Page 5 of Season Warriors & Wolves

“They can try,” I said, standing and pulling my arm from her grip, almost toppling her over.

She followed right after me despite her age. “Comply,” she said quietly, pulling down on my clothes and helping me into the bath. “It is easier.” Her eyes darted to the still fresh wounds all over me and she sighed, her wrinkled face dropping with such despicable pity. “Much easier.”

I dipped into the warm water and leaned back on the bath. “I’m in no need of sympathy. If you have a dagger I could borrow, on the other hand.”

“No sympathy from me, girl,” she said almost cruelly, pouring water on my hair and face. “I’ve got no sympathy left to give. Only my thanks.”

I opened my eyes and took a small piece of crumpled paper from her shaking hands. For saving Nissa, I will forever be in your debt. A mother’s debt.

She put a finger to her lips and continued washing my hair while I tried to process the words written.

Why would I need an old woman’s debt? I’d done for Nissa as much as she’d done for me. It had been a bargain. I was owed nothing, but I was too tired to argue and sure that my room was veiled and surveyed by Melanthe. Causing this woman’s death would serve me nothing. No death should go unprofitable, it would be such a waste.

She got me dressed, combed my hair and neatly plaited it. Once she’d gotten me settled on the settee facing the arched glass window facing the winter garden, she let in a few young servants in with trays of food. All stopped and bowed their heads politely one after the other after laying down the food and leaving. It got my attention for a moment, but Nissa’s mother shook her head in warning.

The girls knew of what I’d done for Nissa. And it somewhat mattered.

“Eat,” she said, backing towards the door and leaving.

My stomach gurgled at the soft smell of herbs, but the thought of eating made me rush to the sink and heave out what little bit of water I had drunk before. “Motherfucker.”

A little laughter trickled at the back of my mind and I looked up at the mirror, watching the twirl of black starting to bleed red, leaking out of the reflection and down the walls, painting everything red—blood red, thick and stained with sin.

“Something funny?” I asked, my words slurring, the world spinning.

Yes, they whispered back, a mocking laughter following.

My fingers shook, trying to grasp the sides of the white porcelain, but no limb of mine obeyed at all, they were locked still like my eyes were—staring at the abyss of my own mind. And soon, the exhaustion, the sleeplessness and hunger made me give up to slumber. My body hitting the floor with a thud.

That evening I was called to dinner for the first time since I’d surfaced from the dungeons. Father had ordered the servants to dress me in some of the finest silks, laces and skirts some of the noble women of Isjord wore. The only thing they had not touched was my hair.

And from the look on his face when I arrived at the dining chambers, it had been a mistake, and a servant would lose a hand for it.

It was only him and I, no one else.

I sat across from him and that was enough to trigger his ego. “Stand.”

“No.”

“Stand!” he shouted.

And I calmly repeated, “Again, no.”

He sneered, huffing and puffing. “You have no power here.”

“It is a seat, father, calm down. The air is not so stale over here with the stench of delusion and treachery.” It wasn’t about a seat. It was about control. Slowly, without him realising, I’d take it all. One rank and file at a time, like he did. If the king wanted me to slow my steps, I’d slow them.

He leaned back in his chair, glaring at me under his nose. From the way satisfaction weighted easily on his features, I could tell he was plenty satisfied by my state. “I’ve called a crowd for tomorrow,” he announced confidently, returning to cut through his lamb.

“You are an excellent jester, they will for sure enjoy your play.”

His jaw ticked at my nonchalance. “For your crowning.”

I plucked a few grapes from the fruit platter and munched while I waited for him to continue, but it seemed it was my turn to speak because he said nothing at all after that. “What, would you like me to prepare a speech or something?”

He leaned back on his seat. “I’m surprised by your easy cooperation given your rabid history.”

“A transaction,” I said, poking my fork in some slices of cheese. “For Malik Castemont’s life, my help. I give nothing for free. You must know because you took him with the purpose to use him against me, didn’t you? You are clearly struggling to retrieve the Octa Virga pieces since you resorted to tricking me into doing it for you. And since you’ve yet to kill me, yet to kill the Night Prince, tortured me just enough to teach me a lesson not to hurt me, you need us both—more so me I suspect, considering I’m up here, asked to prepare a speech. Skygard blood and all, correct?”