Page 119 of Fate's Wicked Oath

The year of my eleventh birthday, there was another hike in taxes—lean times getting leaner. Paired with the loss of our pigs to an unseen predator from the Western Wood, my father had become desperate. My mother had suggested I travel with him on his journey to the capital, hoping to raise his spirits with my company and my spirits with an adventure.

What they didn’t know was that I’d looked into the Mirrors for the first time a month earlier, hoping for an answer to our poverty. Children of my age were not permitted to glimpse their Fates, and I’d had to sneak under the cover of darkness. I hadn’t known what to make of the visions, just that—due to my youth—they were likely to change. But my Fortune had stuck with me all the way to Castle Might. Hunger had stuck with me, too.

It hadn’t been calculated. It was only after the Lord had denied my father that my vengeance hatched the imbecilic idea.

“You thought your Fortune was literal,” Faren said. “That if you found it, you could ease your family’s impoverishment.”

“It brought me this, instead,” I finished for him, gesturing at my black breastplate. I let out a mirthless chuckle. “What kind of fucked-up Fortune is that?”

“But you succeeded.” There was awe in his voice. “You saved your family. By your own craftiness and strength, you took a terrible sentence and turned it into their relief.”

“My greatest Fortune is a cage,” I said. “One that I endure, to see that those I love are free. Sometimes, I—” I bit my lips together, breaking off before I spoke my darkest truth aloud. But if anyone could witness it with compassion, it would be Faren. And maybe, just this once, it would feel good to put words to the feeling. “Sometimes I wish my Fortune wasn’t so selfless. Sometimes I wish it’d been sweeter, simpler, better.”

“By the Fates, do I understand that,” he said, almost to himself, and the darkness inside me brightened into twilight.

We rode in silence for a few strides, our stirrups bumping as our horses drifted closer. Faren reached for me, palm up. Leaning out of the saddle, I took his hand, allowing him to squeeze my fingers, our sword callouses scraping as we let go.

“I know the Morta can warp your Fate, but…did you ever look into the Mirror of Fortune after your Fate became fixed?”

“It was the same,” I said. “A big book with strange writing on the front.”

“Strange writing,” Faren repeated.

“The language of the Arcane.”

Faren’s eyes widened. “Mariana, most Ledgers are titled in the common tongue. There are only seven written entirely in the language of the Arcane. Do you mean to tell me that—”

“The Ledger I stole was one of the Order of the Sovereign,” I said. “Fenrir’s Order of the Sovereign, to be specific.”

“You stole the Ledger that controls the Lord’s power? The Ledger that binds him to Fenrir as one of the rulers of the Seven Territories of the Kingdom of Marona? The Ledger that connects the Lord to his throne?”

“Yes.”

“No wonder he sentenced you for life,” Faren muttered. “Why didn’t you give it back?”

“Idid. After I was caught, the Lord led me to believe that if I returned the Ledger, he would lift my father’s taxes and free me. But the taxes were raised, and I was put in the dungeon.”

Faren’s jaw clenched.

“The theft hurt his pride. Made him feel vulnerable,” I said. “He’s too much of a vindictive prick to give up that grudge.”

“Perhaps you should’ve stolen it back,” Faren gritted out.

“Oh, I have. Numerous times.”

“You—what?”

“Every few years, I break in, take the Ledger, and hide it somewhere in Castle Might. Lord Haron has increased the security of his libraries and vaults over time, but that has only served as further training for my thievery.” My lips twisted with a smile. “I’ve become quite proficient.”

“Why not just steal the Ledger for good?”

“He knows where my family lives. If I took it, he’d retaliate,” I said, allowing Faren to fill in the rest. Heris was right about one thing: leverage waseverything. “This way, he can’t unequivocally prove it’s me who moves it around, and because it never leaves the grounds, he can’t punish anyone for theft.”

“Then why do you do it?”

“At first, I did it to get under his skin. Then, once I learned the truth about his plans, I realized that the thefts also interrupted his scheming. He can’t accomplish his power-hungry aims without his Ledger. The more often it’s misplaced, the more distracted he is. It won’t stop him, but it makes him paranoid, which slows him down.”

“If you can get into Castle Might that easily, why did you…” His brow furrowed, as if he didn’t want to say the thought out loud.