35. Lilias
Lilias
NOT GOING ANYWHERE
Istep out of the stall slowly, moving toward the men with their lanterns and swords like I have nothing to hide. I don’t dare look back to the stall where Elrick and Anura sit with their backs against the rough wood.
“Who the fuck are—” someone begins, but another voice cuts him off.
“That’s his wife,” someone says.
There’s a coughing sort of laugh, and the big guard grins at me like the snake who sang the mice into his jaws. I smile back at him. Zarek looks like he’s just been punched in the gut.
“And why in the hells would you ever want to leave, my lady?” the guard asks, putting just enough of a twist on the word lady to make it sound like an insult.
I drop my head, like I’m embarrassed, and shuffle forward.
“I was engaged to Prince Laurance,” I say.
Someone gasps. I hear the words whore and started the war and pretend I didn’t. My hands twist together at my waist.
“I think he…” I begin. “The prince, that is. I—”
I clear my throat, then take another step toward the big guard.
“Laurance threatened my husband,” I say. “I told Zarek I wanted to leave. Tonight.”
The guard chuckles, low and deep. He takes a step toward me. I force myself to stand up straight and ignore the desperate urge to glance at the stall behind me. The tiny stall where my brother and his wife are sitting in the straw, their backs to the wall, holding their breath.
I looked at Elrick just before I stood up, and I whispered one word.
Go.
“Lady,” the guard says, “you’re not going anywhere.”
The rest of the men laugh at this. Someone grabs Zarek’s arm. He hardly seems to notice. His face is suddenly pale, like he’s about to faint. I sniff, then step toward the guard.
“And why is that?” I ask, remembering the casual arrogance in Zarek’s voice when he led the guard away from our room. “Are you saying we aren’t free to leave the palace of Ethiria? Do you mean to treat me like a prisoner?”
The guard steps back, his smile faltering. I follow him, leading him away from the stall where my brother is hiding.
“There’s a fucking army on that road,” the guard growls, seeming to regain some of his composure. “No one is going anywhere tonight.”
I frown at him, trying to look as royal as possible. “An army? How would that affect us?”
The guard clenches his jaw. “I’m saying, my lady, that it’s not safe. You need to come with us. For your own protection.”
His hand drops to the sword at his waist, and his unspoken threat hangs heavy in the gloom inside the stables. I sniff again.
“Very well,” I say. “It’s not like you’re leaving us with many options.”
With that, I walk past the guard, leaving him scrambling behind me. My heart races inside my chest, and every muscle in my body pulls tight, waiting for someone to scream, to announce they found something, that there’s someone else here.
Finally, I’m standing on the hard cobblestone of the courtyard, staring at the line of torches making their slow descent down the mountains. It’s like a river of fire, slowly dripping down the mountain’s flanks.
Gods, they must have been right behind us when we crossed the mountains.
I shiver in the darkness, remembering how we picked over the rough pass to avoid the Dragon Mine.
The guard barks something to the soldiers huddling around us, and some of them scurry off.
But most of them are frozen in place, staring at the glowing line of torches making its way toward the palace.
“This way,” the guard growls.
He leads us through the palace doors, which are now wide open. Several maids stand in the doorway, not even pretending to do anything but stare at the mountain with open mouths. The guard pushes past them, grumbling, then pulls one of his men aside and mutters something under his breath.
“Uh, of course,” the man replies. His neck bobs as he swallows. “I mean, yes, sir.”
The big guard rolls his eyes and stomps off, swallowed by the darkness inside the castle. The man turns to us with wide eyes.
“I’ll, uh, take you to your room?” he says, with a glance through the open doors. His voice rises as he speaks, making it sound like a question.
When we reach the fourth floor, I worry the guard will say something about checking on Prince Elrick.
I open my mouth, trying to think of something I could say to distract him, but he just pushes our door open and waves his hand inside.
There’s a strange look on his face, like his mind is somewhere else.
Voices drift up from the stairwell; it sounds like a group of people on the floor below us are having one hell of an argument.
I step back into our room and try not to stare at the wine stain on the carpet. Zarek follows me. The door slams closed behind him. I walk to the window and stare through the darkness, imagining I can see the western gate. And Elrick riding through it, following the river.
Finding a safe way out of here.
Footsteps cross the floor. I turn to see Zarek standing next to me with a dark look on his face.
“What are we going to do?” I whisper, half to myself.
“What in the hells were you thinking?” he replies.
I step back. Zarek looks like he’s about to scream.
“Why did you stand up?” he asks, in a low growl. “Why didn’t you stay where you were?”
“Excuse me?” I reply, anger curling inside my gut.
“You were safe!” he snaps.
“They were about to search the stalls!”
I didn’t realize how much my voice had risen until the echo plays back to me. I glance at the door to the room, my heart fluttering in my throat, waiting for the guard outside to throw it open and demand to know what in the hells is going on in here.
When I turn back to the window, Zarek shakes his head and closes his eyes.
“I wanted you out of here,” he whispers.
“Well, excuse me for trying to save everyone else,” I growl. “You might not have noticed, but I don’t think the guards believed that you were alone.”
Zarek doesn’t reply. The window casts his dim reflection into what’s left of the night.
My anger fades as fear seeps in, crawling down my spine like a row of torches descending a mountain.
I turn away from Zarek and sit on the edge of the bed, my hands twisting in my lap as I stare at the dark stain on the carpet.
Was that just last night? It already feels like a distant memory, maybe from another life.
Zarek sighs. “I distracted the guard once,” he whispers. “I’ll do it again.”
He turns to me, his eyes wide and his face pale against the shadows in the room.
“Go back to Elrick’s room and out the balcony,” he says. “Follow the same path across the roof, down to the stables—”
I shake my head. “I can’t.”
“You can,” he says, leaning down to meet my eyes. “You’re braver than you think, Princess.”
“No,” I say, as heat rises in my cheeks. “We locked the door to Elrick’s room before we left. And then we pushed the dresser against it. From the inside.”
“Shit,” Zarek mutters.
He turns to the window, then back to me. “There’s a ledge in that wall. It’s not much, but it’s enough to climb across to the balcony—”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “Zarek, if the guard opens that door and we’re not here, where’s the first place they’re going to look?”
His head drops.
“The stables,” I say, answering my own question. “And if we’re not there, they’ll start to search the roads, right?”
Zarek doesn’t respond. I lower my voice.
“And if they search the roads,” I whisper, “they’ll find Elrick. And then what in the hells was the point of any of this?”
Zarek shakes his head. My chest feels tight as I watch him pace to the window, then back to the foot of the bed.
“You need to get out of here,” he says. There’s a harsh, ragged edge to his voice; he still looks like he’s about to scream. “It’s not safe. Not with—”
He waves his arm at the wall blocking our view of the massive army marching toward the palace of Ethiria, before pacing back to the window. He runs his fingers through his hair, then turns to stare at me with wild eyes.
“You need to go out through the window,” he announces.
I cross my arms over my chest. “No.”
“You can hide in the stables,” he continues. “In the hayloft. Just for a day or two, until it’s safe.”
“Zarek—”
“You can sneak out at night. Hells, you’re good enough with horses, no one will even notice you leaving—”
“I’m not leaving!” I snap.
Zarek falls silent. He frowns; for a heartbeat I think he’s going to scream at me. And then he spins away from me and lets his head fall against the window. His shoulders tremble. The ghost of his reflection flickers in the murky glass.
For some reason, the hunting lodge rises in my mind. I remember Zarek in the stables, drunk and idiotic, screaming about leaving. And then trembling in my arms in a pile of hay, begging me not to let him go.
I come to my feet slowly. Zarek straightens as I walk to the window, his dark eyes watching my reflection in the glass as the sky turns gray with the approaching dawn.
He’s panting, his breath coming in fast little gulps.
I stop just behind him, wondering if I should reach for him. If he would want my touch.
No, probably not. He’s angry with me, isn’t he?
Elrick’s words whisper through my mind. Lilias, that man is a walking disaster. My hands sink into my dress, holding the fabric tight.
“I’m not leaving,” I say again, in a voice that’s almost a whisper. “I won’t. Not if it’s going to put Elrick and everyone with him at risk.”
Zarek’s eyes close and his reflection trembles. His breath comes in sharp little gasps.
“I know,” he says, his voice low and tight.
Above him, the first pale pink streaks of dawn begin to spread across the sky.
“I’m sorry,” Zarek whispers, although his voice is so soft that I wonder if I imagined it.
And then, slowly, almost elegantly, the snake of Vsenrog falls to the floor.