5. Raven #2
Reapers did the reaping, so even though we were not immortal…
hence the existence of the reaper’s reaper, the Killian…
and clearly not impervious to injury, we were fast healers.
Of course, I wouldn’t mind if the healing was faster still.
Several areas—my shoulder and side, especially—were still pink and cripplingly tender.
Thankfully, I could easily hide the remnants of the bump on my forehead with a slight adjustment of my hair.
“Raven.” Winter shifted his chair to better face me and gingerly collected my hands in his own. “Now that you’ll be staying with us for a bit—”
The main door to the outer hall slammed open with a room-echoing bang. Someone clearly wanted to make sure they were heard through every space of the apartment.
Does no one in the palace bother to knock?
Both Winter and I snapped our attention toward the glass doors leading to the bedroom just as Valen strolled into view. I leaped to my feet, clutching the front of my robe closed. Winter rose slowly with an annoyance-touched grace.
Valen practically sneered when he spotted us together on the terrace, me doing exactly what the queen had requested me not to do—fraternizing with the crown prince.
But I had not sought his company. He’d come to me. So, fixing that particular dynamic would take a few relationship adjustments.
“Oh dear,” Valen said. “I do hope I am not interrupting, but the girl and I have much to cover today, and I would prefer to get an early start.”
“Oh. B-but I…” I stammered and glanced between Valen and Winter.
I’d hoped to have a few free hours to visit the pub, check in on Aldine, plus see if there was any news on Chace and his whereabouts. Only I’d signed the queen’s agreements, and taking in the expression on Valen’s face…
Saving me from my tongue-tied embarrassment, and earning endearment points, Winter stepped around his chair, removing the furniture as a barrier between him and Valen. “I’ve actually made plans for the two of us today. Maybe—”
“No, you don’t. Not anymore.” Valen’s gaze shifted to me and narrowed. “While Ms. Gunn is a guest at the palace, her time is that of the queen’s, and ergo mine.”
Winter’s back stiffened, the muscles on his arms bulging through his overcoat. “You forget your place.”
“You may be the prince,” Valen said, veins of irritation lacing his words. “But last I checked, your grandmother is the queen, and it is by her orders that I act.” He flourished a hand up through the air, his attention snapping to me. “Get dressed.”
So, that was how things would be—the shredding of whatever relationship Winter and I had begun. Tearing it down before the foundation stones could even take proper form.
The method, though, I didn’t believe to be the ideal course for the results they desired. Forcing Winter away might only cause him to cling harder. Much like when you tell a child not to do something, making the forbidden action far more enticing… Or so I’d heard.
How long would I need to play the queen’s game? Any amount of time was longer than I desired.
Something inside of me shivered. I didn’t think I felt fear, but something wholly unpleasant. This deal was necessary filth upon my skin and soul. But what was a little…or a lot…of filth when it came to saving and transitioning souls?
In the case of the Citadel of Veritas, a ridiculous number of souls.
Winter dropped his fists upon the nearest table with a loud thud as if to command Valen’s full attention with the action. “What is it exactly the two of you are working on together?”
I stilled and stared at Valen. How did he intend to explain my situation?
His scowl instantly found me. As intense and threatening as his glare was, I refused to back down, to run away and hide.
“Knowledge provided by her lineage may prove to be a necessary element in breaking the curse upon this city. Hopefully cure our afflicted.”
“What element?” Winter pushed. Valen sighed, as if already bored with the conversation.
His finger tapped against his thigh three times, then his sharp eyes snapped to me, a growl on his lips. “What are you doing still standing here? Get dressed. We have a schedule to adhere to.”
I blinked but didn’t move, refusing to be intimidated.
The temperature on the terrace dropped several degrees, and a soft mist lingered around Winter’s ever-wringing fingers. “You do not talk to our guest in such a manner.”
Fire appeared to spark in Valen’s eyes. With the direction the morning confrontation headed—Valen’s fire against Winter’s frost—nothing good would likely transpire.
With a slight shake of my head, I backed away.
“It’s fine, Winter,” I lied. “I don’t mind.”
As Winter and Valen continued with blows of words sharp as steel, I grabbed my bag from the receiving room, then I disappeared into the bathing chamber and locked the door. I took my time washing away the grime of the night and previous days before slipping into my only clean outfit.
I’d packed three outfits through which I had planned to rotate, hoping to work washes in between.
Of the other two, one was filthy and had been collected the previous night to be laundered, and the other had been shredded by Winter when he had needed to access and attend the wounds I’d sustained at the hands… and fear…of the palace gate guards.
Before I finished in the washroom, the thunderous volley of voices calmed and was followed by the heavy bang of a closing door.
I made my way to the receiving room, dressed and ready to meet the day, where I found Valen the one remaining.
Winter had left. And by the sounds of things, he’d left in anger.
Valen spun to face me. “Are you ready to get started?”
My gaze drifted to the windows. Outside, rain began to fall. Fat waterdrops splattering with a tink, tink, tink against the glass. The change in the weather mirrored my mood.
“This is where you want to start?” The tension in my shoulders threatened to tear my tendons. “Don’t you think, starting with what you have to offer, i.e. details about the curse, would better serve to help me hold up my end of the deal?”
“Possibly, but…queen’s orders.” Valen raised a scrutinizing eyebrow. “Going forward, you might want to consider reading contracts more thoroughly before signing them.”
My jaw clenched even as I held the rest of my features in check.
If I wasn’t going to get access to the necessary information regarding the curse—at least, not right away—then I could make use of Valen’s presence.
He was, after all, the male my father had recommended I seek out, and I knew nothing beyond that.
But I needed—no, wanted—to know more. Especially given his position in the palace and his apparent closeness to the queen.
But this…
We both turned our attention to the practically comatose afflicted gentleman seated across the room. His attire suggested that before his fall into the undead, he’d been employed in some capacity at the palace.
Now he did little more than stare and drool.
“But he’s…” I waved a hand in the man’s direction.
Valen nodded, a cat-got-the-canary grin on his lips.
“Exactly. No better place to practice your supposed talent than on one who clearly can’t get much worse.
Honestly, I think death would be a mercy.
” He turned his cold, challenging gaze to me.
“If you could manage a death, given the circumstances.”
He raised his hands toward the ceiling as if the curse had somehow amassed there.
Shifting to my side, Valen laid his hand against the small of my back and gave me a soft nudge, shoving me closer to the afflicted.
I trudged forward, away from Valen’s touch, and tossed him a sidelong glance. Something about the line of his nose caught my attention.
I recalled his nose appearing straighter when I’d met him in the carriage, but last night when he’d pressed my bloodied fingers to the contract, it had appeared somewhat crooked.
Had something happened between those two meetings?
Or had my perception simply been distorted through the skewed lens of exhaustion?
“Heal him.” Valen pointed to the afflicted. “I shall observe so that I may record a baseline from which to work forward and then report to Her Majesty of your fine accomplishment.”
“And after that?” I stared at my splayed hands, curling and stretching my fingers several times.
“You do it again and again until you can prove your success within an acceptable margin of error.”
“And what exactly do you and the queen consider an acceptable margin of error?”
Valen didn’t verbally answer, but his eyes gleamed, and his lips curved upward with a touch of harsh cruelty. His gaze filled with challenge and incredulity. He clearly didn’t believe I had ever healed an afflicted, and he questioned my saving the crown prince.
I would prove him wrong… I hoped.
Turning my gaze from Valen, I studied the afflicted.
This man was a test. One of several I’d be forced to heal…
or attempt to heal. And why start here, with the afflicted, when any information on the curse, information the queen had suggested she could provide, might help me better understand the altered rules governing death… or the lack thereof…within the citadel?
“There’s someone in particular you wish for me to heal, isn’t there?” I asked. “Someone your queen considers very important.”
The widening of his grin answered my question. An expression I took for a seriously fat yes.
Did the queen even care for her citizens? Or was her true motive behind our agreement actually concern for a particular someone?
“Power up, Ms. Gunn,” Valen said with a bark, then he shoved me straight into the afflicted’s embrace.