CHAPTER 21
The thump of the basket against Hollis’s hip matched her gait.
Bristol gripped a wine flask in each hand, as did Avery.
Julia, Rose, and Sashka carried trays loaded with meats, cheeses, and treats.
They had raided the pavilion tables and were taking their feast to a secluded plaza behind the palace, overlooking the Bay of Mirrors, a small shimmering inlet, home to dubious creatures.
It was always quiet and empty there, and that was what they all needed—a little less of Elphame for a few hours.
Glennis’s death weighed on them. And facing execution didn’t exactly brighten spirits.
As they walked, Bristol noticed the sizable notch in Hollis’s ear.
Esmee said it was always trickier healing a shape-shifter.
That part of Hollis was gone forever, deep in the belly of the wretched hound that had bitten it off, but it didn’t seem to bother her.
At least for now. Her mind was elsewhere.
“A funeral and a wedding. Strange, isn’t it? ” Hollis mused.
“Strange how?” Bristol asked.
“How life goes on. Grief and happiness walking side by side. Sometimes that seems impossible.”
“My grandmother always said that news came in threes,” Rose chimed in, “the good, the bad, and the questionable.”
“Questionable?” Hollis asked.
“The kind of news you’re not sure about yet. It could be good or bad.” If news came in threes, Bristol wondered what questionable news might be headed their way.
“When is the wedding?” Julia asked. “Did Ivy say?”
Hollis shook her head, unsure. “No. But before the Choosing Ceremony.”
“And the funeral?”
“Late tomorrow,” Bristol answered. “Sunset, I think she said. Glennis had no one else, so the funeral will be here. The officers were her family.”
“What’s a Danu funeral like?” Avery asked.
None of them knew. Not even Julia. “But it’s apparently intensely personal,” she said. “Only family and close friends participate.”
Which was why they never saw Liam’s funeral.
His body had been returned to his family in Greymarch.
Bristol had only been to two funerals in her life—her parents’.
Funerals for people who weren’t really dead.
The urns with their “ashes” still sat on a shelf in her father’s workshop.
She wondered what was really in them. Fireplace ashes?
A bag of beans? A lifetime of lies? The urns were sealed, and she had never looked inside.
Who would? Her father knew that. Paper cuts.
They still sliced into her skin unexpectedly.
All the things at her fingertips she never saw or knew.
In a twisted way, that pain was a comfort too—proof that her father was not only crafty but devious when it came to survival.
It quieted the persistent worry still nesting in her gut.
“Should we go?” Rose asked. “Do you think we’re considered close friends?”
Bristol shrugged. “I don’t know, but I’m going.”
“I am too,” Julia said.
In seconds, it was settled: They were all going.
“What about weddings?” Sashka wondered aloud. “Do you think they’re the same as ones in the mortal world?” No one knew that either. But they all thought it was odd that Melizan and Cosette would choose to get married now with so much going on.
The day after the funeral, everyone would be back to drills and preparation.
Bristol’s temples pounded. Almost everyone.
She would be occupied with another matter—one she hadn’t told anyone about yet.
Removal of the tick. And now there was also the matter of Cael’s return—and the complication of her bargain with her mother and her promise to leave Elphame.
But no one knew about that yet either. At least not the details.
You give me your word, Bristol? Your promise?
A well-crafted wince. A tilt of the head. Of course, Mother. Going back is all I ever wanted.
And without that prince.
The careful slow pull of her brows. An extra beat. A serious nod of the head. Everything her own parents had taught her. Yes, without him, of course. There’s not that much between us anyway.
Bristol could still see her mother, eyes glistening, vacillating between mother and monster, between nightmares and dreams.
A nudge.
A pause.
A grimace.
Bristol did what she had to do, but she felt the twitch and pull of every manipulation.
Isn’t our family worth more than him?
She made the sale and got Cael back, and now anyone could step up on the Stone of Destiny without it costing Cael his life. Anyone. It didn’t have to be Cael. Maybe it shouldn’t be.
“Ahhhh,” Julia sighed as if she had just slipped into a warm bath. They had arrived at the quiet plaza with the beautiful view of the sea. “Peace at last.”
Sashka tweaked her head to the side, catching the hint of a siren song wafting on the breeze. “Tempting. Almost makes you want to go for a swim.”
“Tempting you is their job, and they’re good at it,” Julia said. “But go for a swim, and it will be your last.”
“Fish food,” Avery confirmed.
Bristol was tempted too. The siren song was strong, piercing the senses like an arrow, like so many of the enticements of Elphame—so much of it beautiful, so much of it deadly.
Right then, swimming seemed like the most perfectly logical thing to do.
Let the water and waves drown out the world she was trying to escape.
But Bristol didn’t want any swim to be her last. She had goals that didn’t include being dinner for bottom dwellers.
They laid their feast on the table and dug in, passing plates and flasks and baskets of bread.
Bristol’s heart floated as she watched them effortlessly working together, the easy comradery.
She loved them all and wondered again about chances, the slim probability of them all ending up here from so many far-flung places, and the even greater odds of failure during that first week.
Yet here they all were, still together. She remembered Tyghan’s words: A million chances happen every day.
The difference is what we make of them. These friends took a chance on her and on each other.
They had reached out and cheered one another on from day one.
Without them, Bristol wouldn’t still be here.
She likely wouldn’t even be alive. The clatter of dishes, the splash of wine in glasses, the hush of the tide pushing and pulling at the rocks on the shore far below them, their relaxed chatter, it was the music they all needed.
“Good thing Old Noodle Legs didn’t nick you today,” Sashka said, “or we really would be guilty of regicide!”
“A very good thing,” Julia echoed.
“Old Noodle Legs isn’t that old,” Rose said. “Thirty, tops.”
“Thirty-one,” Avery corrected. “I checked.”
“Hmm,” Hollis said. “Already checking out the king?”
Avery hissed, like he was the last person she would ever check out.
Bristol poured herself a goblet of velvety red wine and quickly downed it, determined to push thoughts of Cael and bargains from her mind, to enjoy this time with her friends, to make every complication disappear if only for one evening. Was that too much to ask? But thoughts were hard to turn off.
That prince. She poured herself another glass.
Without him. It was a blatant lie. Leaving Tyghan was unthinkable.
She still wasn’t sure how she had convinced her mother she was only using him, but Bristol had risen to the challenge, her inflection disdainful, her timing perfection.
Maybe when you were afraid and desperate, lying was elevated to an art.
If so, Bristol had become a master artist.
Julia lifted her glass in a toast. “It’s a feast fit for knights.”
“Which we practically are after today’s feat!” Rose said, clinking her glass with the others.
Avery jumped to her feet, her fist waving high above her head like it held a weapon, and proclaimed, “Every one of us should be presented with a ruby-adorned sword!”
“Hear, hear!” Hollis called. “Ruby swords all around!”
Sashka laughed, imitating Julia’s order to Cael. “Lower it. Now!”
“His face!” Rose squealed. “It was priceless.”
“Best moment since we got here,” Avery agreed.
They all laughed, recounting the antics they had to go through to tie Cael to August’s back—his noodle legs, threats, and the weak orders he kept spouting.
“What a prize. Do you think he’s always so disagreeable?” Avery asked.
Julia’s glass hummed as she ran her finger along its rim. “Well, he was imprisoned for months under harsh conditions. He may have lost a lot of perspective and trust during that time.”
“And weight,” Hollis added. “Did they even feed him? He was so gaunt. I get grouchy as a bear when I haven’t eaten.”
Rose grimaced. “I bet he had to scavenge for roaches and rats. Maybe he does deserve some pity—”
“Except that he wants us all executed,” Sashka reminded her.
This was met with a flurry of snorts and curses.
An evil glint lit Rose’s dark eyes. “I’d like to see him try.”
“Who knows what might have happened if you all hadn’t been there,” Bristol said. “I was never so happy to see anyone in my life.”
Avery’s brows pulled together. “How did he know Maire was your mother?”
“A slip. I mentioned my father, and he put two and two together.”
“It shouldn’t matter who your parents are,” Sashka said. “You saved his fucking neck.”
“Yes, she did.”
The voice came out of nowhere, and they all jumped and turned.