Chapter 90 Ahnna
Ahnna
They kept her gagged and bound in a cell for the balance of the night, but in the wee hours of the morning, the sound of footsteps tore her from her misery.
Hazel approached with two guards, one of whom carried a washbasin and pitcher, the other a lamp. Hazel herself had white garments over one arm and a pair of white slippers in her other hand.
The guards opened the cell, and the one with the lamp pulled the gag from Ahnna’s mouth.
“Your Highness.” Hazel bobbed a curtsy. “Her Grace, the dowager queen, requested that you be dressed as befits your station so that you might have dignity for your execution.”
Ahnna gave a soft chuckle that held no humor. “You know that most people piss themselves when they are hanged, right, Hazel? It’s hard to maintain dignity with urine dripping off your corpse’s ankles.”
“Then perhaps you should refrain from drinking.”
To be contrary, when the guard unfastened her shackles, Ahnna picked up the cup of water on the floor of her cell and drank deeply. Hazel had been one of Alexandra’s agents, which meant the girl was no friend of hers.
But Ahnna held her tongue, not wanting to do anything that might disrupt the tenuous deal she’d made with William and Alexandra.
Do this, and you will save Ithicana, she silently repeated to herself, knowing that if William’s resolve slipped, her death would be for nothing. “I thought we were friends, Hazel. Why did you betray me?”
Hazel’s fingers paused in untangling Ahnna’s braid. “You remember you and I once talked about how having skill with arms allows you to fight to defend those you love?”
A conversation that felt like a lifetime ago, but Ahnna remembered it. “Yes.”
“Well, there is more than one way to fight.” Hazel continued working on her hair. “My father works for Cartwright Foundries. I think you’re familiar with the name.”
C.F.
“Was my father who took the bribe and smuggled sharpened weapons onto the bridge, though he had no knowledge of how they would be used. He’s not a thinker, my pa.
” The maid gave a frustrated shake of her head.
“After the invasion came to pass, Edward ordered an inquest into the source of the weapons. It was discovered my pa was behind it, and he was arrested. Was to be tried for treason, despite his only fault being that he was a greedy idiot.”
“Alexandra was behind that bribe.”
“I know that now, but I didn’t then. Then, she was my salvation.
She came to me and said that she’d use her right to grant pardons to save my pa if I came to work for her in Verwyrd.
It seemed like a dream being offered the chance to work in the palace washing the sheets of fancy ladies, because we’d been living in Sableton’s tenderloin, which is a miserable place.
Moved my whole family with me to Verwyrd, and I never stopped to question why Alexandra had come to my rescue, because she was known to be so charitable. ”
Hazel passed the comb down the length of Ahnna’s hair and then set to braiding.
“The first favor she asked of me was nothing. Just a bit of spying on one of her ladies and reporting back. But her requests kept coming. Planting objects and delivering messages, and one day, replacing a lord’s glassware in one of the suites with a set she gave me.
‘He deserves the finest,’ I remember her saying.
Just as I remember her saying, ‘We hold you in our hearts in your time of grief,’ to his widow when he dropped dead of a heart attack the next day.
” Her fingers tightened almost painfully on Ahnna’s hair.
“That’s how she does it. Twists you up in her schemes until you are as guilty as she is.
So if she goes down, you go down with her. ”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m the one who is sorry, my lady.” Hazel tied off the braid.
“It’s the charities, that’s how she does it.
That’s how she bribes and incentivizes, all under the guise of good works.
Her banking records are her insurance, because if you follow the flow of gold and silver, it is to the accounts of all the individuals she’s twisted up in her schemes.
If she were to go down, she could take half of Harendell’s nobility with her.
Her banking records went missing recently, and I daresay that she’s not slept a wink since.
Nor should she.” Hazel’s voice turned cutting.
“It’s hard to hide dirty laundry from those who do the cleaning, and we have ways of getting information where it needs to go. ”
Ahnna didn’t press, but she silently put a fervent wish out into the world that Hazel, or others, would bring Alexandra down in due course. “I hope someone makes her pay.”
“As do I, my lady.”
“She murdered James. They’ll blame someone else, but it was Alexandra.”
Hazel’s breath caught, her grief thickening the air. “There is no end to her cruelty.”
Ahnna didn’t fight the tears that rolled down her cheeks as Hazel formed a crown around her head with the braid.
Didn’t fight the grief that pooled around the pieces of her broken heart, because they’d had so little time.
So little time, and most of it had been spent fighting for their lives.
Ahnna allowed Hazel, the guards, and the cold cell to fade away, losing herself in the memory of that one blissful night they’d had together.
The taste of his lips, the feel of his hands, and the exquisite pleasure of being filled by him.
She let the memory replay in her mind, hoping that if there was a Great Thereafter, it would be living in that moment for all eternity.
I love you, she silently whispered. For as long as I draw breath, I will love you, and when my breath ceases, I will find you. I swear it.
Hazel pulled the simple white dress over her head and fastened the buttons up the back.
It had a low neckline, leaving her throat readily exposed for the noose to tighten around.
Next came the soft white shoes, which Hazel carefully laced.
Last was a white cap that covered the coronet of braids.
Dressed like a martyr, and Ahnna hated the choice because no part of her felt that way.
It would have been better to be dressed as a warrior, because this felt like dying in a battle so as to win the war.
“She’s ready,” Hazel murmured, and one of the guards bound Ahnna’s wrists behind her back and led her out of the cell.
The soft lambskin of her slippers made little pats against the stone as they brought her up a narrow staircase and out into the Sky Palace’s courtyard.
More soldiers waited with the small carriage pulled by Buck and Brayer, the mules watching her with bored expressions as she blinked in the dawn light.
Yet before she could take a step farther, shouts rang out through the Sky Palace: “A prince has been born! A new baby prince!”
“It is not auspicious to have an execution on the baby prince’s birthday,” Hazel muttered.
“The execution should be postponed.” The maid abandoned Ahnna to the guards and went into the palace, but Ahnna knew she’d be wasting her breath.
Inauspicious or not, Alexandra wanted her name cleared, and Ahnna’s confession was the only way to achieve it.
Archie stepped into the courtyard, his uniform crisp and his boots polished. “Bring her down,” he said to the guards. “I’ll go ahead to be sure all is as it should be.”
With swift strides, he exited the gate and disappeared down into the spiral.
“Let’s go.” The guard holding Ahnna’s wrists shoved her forward, and she stumbled over her own feet, nearly falling.
They loaded her into the carriage, one sitting next to her, the other across, both with weapons in hand.
There was so much hate in their expressions that Ahnna lowered her eyes to her white skirts as the carriage rocked into motion, the mules making their painfully slow progress down the spiral.
Around, and around, and they were not halfway down when the cathedral bells began to ring, spreading the news about the birth of the heir to the Twisted Throne.
Her nephew.
The corner of her mouth turned up as she considered that fact but then fell as her consideration turned to the legacy he’d know her by.
A murderer and a traitor who died by execution.
Would he even know that she was his aunt, or would Alexandra erase Ahnna’s marriage to James from existence?
Would it be as though it never was, remembered only by the handful of survivors who were there the night she and James swore to defend each other to their dying breaths.
James had honored his vow, Ahnna knew that in her soul. He would never have given up, and she wanted to scream and scream because Alexandra would never be punished for what she’d done to him.
Her body shuddered with a rough sob, and Ahnna rested her cheek against the carriage window, watching as they descended below the clouds. Down and down, and it felt all the world to her as though they were descending into an underworld from which she’d never escape.
A large escort of soldiers awaited them at the spiral’s base as she was transferred to a larger carriage, and then they began their winding passage through the streets.
It was a strange dichotomy to hear the bells still tolling joy for the new prince even as the citizens of Verwyrd jeered and threw rotten food at her carriage, screaming their hate, and Ahnna knew that Hazel had the right of it that her death would be forever entwined with the baby prince’s life.
She wondered what his name was. Wondered what he looked like.
Wondered if he’d break free of the darkness in his family tree and become a good king to all these people.
The carriage rolled into the square. It was normally a teeming marketplace, but all the stalls had been cleared to create space for the crowd that had gathered.
Uniformed soldiers were everywhere to hold the crowd back from the gallows that had been erected, along with a viewing gallery that had been assembled to keep the royalty out of the misting rain while Ahnna said her piece.
Keris was there, as was Zarrah. She wore her Valcottan uniform but still outshone all of Alexandra’s ladies in their fancy gowns.
An enormous man she didn’t recognize stood behind them, dressed in leather and furs, his expression grim and unyielding.
Cardiffian, for certain, and though she’d thought he’d left Verwyrd, her guess was that he was King Ronan.
Which meant that he knew that her confession was a lie.
She could only pray that he didn’t try to interfere.
Alexandra sat on one of the chairs, eyes down, but Virginia was absent, as was William. His absence made Ahnna uneasy. Made her fear that Alexandra had changed his mind, and that he’d hang Ahnna and then set sail to destroy Ithicana.
Her guards pulled her forcefully from the carriage, mud staining her white shoes and splattering her dress as they pulled her up the stairs, her ears filled with jeers and bells. One of them pulled the noose over her head and tightened it, and then they left her standing on the platform alone.
Fear filled her veins, and every instinct in Ahnna’s body screamed fight. Not once in her life had she backed down. Not once had she surrendered. This was not who she was, and her body shook with the need to take action.
It’s not surrender, she told herself. It is a sacrifice that will save lives. It is a victory.
Except her words sounded hollow as the black-clad executioner walked toward the platform.
Alexandra gave the slightest nod, and the big man cleared his throat.
The crowd fell silent, and he said, “Princess Ahnna Kertell of Ithicana, you have been charged with the murder of King Edward of Harendell, the assault of the Dowager Queen Alexandra, and the murder of Prince James—”
What? Her eyes shot to Alexandra, the cruelty of the woman beyond reason.
“—treason, and sedition,” the executioner intoned. “You have confessed, and with your guilt certain in the eyes of the law, King William has condemned you to be hanged by the neck until you are dead. Do you have any final words?”
One last battle. One last swing of the sword in this life before you go find James in the next.
Ahnna coughed, trying to clear her throat, but the noose already felt like it was strangling her. “I…”
She trailed off as the crowd parted, revealing a familiar figure on horseback, and the whole crowd erupted.