Chapter 24
Irock back on my heels, clutching the soldad so tightly the hard edges even cut through my glove. But it is from you.
It’s supposed to be from you.
It’s . . .
The attic of masks swirls, closing in to crush me. I fix my stare on Nicostratus’s obliviously smiling eyes. He has no idea.
“I wish it had come from you too,” I say, thickly.
I slam my eyes shut. All the clues have been there.
I’m closer with his majesty, Evander said.
“Amuletos?”
I open my eyes.
Nicostratus settles the mask into my free hand. “You should take this one.”
“It’s . . . stuffy in here, I need to . . .” I head for the exit; Nicostratus kills the lights with a wave and descends with me.
“You look pale,” he says when we’re outside and I’m gulping air. “I’ll take you back.”
I wave a hand. “Give me a moment.”
“With company or . . .”
“Alone? Please?”
“Did I—I’m sorry.”
I reach up and touch his cheek. “It’s this day that’s got to me.”
He lets me go, a dark heroic figure watching after me, wind tossing his cloak eastward.
I walk the gardens, past the fountain to the rose pavilion with its stone chess set. I slump onto the cold bench and pick up the white king. My chest clenches, a mix of anger and something I can’t name burning my throat. How can I not have seen it?
Something flashes out the corner of my eye.
I set the king down on the board. Who would be working in the gardens this late?
Leaves rustle and I follow the sounds all the way to the pear orchard, where the graceful figure of an akla emerges from a line of trees, carrying a basket of white petals.
The slant of her shoulders, the line of her throat . . .
I clutch the trunk of a pear tree. Megaera.
On King’s Island.
I recall her consumed by grief in front of the guillotine, swathed in smoky magic, devastated and angry. I recall the swish of her cloak as she left with calculated intent. Has she donned akla robes and entered the royal city to bring justice—or vengeance?
Does she know I’m still alive?
Sorrow and anxiety shiver under my skin; I slink quietly down the row of trees, following her.
She cuts across the lawn towards the softly lit bathhouse, a sinister bounce in her step.
The basin of rose petals—if she replaces those petals with the ones in her basket, will Quin come back late tonight or early tomorrow and bathe to his demise?
My shivers turn me to ice.
I have to stop this.
I wait in the shadows until Megaera leaves the bathhouse and when I’m sure she won’t return, I slide the door open—
A dozen redcloaks step before the door in formation, the one in front shouting for identification.
Another voice cuts over their heads. “Stand down. You may all leave.”
The redcloaks part into two lines and file out either side of me.
I blink, taking in the bathwater speckled with petals and Quin, fixing his clothes into place at the other end, hair wetly framing his face.
His eyes fix on me as I inch down the side of the bath to the bowl of flower petals and sniff.
Spring roses. I kneel and use a protective magic filter to pull a handful of petals from the water. I inhale again.
Quin moves to my side, and my chest might as well be a firecracker the way it’s firing. I turn to look at him. “The akla who last left here may have ulterior motives.”
“I’m aware. My uncle transferred her here earlier this week.”
“You let her tend to you in the bath?”
“Keep your friends close . . .”
And your enemies closer.
“I’ve looked into her background,” Quin says. “Tell me, why was I not surprised when your name came up?”
I sigh. Official Temenos’s death was my mistake, a mistake that likely led Megaera to the royal city. “Maybe it’s you who was very bad in a past life, and I’m your fated comeuppance.” I eye him for any signs. His skin doesn’t seem discoloured. His eyes are clear, not bloodshot.
He lifts a brow and extends his forearm.
I grab his wrist and slide two fingers up it until I feel the familiar healthy thump of his pulse. I press harder, reading deeper to be sure. “Nothing tingled in the bath, did it?”
“Excuse me?”
“Did anything tingle, get hot, start itching?” I clutch his wrist, frowning. His pulse has quickened. “I need to do further tests on the water.” He hooks my fingers as they slide off his skin.
I turn back to face him.
“There’s nothing wrong with the water.”
I sit back, about to re-check his pulse, but he draws his arm away. “Outside.”
We leave the bathhouse and breathe in deep lungfuls of fresh air.
Nervously, I follow him past a view of night-lit palaces and moon-glittery canals, to an exposed area of grass with targets lined up at the far end.
Quin snaps his cane on his way to a shelf and takes a bow and quiver to a seat overlooking the training arena.
He says nothing while he prepares himself, and I watch quizzically.
He has a bowman’s physique. His shoulders, back, arms, forearms, core . . .
Did he ever join tournaments? Had he ever competed alongside Calix Solin? Could I have seen him back then, at that very tournament, if I’d paid attention to anyone else?
He pulls the string. I reach out instinctively to his straining arm and he lets the arrow fly.
It whizzes straight past the first target.
His eyes flash and I drop my hand with a flustered whisper, “You just bathed. You’ll get sweaty again.”
He blinks at me. “And yet I still have the urge to vent.”
I smile sheepishly and Quin takes another arrow. “I asked you to leave yesterday. You’re back already.”
“I came with Nicostratus.”
Quin looks pointedly at the empty space around us.
“I—I needed to take a walk.”
“Alone?”
Slowly, I drop to my knees before him, gripping blades of grass. “You gave me my soldad.”
Quin stares hard at the targets. The slightest smile stirs at his lips and a pulse-quickening thought tugs at me.
“Why such a valuable gift?” I croak. “You don’t . . .”
“Don’t what?” His arrow leaves its nock, veering far right of the second target. “And you think I’m arrogant.”
I open my mouth and shut it again. What was I thinking?
“I do have feelings for you.” At my widening eyes, Quin laughs hollowly, plucking his third arrow. “Unpleasant ones.”
Relief. He doesn’t—wait, unpleasant ones? My glare hits his and neither of us is willing to lose this battle. That a person could be this infuriating. If he weren’t the king, or Nicostratus’s brother, or the person who gifted me this soldad—
I scowl. “You can’t find me that unpleasant.”
“I beg to differ. Why else am I transferring you?”
“What’s so unpleasant exactly?”
“Everything.”
“I wish you weren’t a king right now.”
“Why? Want to slap me again?”
I raise a tempted hand and curl a finger, ready to flick. “Can I? Can I please? On the forehead. The side of your ear?”
Quin bats me with the feathered end of his arrow; I dodge it and give his lower thigh a few good flicks.
He prods me away, rolling his eyes.
I stay there before him, and raise my head to meet his dark gaze. He watches me carefully.
“It’s an extraordinary gift,” I murmur.
“Don’t read too much into it.” He nocks the arrow and aims. “I overheard you and Akilah that night on the longboat. She said all your books had been burned. You did a good deed, saving a man; I wanted to give you access to books that couldn’t be taken away.
” He jerks his head in dismissal. “Off you go.”
I reach under my cloak, to where I hooked the pearl mask, and sit it on his knees. He glances at it and lowers his bow.
“Why do you have one of my mother’s masks?”
“This one is my favourite; it matches the soldad. Wear it on Sunday.”
“There you go again, telling me what to do.” He pauses. “What do you mean, wear it on Sunday?”
“Nicostratus will explain as soon as you’re back.”
“Why don’t you tell me now?”
“You and he have the unconditional love between siblings, so I’ll leave it to him.”
Quin frowns curiously at me over the mask.
I flash him a grin. “I’ll go now.”
“A moment.”
I wait as his gaze rises and falls down my front.
“Is that a lemon tucked into your sash?”
I leap to my feet and scurry backwards. “It’s absolutely not from the conservatory.”
Quin shakes his head, laughing, and raises his bow. He aims at me while I skedaddle.
“Haven’t you learned your lesson?”
At six o’clock the following morning I meet Chiron in the apothecary, as promised, to announce my decision. He’s sipping tea over screeds of parchment on his desk. He doesn’t look up until I’ve been standing there for several moments.
He squints at me and strokes the stray scruff he’s been cultivating on his chin. “Will you drop out?”
“I won’t. I want to try.”
“High expectations only lead to disappointment.”
“Not trying is the bitterest of all failures.”
“I was told you’d be stubborn.” He shakes his head.
“If you have indeed decided to stay . . .” He points upwards, to the gallery and that shadow-shrouded archway.
The Crucible, Mikros had once told him. A place of punishment.
He holds up the parchment he was reading. “The request came late last night.”
I squeeze the lemon I slung into a pouch at my belt. You’d better taste divine.
“Is there any room for negotiation?” I glance towards the archway and back to Chiron. “I heard the last scholar needed a hundred days.”
“With a foundation far superior to yours.”
A scuffle comes from the doorway and Makarios and Mikros fall into the classroom. Florentius follows behind them in an elegant sweep of sparkly white robes.
Chiron lifts a brow.
“We wanted to hear his decision,” Makarios says, picking himself off the floor and helping Mikros up. They face Chiron and incline their heads respectfully. “Please don’t send him to the Crucible. He’ll be stuck there forever.” Makarios looks over Mikros’s head at me with a smirk. “No offense.”
I roll my eyes. He’s right though. I’ve been struggling to keep up so far—how can I beat something that’s intentionally more difficult?