Defy the night.pdf

ALSO BY BRIGID KEMMERER Letters to the Lost More an We Can Tell Call It What You Want A Curse So Dark and Lonely A Heart So Fierce and Broken A Vow So Bold and Deadly Storm Spark Spirit Secret Sacri ce icker an Water For Mrs. Pat Bettridge and Mrs. Nancy Vaughan. Two amazing teachers who showed me just how powerful the written word can be. THE POLITICAL LEADERS OF KANDALA NAME ROLE SECTOR King Harristan King Royal Prince Corrick King’s Royal Justice Barnard (deceased) Consul Trader’s Montague Landing* Allisander Sallister Consul Moonlight Plains Leander Cra Consul Steel City Jonas Beeching Consul Artis Lissa Marpetta Consul Emberridge Roydan Pelham Consul e Sorrowlands Arella Cherry Consul Sunkeep Jasper Gold Consul Mosswell *Sometimes called “Traitor’s Landing” aer the former king and queen were assassinated by Consul Montague, leaving Harristan and his younger brother, Corrick, in power. THE OUTLAWS NAME ROLE Tessa Cade Apothecary Weston Lark Steelworker Lochlan Rebel e Benefactors Unknown THE CURE e only known cure for the fever is an elixir created from dried Moon ower petals, a plant native only to two sectors: Moonlight Plains and Emberridge. Moon ower petals are strictly rationed among sectors, and quantities are limited. ose with means can purchase their own supply. ose without, cannot. CHAPTER ONE Tessa The hardest part of this job isn’t the stealing. It’s the escaping. At best, it takes me two minutes to scale the wall out of the Royal Sector, but the night is cold, and my ngers are starting to go numb. Dawn is only an hour oﬀ, and sentry spotlights slide along the high stone walls at irregular intervals. I clutch my father’s old apothecary pack tight under my arm, clinging to the darkness, waiting for an opportunity. Several of the sectors have electricity in the wealthy areas, or so I’ve heard, but the spotlights here are brighter than any candle has ever been—even brighter than the bon res the towns light to burn their dead. e rst time I saw them, I stared like a fool until I realized those lights meant danger. I spent days trying to gure out some kind of pattern to the surveillance, until I admitted that to Weston. He snorted and said there was no pattern, just bored men spinning a light around a pole. ey’ve been spinning this light pretty steadily for the last hour. I ex my ngers and mentally adjust my estimate to three minutes—then bite my lip and think. e light has been returning to this section of wall at least every two. Wes is probably at the workshop already, waiting. He can scale the stone wall in half a minute. anks to his height, he can leap, catch the high spires with his treble hook, then brace against the wall to bounce to the top like a cat. I’d be jealous, but it’s kind of entrancing to watch. Not that I’d ever tell him. I’d never hear the end of it. Entrancing, Tessa? It’s just a wall. Nothing like this. And then he’d climb a tree or do a cartwheel oﬀ the workshop roof or walk on his hands. And then I’d have to punch him, because that would be better than him seeing the blush creeping out from under my mask, because yes, all of that is equally entrancing. I need to stop thinking about Wes. is sentry light needs to stop spinning. I need to make my rounds, or we’ll lose days of healing. Some people don’t have days. A few might not even have hours. I have to get out of here rst. If I’m caught with a pack full of Moon ower petals, King Harristan and his brother, Prince Corrick, will tie me down in the palace gardens and let the birds peck out my organs. Suddenly, the light stops, way down near the corner where the wall dips into shadow because of a slope. It’s where the amateurs always try to make their escape. I’m not going to waste an opportunity. I tear out of my hiding place like a rabbit scared from a glen, my own treble hook already swinging. I can’t ing it all the way to the spires like Wes can, but I can reach the brackets that sit midway. e hook whistles up at the wall ahead of me, and I leap before it pulls taut. My boots scrape against the stone as I climb, slipping a little on the granite. I reach the bracket, the tiniest little ledge, but it’s enough to brace against while I pull the treble hook free and swing for the top. It clangs onto the spires, and up I go. e light begins to move. I suck in a breath and urge my feet to push me faster, higher. e pack bounces against my ribs as my feet slip and shi against the wall. My hands are burning where the rope slides. e light sweeps close, and it’s suddenly blinding. en I’m over the wall, half rappelling, half dropping to the forest ground like a sack of oats. I give the rope a jerk and the hook falls beside me, a little jingle in the gravel at the base of the wall. Dirt and debris cling to the homespun wool of my skirts, but I don’t dare move to brush it away. I can almost taste my heartbeat as I hold my breath and wait for the sentries to ring the alarm. But no. Brightness glides along the edge as the light continues on its path. I swallow my heart and wind up my hook. A crescent moon hangs high in the sky, but the barest hint of purple gleams at the horizon, a reminder that I hesitated too long, and time grows short. I slip through the forest with practiced ease, my feet silent on the fallen pine needles. I usually smell re from the woodstove by now, because Wes always beats me back. We have a system: he starts the kettle and grinds the petals so we can make the elixir, while I weigh and divide the powder into the appropriate dosage. en he bottles the liquid as it’s ready, I wrap it into our packs, and together we make our rounds. But today, there’s no smell of wood smoke. I get to the workshop, and there’s no Weston. I think of that light stopping on the wall. My heart is in my throat again. Wes isn’t stupid. He wouldn’t try the corner. I didn’t hear an alarm anyway. But he’s still not here, and I’m already late. I light the re and try not to worry. I can hear his voice telling me to keep calm. Mind your mettle, Tessa. ey’re the rst words he said to me on the night he saved my life, and he’s said them a dozen times since. He’s ne. He has to be ne. Sometimes we can’t meet at all, and one of us waits at the workshop for een minutes before running solo. Mistress Solomon occasionally keeps me late, brewing and measuring and weighing the herbal remedies that she promises her customers will work—but they rarely do. Sometimes Weston’s master needs him at the forge early, because some spoiled sportsman needs a new sword or a horse has thrown a shoe. It’s happened before. But Wes was here earlier. And he’s always back rst. e workshop is tiny and warms quickly from the re. ere’s no electricity out here, so the workshop is dim, but I don’t need much light for this. I busy my hands to keep from worry, grinding each petal into dust, careful to scrape every speck onto the tray of my scale. Even dry, they’re fragrant. e elites pay dearly for every fraction of an ounce, then waste it by drinking the elixir three times a day, even those who show no signs of disease. Preventive measures, the king calls it. Once a day is usually plenty, and I have my notes to prove it. Even Wes was distributing too much in the beginning, until I showed him that we could help far more people with less. My father would have called it a waste. A waste of good treatment when those who can’t aﬀord it are dying. en again, my father was executed for treason and smuggling, so I don’t call it anything at all. I just do what I can. I glance out the window. e purple horizon has taken on the faintest hint of pink. I glance at the door, as if that will make Wes appear. It doesn’t. e kettle whistles. I divide the water into tiny measured cups and add half an ounce of ground petals to each, along with two drops of roseseed oil for the cough, which I measure out almost as carefully as the Moon ower petals themselves. I try not to steal what I can come by honestly, but roseseed nearly costs me a week’s wages, so I don’t even let Wes measure it. Once the petals and roseseed have dissolved, I weigh in a bit of turmeric, which can bring down a fever enough to let the medicine work better, but I have to add a sprig of mint and a pinch of sugar, too. Adults don’t usually need much convincing to swallow the tincture, but we can’t risk wasting it on children who might spit it out. From the Royal Sector, horns blast and shouts cry out, and I jump so hard that I overturn a cup. ey’ve caught someone. Wes. I should run and see. No, I should run and hide. My muscles refuse to do either. Mind your mettle, Tessa. I need to move. I need to nish. When the Moon ower is combined with the other ingredients, the elixir works better— but then they’re only good for a few hours aer brewing. I need to nish our rounds, even if I have to do it alone. e horns continue to blow. Shouting echoes in the distance. ey’re going to wake half the sector. My breath has become a low keening from my throat. I imagine Prince Corrick being called down to deal with the traitor. e sentries aren’t gentle. Weston’s easy smile will be a grimace of pain. I’ll hear his screams from here. ey’ll tear him apart with the tiniest knives imaginable. ey’ll stuﬀ his mouth with burning coals. ey’ll feed him alive to the royal lions. ey’ll burn each limb, one by one, until he loses consciousness from the— “Lord, Tessa, you hardly need me anymore.” I shriek and overturn another cup. ere he is, in the doorway, his blue eyes bright behind the mask, his smile easy. Weston sees the mess I’ve made and rolls his eyes. “Or maybe you do.” He moves forward and sets the cup upright. “Did you already put the powder in that one?” I don’t know if I want to hug him or hit him. Maybe both. “You’re late. I heard the horns. I thought—I thought they caught you.” “Not today.” He pulls the sleeves of petals from his pack, then follows them with three apples, along with a twist of sugared dough that’s still warm from an oven. “Here. e baker was out back scolding his daughter, so I swiped you some food.” He was late because he brought me breakfast. Not just any breakfast either. Food from the Royal Sector will be the nest imaginable. e apples will be injected with honey, the twists of dough made with real butter and laced with cream and sugar. My mouth opens. Closes. I frown and turn away. My throat is tight for an entirely new reason. “at’s very kind of you, Weston.” “ ‘at’s very kind of you’?” he scoﬀs. “My, aren’t we feeling proper this morning.” “I need to nish the elixirs.” “I’ll nish. You eat.” “I’ll eat in a minute.” e horns continue on the other side of the wall, but now I can ignore them. Probably another smuggler. We’ll likely see his skin suspended beside the gates tomorrow, aer the king and his brother are done with the body. “Fine.” Weston takes an apple, kicks back in the only chair, and props his booted feet up on the worktable. He wears a wide-brimmed black hat above the mask that stretches over his eyes, but he tips the hat back now that we’re in the workshop. I only ever see him by relight, so I can’t tell exactly what color his hair is, but he usually needs a shave by now, and the faint beard growth always seems reddish brown when he sits near a candle, matching the dusting of freckles near the edge of his mask. e skin around his eyes is smudged with kohl or soot, making the blue brighter than any eyes I’ve ever seen. My own eyes are hazel green, my brown hair in a tight braid under my cap. Wes always says I look like a cat in my mask and my black jacket. Once, when I was feeling brave and cocky, I told him he should see me without the disguise so he knows what a proper young woman looks like, but his face went grave. “Never,” he said. “It’s too dangerous. If we know what the other looks like, the information can be gained under torture. I won’t do that to you.” He paused. “And I sure don’t want you to do it to me.” at was the rst time I realized that Weston Lark probably isn’t his real name. He likely assumes Tessa Cade is fake, too, but it’s not. When we met two years ago, my parents had just been killed in front of me, and I was too racked with grief to come up with another name. “You’re quiet,” says Wes. He loudly crunches the apple, and I want to smack it out of his hand. “What’s wrong?” “Nothing.” I bottle the elixir I’ve already made—usually his job—and pour new cups of water to begin the process again. Behind me, I hear him shi out of the chair and stand. He comes close enough for me to catch his scent, like the woods and the cinnamon from the bakery—but also something heavier underneath, something unmistakably Wes. “Tessa.” I jab an elbow into his midsection, and I have the satisfaction of hearing him grunt. “What was that for?” he demands. “You made me worry.” “But I brought you breakfast.” His voice is rich and deep behind me. I ignore him. He leans in until his breath brushes against the sliver of skin between my hair and the high neck of my jacket. e other apple appears in front of me, wrapped up in his long ngers. “It’s a really good breakfast,” he taunts. I take the apple. Sugar dusts the skin. It’s warm to the touch, and I wonder if the honey inside is warm, too. Despite myself, I take a bite. e honey is warm. “I hate you,” I say with my mouth full. “at’ll probably work out for the best.” He icks my hat up a few inches and grins. “Now eat quick,” he says. “We have rounds to make.” CHAPTER TWO Corrick I’ve been listening to my brother’s breathing for hours. ere’s a new sound each time he inhales, a faint stuttering in his lungs. In the Wilds, they call it the death rattle, because it means the end is near. Here in his chambers, I’m unwilling to use the word death at all. I’m unwilling to even think it. He doesn’t have a fever. ere’s no cause to worry. I can’t even convince myself. Sunlight blazes through the open window, and birds trill in the trees. Harristan shouldn’t be sleeping this late, but I hate to wake him. To everyone outside the doors to his rooms, we’ve been deliberating over paperwork all morning. I’ve called for food twice, enough to feed a dozen people, but most of it sits untouched. Flies have begun gathering on the sliced fruit, and a bee drones over the pastries. Harristan coughs faintly, and his breathing eases. Maybe that’s all it was, a tickle in his throat. A tightness in my own chest loosens, and I run a hand across the back of my neck, nding it damp. A faint breeze nudges at my papers with enough insistence that I tuck most of them under the weight of the lamp before they can scatter across the desk. One of us has to work. I’ve been making notes along the margins of a funding request from one of the eastern cities, looking for omissions and inaccuracies in their statement demonstrating the need for a new bridge. I expected to get through only a few pages before Harristan would wake up, but now I’ve gone through the entire report and it must be nearly midday. I tug my pocket watch free and glance at the glittering diamonds embedded in its face. It is midday. If he doesn’t appear at the meeting of the sector consuls, there will be talk. I can only silence so much. As if my thoughts wake him, my brother stirs, blinking in the sunlight. He frowns at me and sits up, shirtless, then runs a hand down his face. “It’s late. Why didn’t you wake me?” I listen to his voice carefully, but there’s no roughness to his tone, no sign of any diﬃculty breathing. Maybe I imagined it. “I was just about to.” I move to the sideboard and li the kettle. “e tea has gone cold.” I pour a cup anyway and carry it to him, along with a thin corked tube of Moon ower elixir that’s darker than usual. e palace apothecary doubled his dosage last week when the coughing started again, so maybe the medicine is beginning to work. Harristan uncorks the tube, drinks it, and makes a face. “ere, there,” I say without a lick of sympathy. He grins. at’s something he only does when we’re alone. Neither of us smiles outside these rooms very oen. “What have you been doing all morning?” “I went through the request from Artis. I’ve draed a refusal for you to sign.” His expression turns serious. “A refusal?” “ey’re asking for twice what a new bridge would cost. ey hid it well, but someone got greedy.” “You hardly need me anymore.” e words are said lightly, but they hit me like an arrow. Kandala needs its king. I need my brother. I lock away my worries and fold my arms. “You need to dress —and shave. I’ll call for Geoﬀrey. I’ve said we were too busy for you to bother earlier. Quint has requested an audience with you twice, but he will need to wait until aer the evening meal, unless—” “Cory.” His voice is so, and I go still. He only ever calls me Cory when we’re alone, one of the few reminders of childhood we have le. A nickname from when I was small and eager and trailing aer him everywhere he went. A name that was once spoken in gentle fondness by our mother or encouraging praise by our father, back when we believed our family was beloved by all. Back before anyone knew about the fever, or the Moon ower, or the way our country would change in ways no one expected. Back when everyone expected Harristan to have decades before he’d take the throne, that he’d rule with rm kindness and thoughtful care for his people, just as our parents did. But four years ago, they were assassinated right in front of us. Shot through the throat in the throne room. e arrows pinned them upright, their heads hanging cockeyed, their eyes wide and glassy as they choked on their own blood. e image still haunts my dreams sometimes. Harristan was nineteen. I was een. He took an arrow in the shoulder when he dove to cover me. It should have been the other way around. I stare back into his blue eyes and look for any sign of sickness. ere is none. “What?” “e medicine is working again.” His voice is quiet. “You don’t need to play nursemaid.” My smile feels a little wicked. “Cruel Cory playing nursemaid? Never.” He rolls his eyes. “No one calls you Cruel Cory.” “Not to my face.” No, to my face, I’m Your Highness, or Prince Corrick, or sometimes, when they’re being especially formal, the King’s Justice. Behind my back, I’m called worse. Much worse. So is Harristan. We don’t mind. Our parents were loved—and they were loving in return. It led to betrayal and death. Fear works better. I move to the closet and pull out a laced shirt to toss at my brother. “You don’t want a nursemaid? en stop lazing around. ere’s a country to run.” e midday meal is already arranged on the sideboard when we enter. Roasted pheasant drips with honey and berries, nestled among a dense bed of greens and root vegetables. A few feathers have been artfully placed along the gilded edge of each platter, held in place by a glistening drop of crystalized honey. ough the stewards stand in silence along the wall, waiting to serve, the eight other Royal Consuls are engaged in lively conversation by the window. I’m the ninth, but I have no interest in lively conversation. ere used to be ten, but Consul Barnard led the plot to have my parents killed. He would have killed us, too. Aer Harristan saved my life, I saw Barnard coming aer him with a dagger. My brother was on top of me, his breath panicked and full of pain in my ear. I pulled that arrow out of Harristan’s shoulder and stabbed it right into Barnard’s neck. I blink the memory away. e consuls fall silent when we enter the room, each oﬀering a short bow to my brother before moving to their chairs, though no one will sit until Harristan does, and no one will eat until we both have taken a bite. e table is shaped like a rectangle at one end, narrowing to a point at the other, like the head of an arrow. Harristan eases into his chair at the head of the table, and I ease into mine, directly to his right. e eight consuls ease into theirs, leaving one seat empty. It’s the one directly beside me, where Consul Barnard used to sit. e Trader’s Landing sector has no new consul, and Harristan is in no rush to appoint one. In whispers, the people oen call it Traitor’s Landing, aer what Barnard did, but no one says it in front of us. No one wants to remind the king or his brother of what happened. ey respect my brother—as they should. ey fear me. I don’t mind. It spares me some tedious conversations. We’ve known everyone in this room for our entire lives, but we’ve long since doused any comfort born of familiarity. We saw what complacence and trust did to our parents, and we know what it could do to us. When Harristan was nineteen, blood still seeping through a bandage on his shoulder, he ran his rst meeting in this room. We were both numb with grief and shock, but I followed him to take a place standing by his shoulder. I remember thinking the consuls would be sympathetic and compassionate following the deaths of our parents. I remember thinking we would all grieve together. But we were barely in the room for a full minute before Consul eadosia snidely commented that a child had no place attending a meeting of the King’s Council. She was talking about me—but her tone implied she was talking about Harristan, too. “is child,” said Harristan, “is my brother, your prince.” His voice was like thunder. I’d never heard my brother’s voice like that. It gave me the strength to stand when I so badly wanted to hide under my bed and pretend my world hadn’t been turned upside down. “Corrick saved my life,” said Harristan. “e life of your new king. He risked himself when none of you were willing to do the same, including you, eadosia. I have named him King’s Justice, and he will attend any meeting he so pleases.” I went very still at those words. e King’s Justice was the highest-ranking adviser to the king. e highest position beside Harristan himself. Our father once said that he was allowed to stay in the people’s good graces because the King’s Justice handled anything … unsavory. Another consul at the time, a man named Talec, coughed to cover a laugh and said, “Corrick will be the King’s Justice? At een?” “Was I unclear?” said Harristan. “Exactly what justice will he mete out? No dinner? No playtime for Kandala’s criminals?” “We must be strong,” said eadosia, her voice full of scorn. “You dishonor your parents. is is no time for Kandala’s rulers to be a source of mockery.” You dishonor your parents. e words turned my insides to ice. Our parents were killed because the council failed to uncover a traitor. “He looks like he’s ready to cry,” said Talec, “and you expect to hold your throne with him at your side?” I was ready to cry. But aer their statements, I was terri ed to show one single icker of weakness. My parents were killed by someone they trusted, and we couldn’t allow the same to happen to us. “No dinner and no playtime,” I said, and because Harristan sounded so unyielding, I forced my voice to be the same. I felt like I was playing a role for which I’d had no time to rehearse. “You will spend thirty days in the harvest elds. You are to fast from midday until the next morning.” ere was absolute silence for a moment, and then eadosia and Talec exploded out of their seats. “is is preposterous!” they cried. “You can’t assign us to work in the elds with the laborers.” “You asked for a demonstration of my justice,” I said. “Be sure to work quickly. I have heard the foremen carry whips.” Talec’s eyes were like re. “You’re both children. You’ll never hold this throne.” “Guards,” I said atly. I remember worrying that the guards would not obey, that the council would overthrow us both. at we would dishonor our parents. Aer what Barnard had done, every face seemed to hide a secret motive that would lead to our deaths. But then the guards stepped forward and took hold of Talec and eadosia. e doors swung closed behind them, leaving the room in absolute silence. Every pair of eyes around the table sat wide and staring at my brother. Harristan gestured at the seat to his right—the seat just vacated by Talec. “Prince Corrick. Take a seat.” I did. No one else dared to say a word. Harristan has held on to his throne for four years. We’re later than usual today, and the food is likely going cool, but he’s in no rush to eat. When my father ran meetings, there was a sense of jovial ease around this table, but that’s always been lacking during Harristan’s reign. He glances at me. “You have the response for Artis?” I place a leather folio on the table before him, along with a fountain pen. He makes a show of reviewing the document, though he’d probably sign a letter authorizing his own execution if I placed it in front of him. Harristan has little patience for lengthy legal documents. He’s all about grand plans and the broad view. I’m the one who dwells in details. He signs with a little ourish, lays the pen to the side, and shoves the folio down the table to Jonas Beeching, an older man with a girth as round as he is tall. I guarantee he’s dying to eat, but he eagerly ips open the cover. He’s expecting a positive response, I can tell. He’s practically salivating at the idea of bringing chests full of gold back to Artis this aernoon. His face falls when he reads the refusal I draed. “Your Majesty,” he says carefully to Harristan. “is bridge would reduce the travel time from Artis to the Royal Sector by three days.” “It should also cost half as much,” I say. “But—but my engineers have spent months on this proposal.” He glances around the table, then back at us. “Surely you could not make a determination in less than a day—” “Your engineers are wrong,” I say. “Perhaps we can come to some sort of compromise. ere— there must be an error in calculation—” “Do you seek a compromise, or do you suspect an error?” says Harristan. “I—” Jonas’s mouth hangs open. He hesitates, and his voice turns rough. “Both, Your Majesty.” He pauses. “Artis has lost many lives to the fever.” At the mention of the fever, I want to look at Harristan. I want to reassure myself that he’s ne. at the rattle in his breathing this morning was all in my imagination. I steel my will and keep my eyes on Jonas. “Artis receives a ration of Moon ower petals, just like the other sectors. If your people need more, they will need to buy it just like anyone else.” “I know. I know.” Jonas clears his throat. “It seems the warm weather is causing the fever to spread more quickly among the dockworkers. We are having diﬃculty keeping ships loaded and staﬀed. is bridge would reduce our reliance on the waterways and allow us to rebuild some of the trade that has been lost.” “en you should have asked for an appropriate amount of gold,” I say. “Artis can’t build a bridge without healthy workers,” says Arella Cherry, who sits at the opposite end of the table. She took over for her father when he retired last year. She’s from Sunkeep, a sector far in the south that’s bordered by the Flaming River on the west and the ocean to the south and east. Her people fare the best from the fevers, and it’s thought that Sunkeep’s high heat and humidity make them less susceptible —but the heat is so oppressive that their population is by far the smallest of any of Kandala’s sectors. She’s so-spoken, with rich russet-brown skin and waist-length black hair that she keeps twisted into a looping knot at the back of her head. “Medicine should factor into their proposal.” “Every city needs healthy workers for all projects,” says Harristan. “Which is why each city receives a ration of medicine for their people. Including yours, Arella.” “Yes, Your Majesty,” she says. “And my people fare well because of it.” She pauses. “But my people are not attempting to construct a bridge across the Queen’s River in the dead heat of summer.” Her voice is quiet and deferential, but there’s a core of steel beneath her gentle voice and so hands. If she had her way, Harristan would seize Allisander’s lands along with everyone else’s, and he’d distribute Moon ower petals with abandon. We’d also be thrust into a full-on civil war when the other consuls refused to yield their territories, but she’s never keen to acknowledge that side of things. at said, she’s one of the few people at this table I enjoy a bit of conversation with. Unfortunately, the last woman who weaseled her way into my thoughts also tried to poison me and Harristan at dinner. It wasn’t the rst assassination attempt, but it was de nitely the closest anyone has gotten since our parents were killed. So romance is oﬀ the table for me. Allisander Sallister clears his throat. He sits almost directly opposite me, and his face is pale, with pink spots over his cheeks that look painted on. His hair and brows are both thick and brown, and he wears a goatee that he’s clearly enamored of, but I think looks ridiculous. He’s only a year younger than Harristan, and they were friends when they were boys. My brother had few companions when we were children, but Allisander was one of the few who had the patience to sit in the library and move chess pieces around a board or listen to tutors read from books of poetry. But then, when they were teens, Allisander’s father, Nathaniel Sallister, requested additional lands from a neighboring sector, claiming his farmlands yielded better crops —and would therefore yield better pro ts, and greater taxes for the Crown. Our father, the king, refused. Allisander then made a plea to Harristan, leaning on their friendship, asking him to intercede on the Sallisters’ behalf—and still, our father, a fair and just man, refused. “We cannot force one sector to yield lands to another,” he said to us over dinner. “Our lands were divided by law, and we will not unjustly take from one to give to another.” He made Harristan reject Allisander’s request personally. Publicly. At a dinner with all the consuls present. In retrospect, I think Father meant to send a message, that it was unfair to seek favoritism through his children, and he wouldn’t play those kinds of games. But Allisander took it personally. We didn’t see him in the palace much aer that. Not until last year, when his silver-hoarding father stepped down. Harristan had hoped Allisander would be a new voice for his sector, the key to distributing more of the Moon ower petals among the population. Instead, he’s worse than his father was. Under Nathaniel Sallister, Moon ower prices were expensive, but stable. Allisander never misses a chance to negotiate for more. Harristan doesn’t like to think that their controversy as teenagers would have anything to do with the way Allisander barters now, but I have no doubt. I spend a lot of time at these meetings imagining ways to irritate him. “A new bridge along with extra medicinal rations would give Artis an unfair advantage at trade,” Allisander says. “An unfair advantage!” Jonas sputters. “You and Lissa control the Moon ower, and you want to accuse me of seeking an unfair advantage?” Allisander steeples his ngers and says nothing. Jonas isn’t wrong. Allisander Sallister represents the Moonlight Plains, and Lissa Marpetta represents Emberridge— the two sectors where the Moon ower, the only known treatment for the fevers that plague Kandala, grows. erefore the richest sectors. e most powerful. Also, the reason all my imagined irritants for Allisander stay in my head. I can hate him and need him as an ally at the same time. “Regardless of advantage,” I say, “your motives in your proposal were deceitful, Jonas.” Allisander glances across the table at me and gives a small nod of appreciation. I nod in return. I want to throw the fountain pen at him. Roydan Pelham clears his throat from the other end of the table. He’s pushing eighty, with weathered skin that can’t seem to decide if it’s more beige or more sallow. He’s served on this council since my grandfather was king. Most of the others seem to grudgingly tolerate him, but I rather like the old man. He’s set in his ways, but he’s also the only consul who seemed genuinely concerned for us aer our parents were killed. No one dotes on Harristan—or me, for that matter—but if anyone could be considered doting, it would be Roydan. “My people suﬀer as greatly as Artis’s,” he says quietly. “If you grant this petition, I will seek the same.” “You have no river to cross!” says Jonas. “Indeed,” says Roydan. “But my people are just as sick.” My brain wants to dri. is is a common argument. If the proposal from Artis hadn’t started it, something else would have. e fever has no cure. Our people are suﬀering. Allisander and Lissa won’t yield the power and control granted to them by their lands and holdings—and as much as Harristan would love to be able to seize their properties, the other consuls would never stand for it. Harristan lets them argue for a few minutes. He’s more patient than I am. Or maybe he’s just better rested. I did let him sleep till noon, when I’ve been up longer than the sun. Eventually, my brother shis his weight and inhales, and that’s all it takes for them to shut up. “Your petition was rejected,” Harristan says to Jonas. “You are free to le another before we convene next month.” e man sucks in a breath like he wants to argue, but his eyes ick to me, and his mouth claps shut. My brother’s temper has a limit, and no one here wants to nd it. “When your people are suﬀering,” Arella says fearlessly, “it would not be inappropriate for the Crown to help make them well.” Harristan looks down the table at her. “At what cost? All of Kandala is suﬀering. e supply of Moon ower petals is not endless. How would you choose, Arella? Would you sacri ce your doses? Your family’s?” She swallows. She wouldn’t. None of them would. I think of Harristan’s cough this morning, of his fever last month, and I can’t even blame them. I wouldn’t either. “We will dine now,” says Harristan, and the silent attendants shi away from the wall to begin serving the food. For a short while, the only sound in the room is the clatter of silver against china. But under it all, I catch the low hiss of Jonas’s voice, spoken under his breath to Jasper Gold, the consul from Mosswell. “ey’re heartless,” he says. I freeze. From the corner of my eye, I see Harristan’s fork go still as well. It might be a coincidence. I wait to see if he’ll acknowledge the words. He doesn’t. And because I’m not heartless, I don’t either. CHAPTER THREE Tessa On a good day, Weston and I can make over a hundred deliveries of the elixir. I once thought we’d be better oﬀ making our rounds separately, because we could hit twice as many families, but Wes insists that one of us should always stand as lookout—and honestly, the stoppered vials get so heavy that I doubt I could carry enough for one hundred homes by myself. Some days it feels impossible. ousands are suﬀering. Possibly tens of thousands. We hardly make a dent—and sometimes we’re too late, or we can’t steal enough, or someone falls ill so quickly that the medicine refuses to work. ose are the worst, when someone goes from mild body aches to dead between one visit and the next. Today, we’re able to get started on our rounds quickly, because we built up a good stash of crushed petals yesterday, so we don’t need to waste time thieving. I won’t admit this to Wes, but I’m still a little shaky over the few moments he was late. He’d never let me hear the end of it. As it is, we’re walking through the woods while he whistles under his breath. He probably thinks I don’t know the melody, a bawdy tavern song about a sailor wooing a maiden, but my father used to sing them all the time when he was busy crushing roots and measuring medicines, just because they would make my mother blush and giggle. oughts of my parents still have the power to make my throat tight, so I shove them away and kick at pebbles in the path. “You shouldn’t whistle that song,” I say. “It’s vulgar.” He glances over and knocks the brim of my hat down a few inches. “Love is never vulgar, Tessa.” “Oh, you think it’s a song about love, do you?” “Well, I’m certain the maiden feels something for the sailor. Why else would she be removing her underthings?” Now my cheeks are heated, and I’m glad for the darkness and the mask. I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of hearing me giggle. “You’re incorrigible.” “On the contrary. I am highly corrigible.” He shes an apple from his pack and oﬀers it to me. “Breakfast?” I blink at him. We didn’t have time to go into the Royal Sector this morning. I don’t like the thought of Wes going without my knowledge. Some days I wonder what I would do if he simply … vanished. I shouldn’t be so attached. I know I shouldn’t. But since my parents were executed, the only constant in my life has been Wes. e thought of fate yanking him away, too … I almost can’t bear it. He must be able to read my expression in the forest shadows, because he says, “I saved one from yesterday.” “Oh.” I hesitate. My stomach is still empty, but men who work in the forges don’t get a lot of opportunities to eat, and I’m sure Wes is no diﬀerent. “No—you have it.” He doesn’t argue, and he bites into it, his crunching loud in the early morning air. “You sure?” he says, holding it out. “e honey’s gone cold, but it’s still sweet.” When I hesitate again, he picks up my hand and presses the fruit into it. “Lord, Tessa. Just share the apple.” His ngers are warm against mine, and I try not to think about the fact that his lips were just against this piece of fruit. I twist it to bite at a diﬀerent spot. He starts whistling that stupid drinking song again. I roll my eyes and take a second bite. Many of the sectors in Kandala have open borders, with the exception of three: the Royal Sector, where the king and his brother and all of the elites live, plus Moonlight Plains and Emberridge, where the Moon ower grows. ose sectors are heavily guarded and walled oﬀ, and also boast the healthiest— and wealthiest—populations. e Royal Sector sits in the center of Kandala, though, bordered by ve others. Mosswell sits to the north, which is mostly livestock and produce. Artis is east, known for its massive lumber trade because of the proximity to the Queen’s River. e Sorrowlands is a vast sector to the west, composed mostly of desert. South of the Royal Sector are Steel City, home to metalworkers and machinists thanks to its proximity to the iron mines, and Trader’s Landing, which has a bustling market that runs parallel to the Flaming River for miles. It’s sometimes called Traitor’s Landing, ever since their chief consul killed the king and queen. e lands immediately surrounding the Royal Sector are heavily wooded and diﬃcult to travel, dense with underbrush and brambles and thorns—the best place for our workshop, especially since it’s far from the main gates, and our little wood re never makes much smoke. Beyond the woods are the lands where most of the sectors come together to surround the Royal Sector like spokes on a wheel. e area is densely populated because of the closeness to the Royal Sector—and it’s also dense with poverty, illness, and armed guards watching for smugglers and troublemakers. My father used to say that the royal elites would sneer and call these lands the Wilds, a slur against the people forced to live and work there. But the people claimed the name for their own, and now living in the Wilds is almost seen as a point of pride, where sector borders are blurred and the people all feel united by desperation. We always start in the Steel City part of the Wilds, because it’s closest to our workshop, and I think Wes is less worried about getting caught by anyone he might know. We trade lookout at each house, because we can’t just leave the vials and vanish into the night. We wake each person, make sure they drink every drop, then take our vials and leave. Leave no evidence, Wes always says. No proof. e streets are empty and quiet in the early morning darkness, but Wes isn’t whistling now. We slip from house to house in the shadows. At the h house, I step up onto the porch just as a low moan sounds from inside. I hesitate with my hand an inch from the wood. Weston is instantly at my side, appearing out of the darkness. “Tessa. What’s wrong?” e moan sounds again, and he freezes. Mistress Kendall lives here with her son, Gillis. Kendall’s husband died two years ago, but she and Gillis haven’t shown any sign of the fever since, and they were two people I’ve felt we were helping. Gillis is thirteen, and he works as a runner for the forge closest to here. He’s a hard worker, and he oen whispers that he wants to join me and Wes once he’s old enough. We haven’t seen him in a week because his mother said he’s been making early morning runs for supplies—but it means he’s been missing the doses we bring. Wes taps at the door lightly, and for a moment, we hear only silence. en a fractured sob from inside. Wes’s eyes meet mine. I swallow. He closes his ngers around the latch and eases the door open. Kendall is kneeling on the oor in the dark, a body wrapped up in blankets by her knees. She snaps her head up with a gasp. Gillis. I suck in a breath, too. Wes puts a nger to his lips and shakes his head, and I’m not sure if it’s at me or her. Probably both. “Tessa,” Mistress Kendall cries out anyway, half yelp, half sob. “Wes. He’s dying.” Dying. Not dead. Yet. I stride forward and drop to a knee beside her. Gillis’s eyes are closed, and his dark hair is matted with sweat. at’s usually a good sign, meaning the fever has broken, but I think it has more to do with the blankets she’s got wrapped around him. I’m surprised we didn’t hear his breathing from the door. e death rattle in his chest is clear. My own chest tightens. “Can you sit him up?” I whisper. “We brought medicine.” But we’ll be too late. I can see we’ll be too late. He’s not even conscious. ere’s no way he can drink a dose—and little chance it’ll do any good at this point. Kendall nods hurriedly, and Wes meets my eyes. His expression is resigned, but he gets an arm under the boy’s shoulders to help. Gillis’s small body ops lifelessly, his head lolling against Wes’s shoulder. I sh one of the vials out of my pack and pull the cork free. My ngers are trembling. “Gillis,” says Wes, and his voice is very low, very so. “Gillis, open your eyes.” We all hold our breath. Hoping. Praying. Waiting. In the beginning, when the fever began to steal lives, many people believed that it spread through close contact, especially since it seemed to aﬀect those in the Wilds before striking the elites in the Royal Sector. e gates to the Royal Sector were kept locked for weeks. But my father kept records of those who grew ill, and as cases began to appear at random, even among those who closed themselves away, it quickly became apparent that the fevers had nothing to do with close contact. I’ve kept up my father’s books, and there’s no pattern to it. e illness might take one life—or a dozen. It might leave an entire family unscathed—or it might leave a half-dozen bodies waiting for the next funeral pyre. A sob breaks free from Mistress Kendall’s chest again. Just when I’ve begun to give up hope, Gillis coughs hard, then blinks. “Ma?” he croaks. Kendall gasps. “Gillis! Oh, Gillis!” She presses her hands to his cheeks. He blinks again slowly. “Shh,” says Wes. “e night patrol will hear. Tessa?” I take a deep breath for the rst time since we came through the doorway. “Here.” I hold out the vial. “Gillis, you have to drink.” He coughs wetly. “Yes, Miss Tessa.” While Wes helps him drink, I dig through my pack hurriedly, pushing the vials of elixir aside, looking for my bottle of morningwood oil. A few drops will help rouse a drunk or someone with a head injury, but I’ve learned that it will also help the Moon ower elixir work more quickly. Mistress Kendall is kissing his forehead, his cheek, her breath shaking, her hands uttering. “Oh, Gillis,” she whispers against his temple. His hand lis weakly to touch her cheek, but I pull the dropper of morningwood free. “is too,” I whisper. His dry lips part, and I tap three droplets into his mouth. His throat works as he swallows. “ere,” says Wes. He nds Gillis’s hand and gives it a squeeze. “You’ll be slipping through the shadows with us in no time.” Gillis blinks, but then a slow smile nds his mouth. “Promise.” “I promise.” Mistress Kendall presses a kiss to his cheek again, murmuring nonsense, but the love in her tone is pure and clear. I put a hand on her shoulder. She looks at me, tears gathering in her eyes. Gillis coughs, hard, then tries to inhale, but the muscles of his neck stand out as he ghts for air. His ngers dig into Wes’s arm. “Slow,” Wes says, but I can hear the concern underlying his tone. “Slow, Gillis. Breathe.” e boy’s jaw clenches tight, and his back arches, his ngers grasping at nothing. en he ops back against Wes’s shoulder, his entire body limp. Kendall is frozen. I’m frozen. Wes is the one who moves, laying the boy at, pulling the blankets free. He presses two ngers to Gillis’s throat, then drops to put an ear against his chest. Gillis doesn’t move. Wes looks up. His eyes are blue pools of sadness. “No!” Kendall’s voice is a sudden shriek, full of rage and pain and fear that echoes in my own chest. “No!” Somewhere in the distance a dog starts barking. She keeps screaming. “is is their fault! at horrible king or his horrible brother or any of those other horrible people who live on the other side of that wall. I hate them! I hate them! I hate—” Weston grabs her arm and slaps a hand over her mouth. His voice is a low rush of words. “Kendall. Get a hold of yourself.” “Wes,” I whisper. “It’s treason,” he snaps at me. “If the night patrol hears, they’ll kill her, too.” “I don’t care,” she moans. She’s sagging against him. “Let them kill me. Let them see what they’ve done to my boy.” I take a long, shuddering breath. “Kendall—I’m so sorry.” “He was just a boy.” She inhales, then seems to steel herself, and she runs a hand against her son’s face. “It’s their fault, you know.” Rage lls her voice again. “ey sit in there healthy, and they leave the rest of us to live or die.” We’ve heard this a hundred times. We’ll hear it a hundred more. It’s why we do this. Because she’s right. Wes pulls a vial from his bag and holds it out. “You need to take yours, Kendall.” She takes the vial in her shaking hand, and I think she’s going to pull the stopper and drink it, but instead she moves to hurl it into the darkness. I gasp. Always quick, Wes snatches it out of the air before it goes far. “Don’t let your grief make you stupid.” His voice isn’t unkind, but she inches and all but crumples onto her son’s body. “Give it to someone who wants to live. I don’t.” I hesitate, then put a hand over hers. “Kendall,” I whisper. “Kendall, I’m so sorry.” She turns her hand to clasp mine within hers. “You know what it’s like,” she says. “You lost someone, too.” “Yes,” I say. My father. My mother. I’ll never be able to erase the moment of their death from my memory. Unbidden, tears form in my own eyes. “Someone needs to stop them,” says Kendall, her breath shaking. “Someone needs to stop them, Tessa.” “I know,” I say. “For now, we do what we can.” She nods, then lis my hand and kisses my knuckles. “You should drink your medicine,” Wes says gently. “Gillis would want you to.” “Gillis can’t care anymore.” She draws a shuddering breath. “Go. Both of you. Don’t waste your potions on me.” I inhale to refuse, and her face contorts with fury. “Go!” she shouts. “Go! You remind me of him. Go!” I jerk back. “Tessa,” says Wes. He catches my elbow. I don’t want to leave. We shouldn’t leave her like this, a broken husk of a woman sobbing over the body of her son. But Wes is right. “We’ll tell Jared Sexton,” I say to her quietly, referring to a woodworker a few houses away. He’s big and burly—and usually the one who drags bodies to the pyre for burning. “I’ll check on you tomorrow.” She doesn’t answer. She’s sobbing into her hands now. We slip away into the shadows, our feet practiced at making no sound on the pathways. Weston must see or hear something, though, because he quickly jerks me into the pit of darkness by the corner of the next house. My back is against the building, and he’s all but pressed against me, his head ducked, partially blocking mine. “What—” I begin, but his eyes jerk to mine, and his head shakes almost invisibly. I peer past him. ere’s little light, but now I can hear the booted footsteps of the night patrol. Wes was right—they likely heard Kendall’s screams, and now they’re here to check it out. It’s too dark for me to see her. Maybe they won’t see anything, and they’ll pass by. But no. Kendall comes ying through her door. “You killed him!” she screams. She has a rock in each hand. One ies, and a man cries out. “You tell that pig of a king and his evil brother that they’ll burn for their—” A crossbow res. e arrow hits with a sickening sound. Her voice goes silent, and her body drops. I whimper. Against me, Wes goes rigid. One of the patrolmen kicks her body. “Leave it,” says one of the others. “ey’ll nd her.” Another one spits at the ground. Maybe at her. “ey’ll never learn.” “Tessa.” Weston’s voice is a bare hiss in my ear. “Mind your mettle, girl. ey’ll kill you, too.” His weight is against me, pressing me into the wall, his hand over my mouth. I don’t realize I’m struggling against him until I stop. My eyes meet his, and when I blink, he goes blurry. “I know,” he whispers. My breathing shudders. I clench my eyes closed. His hand comes oﬀ my mouth. I press my face into his shoulder, shaking with tears like a child. Aer a moment, his hand presses to my cheek below the mask, his thumb brushing away the tears that slip down my face. “I know,” he says again. “I know.” At some point, my tears slow, and I realize that Wes is nearly holding me, and I want to stand right here in this circle of his comfort, because the idea of anything else is too terrible. e thought feels immeasurably sel sh in the face of what happened to Kendall and Gillis, but I can’t help it. Wes is warmth and safety and … friendship. He draws back at exactly that moment, his hand falling to his side. He’s looking into the distance, his eyes searching for trouble. “We should head west now. e night patrol is already keyed up. I don’t want to take a chance. If we have time, we can double back and do the rest.” I swallow and try to force my thoughts into some kind of coherent pattern. “Yes. Sure.” I sniﬀ back the last of my tears and swipe at my face. I’m full of sorrow now, but I know from experience that later it’s going to rearrange itself into rage. “Should we—should we do something about her body?” “No,” he says. He reaches out to straighten my hat. “ey’re right. Someone will nd the body.” “Weston!” “Shh.” He puts a nger to his mouth, and he shakes his head. “I’m not being callous. We can’t help her anymore, Tessa.” He adjusts his pack, the vials clinking. “We do have rounds.” “Right.” I swallow. “Rounds.” We head into the darkness again, shiing silently through the night. Weston’s usual lighthearted banter is gone. His whistling is silent. e air is heavy, as if we carry the weight of what happened along with us. “I hate the king,” I whisper. “I hate the prince. I hate what they’ve done. I hate what Kandala has become.” My voice is so so that I wonder if he can even hear me, but aer a moment, Wes reaches out to take my hand. He gives it a squeeze, for just a second longer than necessary—the only sign that this aﬀected him as profoundly as it did me. “Me too,” he says. en he lets go and nods at the horizon, any hint of vulnerability gone. “Morning is coming. We’ll have to step quick.” CHAPTER FOUR Corrick When Harristan was very young, he was weak and sickly. He fell ill oen. is was before the fevers had begun to terrorize our people—before I was even born. I’ve heard rumors that my mother and father were relieved when she became pregnant with me, because there was a time when they worried Harristan wouldn’t survive, that they’d be le without an heir. Our parents spent so many years coddling him that they never seemed to stop, even once he grew out of his childhood illnesses. Weeklong hunting trip? Harristan remained behind in the palace, while I was free to gallop oﬀ with Father and the nobles. Journey to distant sectors? Harristan would ride in the carriage, protected from the sunlight and the cool air, while I would ride with the guards and advisers, feeling far older than I was when they included me in their banter. You’d think this would breed resentment between the two of us: Harristan’s born of envy for my freedom, and mine born of envy for all the attention he received. But it didn’t. No, resentment never bred because Harristan was good at sneaking. Sneaking out of the palace, sneaking away from watchful eyes, sneaking out of his gilded prison, as he used to call it. Resentment never bred because he always took me with him. We’d wait until the moon hung high overhead, then dress in the plainest clothes we owned, stuﬀ our pockets with copper coins, and sneak out of the Royal Sector. He taught me how to watch the patterns of the guards, how to sprint through the gates in the shadows, how to tell which smiles were genuine and which smirks meant someone was going to try to trick you. Some of the elites will sneer about the dangers of the Wilds, but when we were younger, the Wilds were full of magic and adventure. Music would play until late in the night, dancers spinning by relight. We’d pick at roasted meat with our ngers and drink home-brewed ale that was so much better than the dull wine served in the palace. We’d climb trees and shoot arrows and dodge the patrolmen. And the people! So many people. Fortune-tellers and jugglers and metalworkers and dancers and farmers and artists. We’d listen to stories and sing bawdy drinking songs, and even though no one knew who we were—because who would expect the heir and his brother to be laughing around a bon re in the middle of the night?—we were always welcome, because no one was a stranger in the Wilds. Sometimes now, as King’s Justice, I’ll see a face and wonder if it was someone I knew as a child. I’ll wonder if the thieving woman I’m sentencing to a month of hard labor in the limestone mines is someone who once poured me an extra cup of ale. Or if the Moon ower smuggler I’m condemning to die by re is the man who once read the lines in my hand and told me I’d live a long and happy life, winking as he promised I’d have a big-breasted woman at my side. I don’t like dwelling on thoughts of the past. Honestly, I don’t like dwelling on thoughts of the present either. ey’re heartless. Jonas’s words from yesterday’s council meeting are haunting me. I keep wondering if Harristan heard him. I don’t want to ask. For as close as we are, some of his thoughts are better le a secret, just like my own. It’s late, and my windows are dark. My brother likely retired long ago, but despite how early I wake every morning, I always have a hard time nding sleep. I have another request to read, another plea for money, this time from Arella. She turned it in aer Jonas’s proposal was rejected, and it’s brief and rather hastily written, so there’s a part of me that wonders if it’s being done in retaliation somehow. Or maybe she senses that silver sits ready to be spent, so she should grab it before Jonas can reorganize. I sigh and rub at my eyes. When a knock sounds at my door, I look up in surprise. “Enter.” A guard pushes the door open. “Your Highness. Consul Sallister requests a word.” I pull my pocket watch free and glance at the face. I want to ask if Allisander is aware that it’s nearly midnight, but he likely knows and doesn’t care. He’s one of the few people who could demand an audience at this time of night and have it granted. I sigh, then shuﬄe the papers together and lay them facedown on my desk. “Send him in.” Despite the late hour, Allisander is still buttoned up in all his nery from the day. I’ve long since abandoned my jacket, and my sleeves are rolled back. He takes in my dishabille and says, “Forgive me. I did not realize you had already retired.” “I haven’t.” He waits for me to indicate that he may sit, but I don’t. “e smugglers have grown more bold,” he says. “I am receiving word of interrupted deliveries, of thievery on the road, of supply loads being raided. And that is outside the Royal Sector. You know it has long been a problem within your own walls.” I take a sip from my cup of tea. “When smugglers are caught,” I say, “they are punished severely.” “e rains have been heavy this year. Our crops are not as plentiful as they were last year. Combined with raids on our deliveries, we may have a supply issue.” “Does that mean you do have an issue, or you might?” “e promise of a problem is nearly as bad as the problem itself, Corrick.” His father used to be a pain in the ass, but there’s something worse about hearing these words from someone not much older than I am. His tone is patronizing. His use of my given name is patronizing. His stupid goatee is patronizing. I have no idea how my brother was ever friends with this man. I set down my cup. “I can oﬀer armed guards for your supply runs into the Royal Sector.” “I will gladly accept them. We will also be increasing our prices by twenty percent.” “Twenty percent!” e absolute gall. He heard me refuse funding to Artis because they already suﬀer for lack of medicine, and now he’s raising his prices. I don’t know if this is simple greed or if it’s rooted in humiliation, as if he takes any opportunity to retaliate against Harristan. Either way, I want to throw my tea at him. I settle for raising an eyebrow and tracing my nger around the rim of my cup. “You believe your crops have suﬀered that much?” He shares what he must think is a conspiratorial smile. “We must protect our supply.” He hesitates. “If you feel that our pricing is too extreme, I can speak with Lissa. We can try to work within our current constraints.” His voice is pleasant, unchanged, but I hear the veiled threat. Kandala needs their Moon ower crops. All of us do. I think of Harristan’s coughing in his sleep yesterday morning, then quickly shove the thought out of my head before any shred of worry can manifest in my eyes. “No need,” I say. “Your position is understandable.” I pause. “I imagine Consul Marpetta will be raising her prices as well?” Lissa Marpetta rarely says much in our council meetings, but it’s always assumed that she will act in accord with Allisander. Her sector, Emberridge, provides half as much of the Moon ower petals as his—but it’s enough for her to carry a great deal of in uence. “I believe so,” he says. “Of course we will happily pay taxes on our revenue, as always. If our supply runs remain safe, this could be quite a bene t to the Royal Sector—and therefore to all of Kandala.” He thinks he’s doing us a favor. As if the bulk of these taxes won’t come straight from our own coﬀers when we buy our own supply. Sometimes I wish I knew how my father would have handled this kind of conversation. Or rather, how Micah Clarke, the previous King’s Justice, would have handled it. Father was a well-loved and temperate man, known for kindness and fair ruling. But maybe that was a luxury aﬀorded to him by allowing someone else to handle the more challenging political intrigues. Either way, I have no idea. Micah was killed when our parents were. And our people weren’t suﬀering like this when Father and Mother were in power. e fevers had only just begun to spread. People weren’t making choices between whether to feed their families or buy medicine. Another rap sounds at my door, and I sigh. Does no one sleep? “Enter,” I call. e guard swings the door wide. “Your Highness. Master Quint would like a—” “Yes, yes, yes,” says Quint, shoving past the guards with no regard for whether I’ll even see him. “I don’t need to be announced.” His red hair is a bit of an unruly mess, as usual, and I doubt his jacket was fully buttoned at any point today. He takes note that we’re not alone and all but skids to a stop. He gives a brief nod to me, and then to Allisander. “Your Highness. Consul.” Aside from my brother, Quint might be my favorite person in the palace. He’s young for his role as Palace Master, but he was apprenticed to the last one, and when the man wanted to retire, I told Harristan to give Quint a chance. He’s honest as the day is long, and he keeps secrets better than a dead man. He’s also got enough energy for half a dozen people, talks twice as much as necessary, and has little patience for pomposity and presumption. He annoys Harristan to no end. He annoys pretty much everyone to no end. I rather love him. Allisander’s mouth forms a line. “Master Quint. We are in the middle of a private conversation.” Quint blinks like that’s quite obvious. “I see that.” He makes no move to leave. Allisander inhales with clear intent to speak words that will chase Quint out of here. I pick up my cup of tea. “We’re nearly done, though, are we not, Consul?” His mouth snaps shut. He doesn’t scowl at me, but almost. I oﬀer him an indulgent smile. “I believe we’ve come to an understanding.” It’s the best sentence in my arsenal of courtly lines, because it means absolutely nothing, yet somehow always makes people believe I’ve acknowledged their point. It does the trick now, too, because Allisander’s expression smooths over. “I’m glad to hear it.” “I’ll draw up an order for guards for your supply runs in the morning.” “Early, Corrick,” he says pointedly. “We’d like to return to the Plains before midday.” I go still. He can raise his prices and make pains about his supply runs being in danger, but just like my brother, I have a limit. Allisander Sallister may have money and power, but he does not rule Kandala—or me. He must read the change in my expression, because he says, “At your convenience, of course. With my thanks.” He pauses, then adds, “Your Highness.” I set down my cup. “You’ll have it in the morning.” Once the door swings closed behind him, Quint drops into the opposite chair. “Does he want to be fed to the royal lions?” “Don’t tempt me.” ough really, it’s not tempting. I ordered it as a sentence once, for a man who’d killed an entire family in order to hoard their supply of Moon ower petals. Watching the lions tear him apart while he screamed for mercy was the most horri c thing I’ve ever seen. Even Harristan, always stoic since we watched our parents murdered, had later said to me, “Don’t do that one again.” “Sallister wants more guards?” says Quint. “Among other things.” I take in his tousled appearance and try to determine whether he looks more harried than usual. It’s possible Quint doesn’t even know it’s so late. “Have you eaten? I can call for a meal.” “Ah—no. I dined with Consul Marpetta at …” He pulls out his pocket watch and frowns at the face. “at can’t be right.” I smile. “You sleep less than I do.” “No one sleeps less than you do.” True enough. “I’ll send for food. Wine too?” I stand and move toward the door. “Or should you be sober for whatever you came crashing in here about?” “A runner just arrived at the palace. e night patrol in Steel City unearthed a group of smugglers. Two were killed in the fray. e other eight have been taken to the Hold.” I stop and look at him. “at’s a large pack.” “ey had quite the operation, from what I understand.” Quite the operation. It’s rare to have outlaws and smugglers working in larger groups. Ten is unheard of. e risk of discovery is simply too great. e punishments too severe. Maybe Allisander wasn’t exaggerating about the threat to his supply runs. I was going to make him wait, but now I’ll be sure to draw up an order before I go to sleep. “Does Harristan know?” I say. “No.” My brother will want to issue a statement early. He’ll expect me to make an example of them all. At least one of us is sleeping. “I’ll call for food,” I say. “Send a message to the Hold. I want to speak to the patrolmen who captured them. Tell them I’ll want to question the prisoners aer sunrise. Separate them if they haven’t already done so. I don’t want them conniving a story.” Quint has taken a piece of paper from the desk, and he’s been writing since the moment I began speaking. He’s good at his job. “Shall we make a public announcement?” “Not yet.” My thoughts are reeling. Eight all at once. We’ll be lucky if we don’t start a riot. “Tomorrow. Midday.” He glances up. “Should I wake the king?” I think of Harristan’s cough. e fever. He needs to sleep. I blink the thoughts away. “No.” Quint nods and rises, taking his paper with him. “I’ll see to it.” I follow him to the door. He pauses with his hand against the handle and turns to look at me. “You asked about wine …” “I’ll order plenty.” CHAPTER FIVE Tessa I shouldn’t be daydreaming about Weston. It’s the least productive way to spend my time. I should be focusing on measuring thimbleweed for Mistress Solomon’s ointments, or thinking about how many houses we missed this morning since Wes said it wasn’t safe to sneak into the Royal Sector. I should be thinking about how many coins I have in my purse, and whether it would be too indulgent to buy some sweets from the baker. I should be mourning Mistress Kendall and Gillis. But thoughts of their deaths ll me with more rage than sorrow, and my hands begin to shake, until it’s all I can do to avoid inging rocks at the patrolmen myself. oughts of Wes are safe, and nearly as indulgent as the sweets would be. He was pressed so tightly against me yesterday morning, his palm against my cheek, his voice so so in my ear. When we were in danger, my brain whispers at me. It was not a romantic moment. I don’t care. Karri, the other assistant, is grinning at me over her own scale. We’re the same age, but instead of the freckled tan skin and brown hair that I have, Karri’s skin is a rich, deep brown, with shiny black hair she wears twisted in a rope that reaches her waist. “What are you blushing about?” she says. I bite the inside of my lip. “Nothing.” She leans in against the table and drops her voice, because Mistress Solomon doesn’t like it when we gossip. “Tessa. Do you have a sweetheart?” I try not to blush. Instead, my traitorous cheeks burn hotter. “Of course not.” I would never hear the end of it if Weston knew I was blushing over the idea of him being my sweetheart. Never. “What’s his name?” she says. I blink at her innocently. “Whose name?” “Tessa!” I add some thimbleweed to my bowl and begin to smash it with the pestle, grinding it against the stone. “It’s nothing. ere’s nothing.” She pouts, but her brown eyes are twinkling. “Tell me about his hands.” Unbidden, my thoughts summon the image of the apple held between his ngers. I sigh. I can’t help it. She bursts out laughing. “You have a sweetheart.” I glance at the front of the shop. “Shh.” “If you won’t tell me his name, will you tell me what he looks like?” Words come to mind so quickly that it’s a miracle they don’t fall out of my mouth. He looks like revolution. He looks like compassion. Blue eyes and gentle hands and quick feet and a core of strength and steel. I grind hard with my pestle, and Karri laughs again. I wonder how dark my cheeks have gotten. “I can’t wait to meet him,” she says. at will never happen. I sigh for an entirely diﬀerent reason now. “Is he from Artis?” she asks. I have to give her something, or she’ll never stop rooting for information. “Steel City,” I say. “Steel City! A metalworker, then.” “Hmm.” I add more thistleroot to my bowl. “Steel City?” says Mistress Solomon. She’s caught wind of our conversation, and she leaves the front of the shop to come peer at what we’re doing. “Are you talking about the smugglers?” “What smugglers?” says Karri. “ere was an announcement from the Royal Sector at midday. ey caught a pack of smugglers from Steel City. Ten of them, all from the same forge.” My blood goes cold. Mistress Solomon tsks under her breath. “We’re lucky the night patrol looks out for the people, you know. ose criminals deserve everything they get. We all get our allotment of medicine. No one needs to be greedy.” I bite my tongue. Not everyone gets an allotment of the Moon ower petals, and she well knows it. Only those who can pay for it. at’s how she makes such a market from her ointments and potions—it’s cheaper to buy from her. It’s cheaper because it doesn’t really work, but I can’t say that if I want to keep my job. Back when the healing eﬀects of the Moon ower was rst discovered, there were hundreds of charlatans who tried to pass oﬀ other leaves and petals as the Moon ower—but when the king put as strict a penalty on fraud as he did on smuggling, the fake petals quickly went away. It’s easier to just steal it than to grow and nurture something that simply looks the same. ere are plenty of shop owners like Mistress Solomon, though. People who can’t cure the fevers, but who claim to “help” with symptoms. I wouldn’t work for a true swindler, but Mistress Solomon seems to mean well. Most of the potions we create are for frivolous things like clear skin or shiny hair or trouble with sleep. Sometimes her mixtures won’t work, but I know what will, and I adjust my measurements accordingly. I keep notes in my father’s notebooks of what cures the fevers—the Moon ower—and what doesn’t: everything else. My ears are still ringing with what Mistress Solomon said: ten smugglers were captured. All from the same forge. Weston. He doesn’t work with anyone else. I know he doesn’t. But Weston isn’t even his real name. And if that’s not real … maybe I don’t really know anything for sure. Maybe the ten of them are people like Wes, who pretend to be working solo with friends in other sectors who don’t know the truth. I have no way to nd him. No way to ask. I swallow. “Did they read oﬀ names?” “No. Six men, four women. Two of the men died in the capture.” I feel dizzy. “When—” I have to clear my throat. “When were they captured?” “ey didn’t say. Yesterday, today, does it matter?” She sniﬀs haughtily. “You’re overgrinding that thistleroot, Tessa.” “Oh. I’m sorry.” She’s wrong, but she won’t like me saying so. She doesn’t like the idea of an impertinent young woman telling her how to run her business—which is how the last girl was let go. I need this job. No one thinks an eighteen-year-old girl from the Wilds could be a real apothecary. My father would have found these tinctures and remedies ridiculous, and he would have told Mistress Solomon to her face—but my father isn’t here to pay my rent, so I obediently drop the pestle on the worktable and scrape out the powder. When she moves away, Karri is eyeing me. Her voice drops very low. “Is your sweetheart a smuggler?” “What? No!” I’m sure my face is redder than re now. She goes back to her herbs, tossing a small handful into her bowl. “Mother says a lot of them are just trying to feed their own families. She’s heard stories of men who promise the moon, getting women to help them, and really it’s all for a half- dozen mouths to feed at home.” I scowl into my bowl. My stomach is churning, tying itself into knots. I don’t know what’s worse: Wes dead at the hand of the King’s Justice, or Wes having a family at home. What a thought. Dead is worse. Of course. I always thought he was close to my age, but maybe he’s older. I only ever see him in the dark, with kohl-smudged eyes hidden behind a mask. He could easily be twice my age, I suppose. “Be careful, Tessa,” says Karri. I glance up. “I’m always careful,” I say. And then I perfectly measure my medicines to prove it. Once the dinner bells begin ringing through the streets, Karri and I are free to go. She lives at home with her family, while I’ve lived alone in a rented room in a boarding house since my parents died. She watched me all aernoon and invited me to dinner, probably thinking my “sweetheart” must have been one of the captured men. I can’t take her pitying glances for one more moment, so I turn her down and head home. I stop in at the confectioner’s anyway, deciding it isn’t too much of an indulgence if I can hear any more gossip. As I hand my coins across, I say, “Can you believe they caught so many smugglers?” e clerk nods sadly and says, “ey’ll all be put to death tomorrow, I reason.” at icy grip on my spine refuses to loosen, especially when she adds, “I understand they’ll be doing it at the gates. You know that will draw a crowd.” I wish I had a way to nd out if Wes is part of it. He can’t be. But … Steel City. A forge. at’s too close. I try to bide the time in my room, but the air is too sti ing and my nerves are too jangled. I’ll never sleep. I head for our workshop hours before we’re supposed to be there and light the re. I thought this would be better, to sit somewhere and wait, but it’s worse. Every inch of this space is wrapped up in two years’ worth of memories of Wes. at’s where he sits while I measure. at’s the spot where he burned his nger on the woodstove. at’s the window that broke during the winter storms, the one Wes boarded over while the snow swirled in. I fall asleep in the chair, sitting up, tears on my face. When I sleep, I dream. I dream of my parents, the night they were caught by the night patrol. I remember how I was ready to burst from my hiding place, ready to tackle the patrolmen myself. Wes caught me and kept me out of sight that night— but in my dream, he’s caught, too, his body jerking as arrows pierce his esh. I dream of Wes’s body hung from the gates or his head on a stake. I see him broken and burning in a pile of bodies, while onlookers yell, though some cheer. I dream of him screaming for me, shouting warnings while they beat him with clubs, smashing his bones. “Tessa. Tessa.” I open my eyes and there he is. For a moment, I think this is a new dream, that I’ve been so worried that my imagination has conjured him into this space, and I’ll wake up for real and the workshop will still be empty. But he’s not. He’s real and solid and his blue eyes are bright as ever behind the mask. My eyes well with relief, and I don’t even bother to stop the tears from running over. “You’re crying?” he says, and he sounds so startled about the fact that I’m crying over him that I want to punch him right in the face. Instead I lurch forward and throw my arms around his neck. “Tessa,” he says. “is is so sudden.” “Shut up, Wes. I hate you.” “Ah yes. Quite obviously.” I giggle through my tears against his shoulder. I should let him go. I don’t. He doesn’t either. I want to ask if he knows about the people who were arrested, but instead, all that comes out of my mouth is, “Do you have a wife and a house full of children to feed?” “No. Do you?” I sniﬀ and draw back to stare at him. For all his teasing, his eyes are serious, searching mine. “You were right,” he says. “About the children?” He grins. “No. No children.” He shakes his head at me like I’m addled. “No, you were right that I should see you without your mask.” I gasp and slap my hands to my bare cheeks. Weston’s grin turns wol sh. “I regret not taking you up on the oﬀer earlier.” I sink back into the chair and press my hands over my eyes, but of course it’s too late now—and truly, he was the one who never wanted to see me. “I was … upset. I wasn’t thinking. I was so worried.” My voice breaks on the last word. He drops into the opposite chair. “Tell me all your fears.” “I thought you were one of the smugglers who got captured.” His face goes still, and his eyes seem to shutter. “I’m not a smuggler, Tessa.” “I know. I know you’re not. We’re not.” I have to swipe at my eyes. “I just—they were from Steel City, so I thought maybe—” “You see every single petal I take from the Royal Sector.” His eyes have gone cold. “I’ve never sold anything that we’ve taken. What we do—” “Wes! I know.” “What we do,” he repeats, his tone as sharp as I’ve ever heard it, “is not the same as what the smugglers do. I’m not in this to line my pockets.” “I know,” I cry. “Wes, I know.” I sniﬀ. “Me too. But it’s all the same to the king and his brother.” He draws a long breath, then runs a hand down his face. When he looks back at me, his eyes are no longer so hard. “You’re right. Forgive me.” I press my ngers into my eyes. “And I know you always tell me not to grow attached, but you’re the only true friend I have, especially since—since—” My voice breaks again. “Since my parents—” Wes takes hold of my wrists, so gently. “Tessa.” When he pulls me against him, I don’t resist, and he holds me for the longest time. We hold each other. is is so diﬀerent from the other day, when we were pressed into the shadows beside a house, hiding from the night patrol. Now it’s just me and Wes, in the warmth of the workshop, our workshop, holding on as if we can keep out all the evils of the world. “ey’ll be executed.” His voice is so quiet. “At midday.” I nod against him. “I heard.” I draw back and look up. “Do you think they deserve it?” He hesitates, and his eyes are shuttered again. is isn’t something we ever talk about. Our conversations revolve around how to avoid detection. How eﬀective the medicines are, and whether a little browning on the petals makes a diﬀerence. How frivolous and wasteful the elites are. We discuss the people we lose to the fever, and the people who live. We don’t discuss what could happen, because I’m right. e king wouldn’t care that we’re stealing to help people. If we’re caught, we’ll be executed right next to the smugglers. “I think … ,” he begins, and then he shakes his head. “I think we’re wasting time. Do you have your mask? e patrols have doubled because of—” “Wes.” I swallow and catch his arm. His voice was so harsh when he said, I’m not a smuggler, Tessa. “Do you think they deserve it?” “I think that very few people truly deserve what they get, Tessa.” He pauses, and for the briefest moment, sadness ickers through his eyes. “For good or for bad.” I think of my parents, executed in the street for doing the very thing Wes and I do. I think of Gillis, dying for lack of medicine, and Kendall, killed to leave an example. I think of the executions to come, and what that will mean for the people le behind. I think of Weston risking his life to save mine, once upon a time, stopping me from falling to the same fate as my parents. I think of how he risks his life every night to bring medicine to people who need it. “You only deserve good things,” I whisper. He gives a small laugh without any humor to it and looks away. “Do you think so?” I catch his face in my palm and turn his gaze back to mine. As usual, his jaw is a little rough and a little warm, the fabric of the mask so under my ngertips. “I do,” I say. I wait for him to pull away, but he doesn’t. Maybe we’re both shaken. Maybe what happened to Kendall and Gillis has le us both reeling. e air between us seems to shi, and his eyes ick to my mouth. He inhales, his lips parting slightly. “Lord, Tessa …” My thumb slips under the edge of his mask, shiing it higher. Weston hisses a breath, and his hand shoots out to capture my wrist. I give a small yip of surprise at the suddenness of it. His eyes clench closed. He lets me go. Takes a step back. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. I’m such a fool. He’s always been so clear about where we stand. About where he stands. “Put your mask on,” he says roughly. “We’ll lose the darkness.” I swallow and turn away, digging between the books in my apothecary pack until I nd it. I tie it into place over my hair with shaking ngers. When I reach for my hat where it hangs on a hook by the window, Wes catches my arm and turns me around. I suck in a breath, but he puts his hands on my cheeks to lean in close, and I all but melt into a puddle on the oor. My back hits the wall of the workshop, and my head spins. en Wes’s mouth hovers above mine, and I lose all rational thought. His thumb traces my lower lip. “Not never, Tessa,” he says, and his voice is so rich and deep that he could be speaking straight to my heart. “But not like this.” I stare into his eyes, wide and guileless and pleading. And ever the fool, I nod. He pulls me forward and kisses me on the forehead. I sigh. “I really do hate you.” “Always for the best.” He takes a step back, puts my hat on my head rmly, then icks the brim of his own up an inch. “Eight people will die at midday. Let’s see if we can get enough medicine to spare twice as many this morning.” CHAPTER SIX Corrick Harristan never visits the Hold. If he wants to see a prisoner, they’re dragged into the palace in chains and deposited on the oor at his feet. To my knowledge, he’s never set foot inside the prison since the day our parents died. Possibly not even before. I, however, am well acquainted. I know every guard, every cell, every lock, every brick. When I was een, already drowning in grief so thick I could barely breathe past it, I quickly learned how to block emotion once I stepped past the heavy oak doors. We couldn’t aﬀord one single moment of weakness, and I would not be the one to cause my brother’s downfall. I have heard every manner of scream without inching. I have listened to promises and threats and curses and lies—and occasionally, the truth. I have never hesitated in doing what needs to be done. Today, Allisander has accompanied me to the Hold. Aer learning of the smuggling operation, he delayed his return home. Both he and Lissa have stated that they will remain in the palace until they can be certain there is no danger to their supply runs. I’ve oen imagined Allisander walking through these halls, but in my imagination, he’s usually in chains, a guard prodding him with a blade, instead of how he looks right now: exasperated and huﬀy, with a handkerchief pressed over his nose and mouth. “Is there nothing you can do for the smell?” he says. “It’s a prison,” I say to him. “e residents aren’t motivated to make it pleasant.” He sighs, then winces, as if it required more inhaling than he was ready for. “You could have brought them to the palace.” “e last thing I need is eight martyrs being marched through the Royal Sector.” I glance over. “I told you they’re a sympathetic lot.” He glances back and seems to be taking shallow breaths through his mouth. I have to force my eyes not to roll. “Did they reveal the names of any other smugglers?” he says. “No.” We reach the end of the hallway, which leads to a descending staircase. e guards here snap to attention and salute me. e smell is only going to get worse, but I don’t warn Allisander. “Nothing?” he demands. “And you questioned them thoroughly? You were convincing?” “Are you asking if I tortured them?” He hesitates. Most of the consuls—hell, most of the elites, if not most of Kandala—don’t like what I do, but they say nothing because they believe it keeps them safe. ey don’t mind it as long as they don’t have to talk about it. ey’ll wrap it up in pretty language and dance around terms like torture and execution by asking if I’m encouraging forthright answers or terminating a risk to the populace. Allisander is bolder than most, though, and his hesitation only lasts a second. “Yes. at’s precisely what I’m asking.” “No.” “Why not?” Because despite all outward appearances, I’m not cruel. I don’t delight in pain. I don’t delight in any of this. And they’re all sentenced to die. e penalties for the and smuggling are well known, and each prisoner knew it before they stole the rst petals. Half of them are terri ed. I only had to question one to discover that they were working together in the loosest sense of the word. One outright fainted when the guards let me into her cell. Cutting oﬀ their ngers or whatever Allisander is imagining feels like overkill. “In my experience,” I say, “those who are facing execution are not eager to share information that will help their captors.” He’s frowning behind his handkerchief. “But there could be more. Our supply runs could be at greater risk than we expected.” “ey’re roughshod laborers, Consul, not military strategists. From what I can tell, they’re not very organized.” It’s likely the reason they were all captured so quickly. We reach the bottom of the staircase. While the palace and many of the homes in the Royal Sector have been wired for electricity, the lowest level of the Hold has not. Outside, it’s morning, but down here, it’s dim and cold, lit by oil lamps hung at odd intervals, with gray walls and black bars. ere are twenty cells, but they’re never occupied for long. “Go ahead,” I say. “Question whoever you’d like.” He looks at me like he was expecting … more. As if I were going to walk down the line of cells and personally introduce him to each captive. I lean against the opposite wall, fold my arms, and raise my eyebrows. “You can’t very well do it aer they’re dead.” Allisander starts to sigh, thinks better of it, and turns for the rst cell. is one holds a man named Lochlan. He’s not more than twenty- ve, with coal-black hair, pale, heavily freckled skin, and arms bearing a lifetime of burn scars from a forge. When I questioned him, he stared back at me fearlessly and refused to say a word. is is the kind of man Allisander would torture, but I know it wouldn’t make any diﬀerence. I’ve seen Lochlan’s type before, men who think they can survive an execution through sheer force of will. ey can’t. He’s sitting in the back of his cell, glaring darkly at both of us, but when the consul approaches the bars, Lochlan rises to his feet and comes forward. His expression is similar to one I’d wear if I were free to make my feelings for Consul Sallister known. Allisander clears his throat as if he’s addressing a dinner party. “I would like to know the names of any associates you—” Lochlan spits right in his face. Some hits the handkerchief, but most hits Allisander right between the eyes. He sputters and swipes at his face, then takes a step forward, rage transforming his features. “You will pay for that, you stupid—” “Consul!” I start forward, but I’m too far. Lochlan has already reached through the bars to grab the front of Allisander’s jacket. He jerks him face- rst into the steel. Blood blossoms on the consul’s face. “I know who you are,” Lochlan is snarling. Down the hallway, the other prisoners have been drawn to their own bars by the sound of the commotion, and those who can see begin yelling. “Kill him!” they scream. “Kill him!” Lochlan jerks Allisander against the bars again, and it’s clear he needs no encouragement. “You’re the killer. I know what you’re doing to your people.” e guards are nearly upon us, but Lochlan rallies to jerk Allisander against the bars again. is time might really be a killing blow. I draw back a st and throw a punch right into Lochlan’s wrist where it extends through the bars. e bones give with a sickening crack. He lets go and drops back, screaming, clutching his arm to his chest. Allisander falls to his knees in the hallway, choking on blood and mucus and arrogance. Rust-colored dirt from the oor is in streaks on his pristine clothing. His breathing is broken and hitching, marked by a thin whimper every few breaths. I stare down at him for a second longer than necessary. Perhaps I delight in some pain. I drop to a crouch in front of him. “Look at me,” I say. “Is your nose broken?” “I want him dead.” His voice is thick and nasally, but he doesn’t glance up. “He will be,” I say. “But I can’t kill him twice. Now look at me.” He spits blood at the ground, then draws a ragged breath and looks up. A lump is already forming above his le eyebrow. He’ll have two black eyes, and his lip is split, but his nose looks straight as ever. Pity. e guards have lled the hallway now, chasing the other prisoners back from their bars. Lochlan is curled on the oor of his cell, dry-heaving over his broken arm. One of the guards has a hand on the cell door, but he looks to me, waiting for an order on whether he should take action. I shake my head, and the guard gives a brief nod before stepping away. I draw my own handkerchief from a pocket and hold it out to Allisander. “Here.” He takes it, somewhat sheepishly, and presses it to his mouth. I rather doubt he needs me to tell him he shouldn’t have stepped right up to the bars like that, so I don’t. I straighten. “So,” I say brightly, and he blinks wearily up at me. “Who would you like to question next?” Harristan is t to be tied. “Why would you bring him there?” he demands. “What were you thinking?” “I was thinking that our richest consul made a request, and I sought to honor it.” “Well, now he’s requesting a spectacle.” My brother is pacing the oor along the windowed wall of his chambers. e weather has turned overcast, promising rain and lending enough shadows to match his mood. “He’s requesting that we send a clear message to anyone else who might be considering a similar plot.” For all my brother’s anxious movement, I’m motionless in a chair. “We’re executing eight prisoners, Harristan. It’ll be a spectacle.” He stops and looks at me. Some unspoken emotion passes between us, a mixture of regret and loss and fury, but he blinks and it’s gone. His voice goes quiet. “How are you going to do it?” In moments like this, I sometimes wonder if Harristan regrets that moment with Allisander from so long ago, as if our father yielding to Nathaniel Sallister then would have somehow staved oﬀ Allisander’s manipulations now. I doubt it. I think he’d be worse. I think we’d be forced to do worse. I inhale to answer, but a sharp rap sounds at the door. Harristan doesn’t look away. “Enter,” he calls. e door swings wide, and a guard says, “Your Majesty, Master Quint would like—” “No,” says Harristan. His eyes still haven’t le mine. “Oh, let him in,” I say. My brother sighs and glances at the doorway. “You have ten minutes, Quint.” Quint was bouncing outside the door like an eager puppy, documents and folios clutched to his chest, but now he comes bustling through. His jacket is unbuttoned, his hair unruly. He never bothered with a shave this morning, so his pale jaw is dusted with red. “I only need nine.” “I’m counting.” Quint sets down his materials and launches into a litany of issues in the palace, from a shortage of straw bedding for the royal cattle requiring a decision on whether to substitute wood shavings, to a disagreement among the kitchen staﬀ about whether Harristan prefers ivory tablecloths trimmed in green or burgundy tablecloths trimmed in gray. My brother casts me a withering glance when Quint shis into a request from the Royal Sector to ring the dawn bells at two hours past dawn so people aren’t woken so early. “Could they really be called dawn bells, then?” I say. Harristan sighs. “I feel rather certain we’ve passed nine minutes.” “It’s hardly been eight and a half,” I say. I really have no idea. Quint makes a note on his papers. “I do still need to address the matter of pardon requests we’ve received this morning.” Harristan waves a hand. “You’re done, Quint. Dra the usual response.” “But—” “Out.” “I’ll just leave them with you, then.” Quint shoves most of the paperwork he was carrying toward the center of the table, then turns for the door. “Wait!” says Harristan. “Leave what with me?” I lean forward and take the top piece of paper from the pile. It’s scribbled and unsigned, but requests can be made at the palace gates by any citizen. We’re all dying. You’re just killing them quicker. Show mercy. I skip to the next one. Free the rebels from Steel City. I ip through a few more. Some are hastily written, some are more eloquent, but they all beg for the same thing. “Pardon requests,” I say hollowly. We always get a few—but never to this extent. “How many are there?” says Harristan. Quint hovers by the doorway. “One hundred eighty-seven.” I set down the letters and look at my brother. “As I said. A spectacle.” “One is from Consul Cherry,” says Quint. at gets Harristan’s attention. “Arella?” he says. “I thought the smugglers were captured in Steel City.” at’s rmly Leander Cra’s territory, while Arella speaks for Sunkeep, far in the south. “ey were.” I push aside the thinner parchments and scribbled pleas until I get to the folios at the bottom. Arella’s is black leather, the cover stamped with Sunkeep’s sigil in gold: half a sun descending into a rolling sea. To His Royal Majesty, the Esteemed King Harristan, I write to you in regard to the men and women imprisoned on charges of smuggling and illegal trade. While I recognize that true crime deserves punishment, these men and women are not criminals. They are acting out of desperation to help their families during a time of need. I humbly request that you might ﬁnd it in your heart to pardon them. We of Sunkeep are willing to welcome them into our territory if you will grant clemency. Yours in service, Consul Arella Cherry I read it out loud, and Harristan looks at Quint. “You dragged me through twenty minutes of nonsense when this was sitting on the table?” My brother’s voice could cut steel, but Quint doesn’t inch. If anything, he looks somewhat incredulous. “I brought a day’s worth of issues to you and attempted to t them into nine minutes. As per your request.” Harristan swipes the leather folio out of my hands, but he’s still glaring at Quint. “I gave you ten.” Quint opens his mouth to argue, but I have no desire to see him as the ninth victim today, so I say, “Did Leander issue a request?” “No,” says Quint. Harristan scans the letter I just read, then snaps it shu

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