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But that guilt and loss is still pooled in my chest, wrapped up as tightly as the muslin pack. So many people are sick. I’ve left so many with no access to medicine. A small sample from the palace might be enough to cure ten times as many.
Much like in the shopping district, it takes me a longer moment to notice the commoners surrounding the palace, the laborers, the men and women working in drab attire, sweeping the streets and cleaning the gutters and brushing the horses. As I wander past them, I begin to feel invisible, too. I wonder if this is why it’s so easy for the royal elites to ignore the people outside the walls of this sector. Are we all invisible to them?
Agroup of younger women in homespun skirts and wool trousers are walking toward the palace, and out of curiosity, I fall in behind them. The guards at the gate paid attention to me when I was gawking at the consul, but maybe they won’t pay me any mind if I look bored and inattentive.
My heart is hammering in my chest as we approach the eastern side of the palace, but I keep my eyes forward, on the backs of the girls who are chattering away about some scandal involving Consul Cherry and Consul Pelham having secret meetings right underneath the king’s nose. Another girl chirps that she’s heard that one of the consuls is sneaking money to the rebels. I don’t know any of the players, so I can’t follow their conversation, but it doesn’t matter anyway. I wait for a guard to shout out, or to stop me, or for one of the girls to notice that I’m following them, but no one says anything at all.
Just like that, I’m inside the palace.
It takes everything I have to keep from falling against a wall and pressing a hand over my chest.
I am inside the palace.
I have no idea what to do.
The doorway here leads into an area for servants, because, although the decor is still rather splendid, the floor is worn and the wallpaper scuffed in spots. The girls have moved into a room where uniforms are hung from racks along the wall, and they’re quickly disrobing.
This is ridiculous. Someone is going to find me. I’m going to be dragged through the streets behind a horse or hung from the sector gates or something.
One of the girls must notice my attention, because she begins to turn. I quickly duck away from the doorway and hurry down the hall.
Thereare workers everywhere down here, some assembling cleaning supplies, others working on repairs to small bits of machinery, some polishing leather or mending clothes or embroidering finery. A few glance at me, but most are so wrapped up in their own duties that they pay me little mind.
I need to get out while I can.
I don’t. I keep thinking about the elixirs and petals that must be stored here in the palace, the ones that can cure so very many people.
I keep thinking of the poison in my pack, of the fact that the king and his brother are likely somewhere inside these walls, plotting how they’re going to execute the next smuggler.
The thought launches a swell of fury and fear into my chest, and I breathe deeply so I don’t begin screaming.
Mind your mettle, Tessa.
Oh, Wes. My eyes fill. I press a hand to my mouth so I don’t openly sob.
I need to find a place to hide. To think. To question my sanity.
And then, as if fate granted my wish, I notice a small closet filled with linens that seems wide and dark and cool. Without a thought, and while no one is looking, I close myself inside and tuck myself into the back.
