“What are you doing here?” Rian snarled.
For a moment, all I could do was gape at him as my ears popped, as a shiver pulled over my skin, as horror rooted in my heart. Tristan had completely disintegrated, leaving me behind to mend this disaster.
“I . . . I am sorry,” I panted, pulling my shawl tighter about my shoulders. “I was exploring and I—”
“Who were you exploring with?”
I swallowed, the suspicions in his dark gaze piercing me. “One of the musicians. We thought it would be nice to see a castle view.”
“You don’t have castles in Valenia?”
I stared at Rian, trying not to flinch when he stepped closer to me.
“Why don’t you and I wait together for your friend to arrive,” he murmured, tilting his head to the side as his eyes roamed over me.
I wanted to turn and flee. I almost did, my right foot beginning to slide on the stone floor when Rian moved to purposely block the path to the door.
“This will give us a good chance to get to know each other,” he continued, crossing his arms. “Because ever since you arrived here, my father has been all out of sorts.”
“Wh-what?” My pulse was wild, pounding like a drum in my ears.
“You heard me, Amadine Jourdain.”
I took a step back, to put some space between us. The parapet wall jarred into my back, the mortar picking at my dress.
“Why have you come here?” Rian questioned.
Before the words could crumble in my throat, I said, “I came here for MacQuinn.”
He smiled down at me—we were close to the same height, and yet I felt small in his shadow. It was evident my fear was like wine to him.
“Let’s play a little game.” He withdrew a sheathed dirk from his belt.
“I don’t want to play,” I rasped and tried to slip away.
His arm extended, his hand resting on the wall to keep me standing before him. “I’m not going to hurt you . . . unless you lie. In fact, we’ll play the game equally. If I lie, you get to wield the blade. But if you lie . . .”
I stared at him. I thought of what Jourdain had said to me, just before I departed Valenia. And I told myself to be brave, that Rian was fueling off my fears and helplessness. “Fine, but my friend will arrive any moment. . . .”
“We get three questions each,” he all but spoke over me, flicking the end of the blade. “I’ll go first.” He set the point of his dirk at my throat. I didn’t dare move, breathe, as the steel hovered over my pulse. “If you are a passion of knowledge, where is your fancy cloak?”
I swallowed, fear wedging in my throat like splintered bone. “My cloak was burned in a house fire a month ago. My mistress is currently having it replicated.”
I waited, praying he would believe me. He clearly enjoyed making me worry and suffer, but eventually he lowered the blade and gave it to me. I didn’t want to hold a dirk to him; I didn’t want to stoop to his level of cruelty. And yet I thought of what might have happened to my mother. I took the point of the blade and aimed at his crotch.
Rian glanced down at it and smirked. “You’re a vicious little thing, aren’t you?”
“Why do you feel threatened by a woman?” The question flowed like fire from my mouth, anger curling the words.
His eyes sharpened over mine; his smirk shifted into a sinister expression. “I do not feel threatened by a woman. I question one who would come and appeal for a known traitor and coward.”
He didn’t give me time to weigh his response, to test if he was lying. He swiped the blade from me and pressed it against the bodice of my dress, just below my right breast. He was one inch from pointing it at the Stone of Eventide, which began to hum within my corset, as if the stone were waking with ire.
“The dark-haired musician,” Rian snarled. “What’s her name? Merei, I think. You know her. You knew her before you arrived here. How?”
Sweat began to trace down my back as my mind whirled, trying to weave a plausible lie. My hesitation fanned his contempt. He began to press the blade deeper; I felt the outer layer of my gown tear, my corset bend . . .
“There is camaraderie in passion, in sisterhood,” I answered hoarsely. “This is something I do not expect you to understand, but there are binds between anyone who wears the cloak, even among strangers.”
He paused, his eyes cold as they traced the lines of my face. I thought he believed my answer. I was about to extend my hand for the dirk when he shoved the blade into me.
My body went rigid, stiff with the sudden flare of pain in my side. And then came the terror as I acknowledged that he had stabbed me, that a dirk was embedded in my flesh.
“No, Amadine,” Rian whispered bitterly. “That’s a lie.” And he withdrew the blade from me, so quickly that I staggered, sinking to my knees. “You lose.”
My fingers curled into the stone floor, trying to find something to anchor me, to give me courage to face him. I was violently trembling when he knelt in front of me, when his fingers brushed the hair away from my face. The sensation of his skin touching mine made me want to retch.
“Let me give you some advice, little Valenian lass,” he said, wiping my blood off the dirk before sheathing it back into its scabbard. “If you have come here for one like MacQuinn, if you plan to do something foolish . . . you had better have all your lies figured out. Because King Lannon is a hound when it comes to falsehood. And that wound in your side? That is only a foretaste of what he will do to you if you lie. So you can thank me for the warning.”
Rian stood. I felt a cold whisper of air, heard the howling of the wind as he moved to leave the parapet walk. I was still on my hands and knees when he turned and said, “If my father finds out about this lesson, I can promise you that your little musician friend will pay for it. Good night, Amadine.”
The door closed.
Alone, I began to gulp in air, trying to sear my distress before the shock overcame me, before I lost my composure. I slowly sat back on my heels, my eyes clenched shut. I didn’t want to look; I didn’t want to see what he had done to me. I wanted to melt and vanish; I wanted to go home, but I didn’t even know where home was.
The stone was growing warmer against my stomach, so warm I realized it might burn me through the wooden locket, as if it were angry for me, for what had been done to me. I opened my eyes and glanced down to my bodice.
My blood was trickling down the pale blue of my gown and kirtle, dark as ink in the moonlight. He had stabbed me just below my breast, within my rib cage. I numbly tried to examine my puncture—how deep had the dirk gone into me?—but the layers of my dress . . . I couldn’t access anything, only feel the pain begin to gradually ease as the shock overcame me.
I took my shawl and tied it around my middle, to conceal the blood.
I hurried back inside, down the corridor, down two flights of stairs. I could feel the blood flowing, leaving me. I could feel my panic gnaw around my mind as I held it together, long enough to pass my guard and slip into my chamber.
I locked the door. I tore away the shawl.
My blood was bright red in the firelight.
I stumbled to the tapestry, snagging a candelabra on my way. Into the dark I went. The inner passageway felt like I was roaming the endless bowels of a beast. I went from door to door, my head becoming fuzzy, the shadows whispering and nipping at my dress as I searched for the symbol for Cartier’s room.
I could hardly remain upright, my heart thundering in my ears, my feet tripping over themselves. But like the night before, his door appeared to me just before I gave up, just before I melted to the floor.
The winged weasel flickered with blessing in my candlelight as I opened the inner door, as I pushed against the tapestry.
He was sitting at his desk, writing. My unexpected entrance startled him; he jerked, his quill streaking across the parchment as I came to stand in the heart of his room.
“Brienna?”
The sound of my name, the sound of his voice, was my undoing. I took my hand from my wound, my blood dripping from my fingers onto the rug.
“Cartier,” I whispered just before I collapsed.