmer…
Gold.
