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Keris bit at his thumbnail, staring out the window but not seeing the homes and businesses lining Vencia’s streets as they bounced over the cobbles, moving ever closer to his father’s palace.
Valcotta sat slumped against the side of the carriage, her eyes closed, her cheeks still hollowed from the toll the poison had taken on her.
It had been unreasonable to expect her to be physically capable of escape after how sick she’d been, and yet it had still been a shock when she’d fainted in his arms. There was something about her that had always seemed indomitable, she who, on her deathbed, had still been willing to pick up a weapon and fight. And if not for the fact she’d slept nearly the rest of the journey, he’d have questioned whether her faint had been an act.
Sweat ran in rivulets down his spine, the steady throb of his pulse loud as they rolled through the gates of the palace, the carriage rocking as it came to a halt, causing Zarrah to sit upright.
“We’re here.” He searched her face for a hint of her thoughts, but she only gave a grim nod, then squared her shoulders. He had to fight the desire to take up a weapon and attempt to get her away. Except the time for weapons had passed, and now he had to rely on his wits to keep her alive long enough to find another path to escape.
Someone opened the door, and Keris exited the carriage, his heart thundering. One of the soldiers reached up to catch hold of Zarrah’s bound wrists, but she jerked herself free and stepped out of the carriage, chin high. Even in her rough woolen dress, her hair unwashed and tangled, she looked like an empress, not a prisoner.
I will get you out of this,he silently promised her.No matter the cost.
Turning to one of the servants who was offering towels to wipe the grime of travel from his hands, Keris asked, “Is he here?” There was no need to be specific. In this palace, only one man mattered.
“Yes, Your Highness.” She accepted back the soiled towel. “In his office. I’ll send word to him that you have arrived with the…” Her gaze flicked to Valcotta, expression darkening.
“Prisoner?” he supplied before the servant could come up with anything disparaging. “No need. I’ll go to him directly.”
But before Keris could move, a scream split the air, loud and piercing and full of fear.
A scream that had come from the inner sanctum of the palace. Where all of his aunts and youngest siblings resided.
Uneasy, Keris motioned for the soldiers to bring Valcotta and strode across the stable yard to the gates of the inner walls. As he drew nearer, his eyes landed on two hooded figures on their knees, wrists bound. “Who are they?”
The soldiers guarding them exchanged looks, then one reluctantly replied, “Ithicanian prisoners, Your Highness. Serin is…” The man trailed off, and Keris’s mouth soured. God, but he despised that creature.
“Does my father know the Magpie is playing with his toys in the garden?” He immediately waved a hand at the man, silencing any need for response. “Never mind. Of course he knows.”
The soldiers swiftly searched him for weapons, then swung open the gate. Keris moved into the sanctum, the scents of flowers and misting fountains filling his nose even as his eyes filled with the sight of Serin ripping the fingernails off a hooded woman’s hands, an unfamiliar man chained to a bench before them.
What madness was this?
“How do we get into Eranahl?” Serin’s words reached Keris’s ears. “No? Let’s see how she holds up to losing her fingers.”
“Pull out the damned gate!” the chained man screamed, and Keris fought the urge to intervene.
This was happening on his father’s orders, which meant he was powerless to stop it. To try would have consequences he couldn’t risk with Valcotta’s life at stake.
“How do we manage that?” Serin picked up another tool, and the chained man fell to his knees.
“Please.” The desperation in the man’s voice made Keris’s stomach twist. Especially since he knew this was the least of the horrors Serin was capable of conjuring. He was a sadist of the first order.
“A strategy, Aren,” the Magpie crooned. “Give us a strategy, and this will all be over.”
Aren.The Ithicanian king.
Realization struck Keris, but before he could react, the woman being tortured twisted free from the guards holding her. She threw herself at the Ithicanian king, then reached up with her bound hands and pulled the sack from her head.
At the sight of her face, the Ithicanian king’s eyes widened in surprise before quickly turning to horror. Not whom he’d expected, apparently, but most assuredly someone he knew.
“Idiots,” Serin hissed at the guards. “Get her back!”
The men stalked closer, their eyes wary despite the king being chained and outnumbered. And Keris knew the hesitation would cost them as resolve flashed over the Ithicanian’s face—an unwillingness to allow the young woman to suffer any further. Serin saw it, too, and he shrieked, “Stop him!”
But it was too late.
With a quick twist of his muscled arms, the Ithicanian king broke the woman’s neck, the crack audible. As was Zarrah’s soft intake of breath from where she stood at his elbow.
