Lochlan and I have tucked ourselves into the shadows, and while neither of us has a weapon, we’ve each put a hand on something sturdy enough to use as a club. Mine is a heavy wooden dowel about the length of my arm. The man’s feet climb the steps heavily, lacking any stealth at all, so he’s clearly not worried about scaring off thieves. We’re ducked behind a large chest, so I can’t see anything at all, but I can hear when his footsteps reach the landing. Lantern light suddenly flickers on the walls.
The man lets out an aggrieved sigh. “There’s a draft up here,” he calls down. “Someone left a window open. I bet some gulls got in.”
“Can you get them out?” a woman’s voice calls.
“I’m looking,” the man calls back. “I know someone is going to be discharged for this tomorrow.”
Lochlan looks at me. His eyes gleam in the darkness.
I wonder if he’s thinking the same things I am.
There’s this man, and now a woman, too. Plus Ford Cheeke himself. Four guards outside. He has a lantern, so he’s going to discover the shattered window eventually—if he doesn’t discover us first. Do we kill him, too?
The man is moving away from us now. He’s wearing a white shirt with sleeves rolled back and pants held up with suspenders, and he’s built like the kind of man who spends a lot of time sitting at a desk. I can’t tell how old he is, but the top of his head is bald, and what’s left around the sides looks gray. I don’t want to sit here and stare at him much longer, because if he doubles back with that lantern, he’s going to see us.
I turn to Lochlan. I point at him, then toward the stairs. I point at myself, then at the man. I hope my meaning is clear. Go for the stairs. I’ll take care of him.
Lochlan nods and doesn’t hesitate. Silently, he slips away from me, and I’m alone behind the chest. My heart pounds against my ribs, and I consider that for all the hours I’ve spent hiding in the darkness, I never did it with the intent to cause harm.
I hate that I’m doing it now.
I have to close my eyes and take a breath. Please, Tessa. Forgive me.
I slip out of my spot as silently as Lochlan did. The lantern light helps me avoid the obstacles that made us trip earlier. I creep along behind the man, who gives another sigh. He’s muttering as he goes, and he sounds like the kind of person who rambles as he works. “I know it’s hot during the day, but those men have got to remember to close up before they go. They were probably lingering with Penny again. Now where are those gulls?”
It reminds me a little of Quint, and I feel a pang of homesickness. I wish I could have brought him instead of Lochlan. Traipsing the streets of Silvesse with my best friend would’ve felt like a holiday, regardless of what Oren Crane wanted us to do.
Well, I’ll never see Quint again if I don’t handle things here. I steel my will and tighten my grip on the dowel, ready to knock him across the back of the head.
But the man turns around.
He jumps a mile when he spots me, and he drops the lantern. It cracks into the floor with a little tinkle of glass, but the flame doesn’t go out. Now that I can see his face, I realize he’s older than I thought. Fifty, maybe sixty. I’m prepared to fight, so I’m surprised when he falls back a few steps and gasps.
His eyes skip up and down my form, and he actually says, “You’re not a gull.”
“No,” I say.
His eyes shoot behind me, where the draft is coming from, then flick toward the stairs. I see him put two and two together, and when he inhales sharply, I know he’s going to shout for Mr. Cheeke and the woman we heard.
I don’t give him the chance. I surge forward and punch him right in the face.
He drops like a rock. I stand there with my fist drawn back to hit him again, because I genuinely didn’t expect to knock him out with one strike.
He’s landed in a crumpled heap, and I drop to a crouch next to him. I’m a bit horrified at the thought that I might have killed him without meaning to.
But no, he’s breathing and already moaning a little.
“I’m sorry,” I say softly, and I mean it. “Please forgive me. This wasn’t my intent.”
His fingers are already shifting against the floorboards. No one ever stays knocked out for long.
Maybe it’s because he reminds me so much of an older version of my best friend, but I don’t think I can kill a doddering man who says things like you’re not a gull to an intruder.
Well, he wasn’t our target anyway. I reach for his suspenders, unbuttoning them as he feebly begins to try to fight me off.
“Stop,” he gasps. “What—what are you doing—”
“Tying you up,” I say. I pull the suspenders free and wrench one of his arms behind his back.
He cries out, and I wince at the sound.
“If you’re not quiet,” I say, “my only other option is to kill you, so I need you to shut up.”
He goes silent at once.
That lasts for exactly three seconds—which again reminds me of Quint.
“Please don’t hurt Penny,” he says in a whispered rush. “Please—not in front of Ford. He’s been through—he’s seen—”
“I told you to be quiet,” I snap. I jerk the suspenders in a knot around his wrists. “I’m not here for Penny.”
“Yes. Yes. All right. But you—your accent—you’re not—”
“I’m going to punch you again.”
He clamps his mouth shut.
I move to tie his ankles.
He starts babbling immediately. “The bankers take the day’s draw at dusk. There’s no silver on the premises, sir.”
“I’m not a thief.”
“But—”
I yank the knot on his ankles so tightly that he cries out again, then cuts off the sound abruptly when I meet his eyes. I load my gaze with cruel promise, the way I’d look at prisoners in the Hold.
“I only have one thing to do,” I say. “So you’re either going to be quiet and let me do it, or I’m going to have to kill everyone in this building. Do you understand?”
His face goes white. But he clamps his mouth shut and he nods vigorously.
“Good.” I look down and see the edge of a handkerchief sticking out of his pocket. I seize it and pull it free, then ball it up in front of his face. “Open up.”
“Oh, you cannot be ser—”
I shove the handkerchief in his mouth, and he cuts off with a muffled gasp. He’s glaring at me, but I clap him on the shoulder. “We’ll be out of your way in no time.”
Then I slip down the stairs to find Lochlan.
My “partner” is waiting in the shadows at the bottom of the stairs, and he grabs hold of my wrist without warning, dragging me into an alcove. I’m so keyed up that I nearly kill him with my dowel.
“It’s just me, you idiot,” he breathes in my ear as he drags me against the wall.
“Did you find Cheeke?” I whisper, because it’s obvious the job isn’t done yet. I hate myself for it, but there’s a part of me that’s disappointed that Lochlan didn’t take care of this for me, that we could be done and get out of here.
“Yeah, I found him,” Lochlan whispers. “I’ve only seen him and the girl. I’m waiting to see if there’s anyone else, but I haven’t heard anything.” He peers at me in the darkness. “Did you take care of the man?”
“Yes.”
Lochlan frowns a little and looks away, and I realize he thinks I killed him.
I set my jaw and peek out of the alcove down the hallway, where candlelight flickers from three different rooms. “Which one?”
“To the right.”
“Has Edward come back down yet?” calls a female voice, and I duck back quickly. She’s obviously in one of the rooms to the left. Her voice sounds a bit closer, and I wonder if she’s stepped into the hallway. “Maybe I should go see if he needs help.”
“I’m sure he’ll be back in a minute,” calls a man. His voice is kind, and he sounds like he’s as old as the man I tied up upstairs. “Have you found the logs from Kaisa yet? I’d really like to get through these ledgers so you can get home.”
“You know I don’t mind staying to help.” Her voice is muffled again, and lightly teasing. “You need to get home, old man.”
“Ah, Penny, hush.” He chuckles, his tone low and gentle.
They sound so friendly and kind that I want to climb back up those stairs, untie those suspenders from Edward, and throw myself out the broken window. I thought the first man was too much with his sir and you’re not a gull, but I’m supposed to kill this one? I’m supposed to bring back his head? He sounds like the grandfathers in the Wilds who’d share warm stories about their childhoods while Tessa and I were bringing them medicine. They’d pat me on the cheek and call me a good boy and wink at me, asking if I was sweet on Tessa when she couldn’t hear.
Just a little, I’d always say.
Lord, how she’d hate this.
I pull back into the shadows of the alcove, bracing my shoulders against the wall. My heart is pounding hard. I don’t want to hurt anyone—but my thoughts are so tangled up, and I don’t know how else to work with Oren Crane to find a way back to Tessa. There isn’t going to be anyone else in Ostriary who’s willing to stand against Rian—and I know what Rian will do if he gets his hands on me.
Lochlan looks at me, studying my face for a long minute.
“Do you have another idea?” he says.
“No,” I grind out roughly.
“Do you know why I didn’t kill your brother when we held the Circle?” he says.
The question comes out of nowhere, and I turn my head to look at him. “What?”
“When we held the Circle. In the middle of the Royal Sector. During the revolution—”
“No, I know when you mean. What are you talking about?”
He steps closer. “Do you, Cory, know why I didn’t kill the king?”
“If you call me that again, I’m going to shove this dowel somewhere you won’t like it.” I glare at him. “If you’d killed the king, the army would have filled you with a hundred arrows before your finger left the trigger.”
“Maybe, maybe not. There was a lot of smoke. A lot of cover. And I had a clean shot at least three times. The king had armor, but I had a crossbow. I could have got him in the face. Or the throat. Tessa, too.”
I’ve gone completely still, frozen in place in the little alcove. I have to shake my thoughts loose and remind myself that he didn’t kill my brother. That he didn’t harm Tessa. My hand is tight on the dowel anyway.
Lochlan’s eyes haven’t left mine, and he laughs under his breath, but not like anything is really funny. “Exactly,” he says. He leans in close. “I wasn’t worried about the army. I’d seen you as Weston Lark, and I’d seen you as Prince Corrick. If I killed the king, I was afraid of what you would do.”
I look away from him and shift to peer down the hallway. “I already know you think I’m a monster, Lochlan. It’s the only reason we’re here.”
He grabs my shoulder and jerks me back into the alcove. “No,” he growls, his voice low. “I actually kind of hate that you’re not a monster.” His eyes are very dark in the shadows. “But I know you can do terrible things when you have to.”
I stare at him. It’s the closest he’s ever come to acknowledging that my actions are backed by something other than cruelty, and I actually kind of hate that he’s said it in a way that won’t let me enjoy it.
But he’s not done. “I hate all of this,” he says. “I don’t want to be a part of Rian’s stupid conflict either. But I want to go home as badly as you do. I wouldn’t have followed you this far if I expected you to hesitate. The King’s Justice wouldn’t hesitate.”
That shocks me still again. Lochlan is the last person in the world I ever expected to hear such a thing from. But maybe it’s a reminder I need, because I take a deep breath and let a cool band of focus wrap around my thoughts. I’ve done terrible things to protect Kandala for years. I’ve supported my brother’s reign for years. I can’t be better for Tessa if I can’t get us out of this mess.
I steel my spine, and then I tap Lochlan on the cheek, a little too hard to be friendly. “Love you, too. Now cover my back.”
With that, I slip out of the alcove. Cheeke’s room is first, and I cling to the wall, because shadows are shifting in the room where the woman is working. Cheeke is visible from the hallway, but he’s not quite as old as he sounded. He’s sitting at a desk, writing in a ledger by the light of several lanterns. He’s slender, and doesn’t seem overly tall, with thick gray hair. A pipe sits on the desk beside him, and I catch a whiff of tobacco smoke. He’s facing the door, so there’s no way I’m going to take him unawares. I’m going to have to run at him, and considering his build, he’ll probably put up a fight. Based on the distance, he’ll have time to pull a weapon, if he’s got one.
But none of that is what’s really caught my attention. His clothes are buttoned up nicely, his hair and beard finely trimmed, but a massive cluster of burn scars run from his ear to the back of his head and down the side of his neck. The scarring is profound, disappearing down the collar of his shirt.
While I’m staring, I notice the scars affect his hand, too. It looks like he’s missing a finger or two.
And then I realize I’ve stared for one second too long, because the woman appears in the other doorway, carrying two books under one arm. She’s saying, “I really do think I should check on Edward,” but she breaks off with a shriek when she sees me.
“Penny!” the man shouts in alarm, and he shoves back from his desk.
“One of Crane’s people got in here!” Penny cries. She’s young and pretty and full of scars herself—and that’s all I notice before she chucks a book right at my head.
Well, there goes my element of surprise. I knock the book out of the way and prepare to fend her off.
But Lochlan slips out of the darkness to seize her. “Get him!” he snaps at me, just as she cries out, trying to wrench herself free.
“Try not to hurt her,” I tell him, and then I turn to face Cheeke.
I’m almost too late. The man tackles me with a knife in hand, and it nearly goes right into my gut. As it is, I knock his arm to the side with the dowel, but he slams into me anyway. We go tumbling into the hallway. My shoulders take the impact, but I use momentum to my advantage, and I roll Cheeke into the wall. I’m distantly aware of Lochlan struggling to keep a grip on the girl, and it sounds like she’s trying to scream, but he’s got a hand over her mouth. I get a hold of Cheeke’s wrist and slam his hand against the floor. The knife clatters to the floor, and he grunts, trying to twist away from me.
“Penny!” he gasps.
Behind us, she squeals, and she must do something, because Lochlan yelps. Cheeke surges against my weight, but I have the upper hand now. I shift to kneel on his wrist, then pin his neck to the floor with the dowel. The blade hasn’t gone too far, and I take hold of the hilt, putting the point right against his throat.
He’s panting, wheezing from the pressure on his neck. It reminds me of the way Harristan breathes sometimes. I force the thought out of my head, because if I compare him to my brother, I’ll never be able to do this.
The King’s Justice wouldn’t hesitate.
The blade is in my hand, but I can’t move. My heart won’t stop pounding.
This is nothing like what I ever had to do in Kandala. Maybe Harristan and I could have done better, but we were trying. We were trying to keep our people alive. We were doing the best we could in an impossible situation. When I did terrible things, I was enforcing laws to protect the people.
There’s no justice in this. None at all.
Cheeke isn’t even looking at me. His eyes are straining past me, at Lochlan and Penny, who don’t seem to be struggling as much now. She’s whimpering.
“Please,” Cheeke gasps. “Please let her go. Don’t hurt her anymore. Tell Crane I’ll give him whatever he wants.”
Penny squeals a little in Lochlan’s grasp, and her voice is muffled, but she says, “Papa, no.”
Now I understand the fondness in his tone when he spoke earlier. She’s not an employee. They’re not business partners. Ford Cheeke is her father.
It reminds me of Tessa. Tessa, whose own father was killed right in front of her. I watched it happen.
Tessa, who would hate every single part of what we’re doing.
Tessa, who sat in front of me on the Dawn Chaser and lectured me about the way I turn every single person I meet into an adversary before I give them a chance to be an ally.
Much like I’m doing right now.
Lochlan grunts with strain again, but his voice is tight with something akin to sorrow. “I’ll take her down the hall.”
A cord pulls in my chest. He’ll take her down the hall—so she doesn’t have to see.
I stare into Ford Cheeke’s face. His eyes blaze into mine. He doesn’t look afraid, and he doesn’t look furious.
He looks beseeching.
“Please,” he gasps, and his voice has grown so soft it’s barely a whisper. “Please just let her go. She’s been through so much.”
“Papa,” she whimpers. Then she must fling her head back, because there’s a cracking sound, and Lochlan swears—but he doesn’t let her go. He begins wrenching her backward.
“Please,” Ford says again. “I beg of you.”
I try to steel myself against the words, but I can’t. I’m so tired of listening to people beg me for mercy and never being able to grant it. My brother is the king. There should be another way. There should be a better way.
I hear Tessa’s voice in my head.
You could have been kind, and you could have been gentle, and you could’ve explained.
She was talking about the night she snuck into the palace, when she woke up and discovered I was the terrifying Prince Corrick, not the warm outlaw Weston Lark she’d grown to love and trust.
And she was right.
“Stop,” I grind out. “Lochlan, wait.”
“It’s her da,” he says, his tone resigned. “She doesn’t need to see this.”
I look down at the man I’m pinning to the floor. “Are you Ford Cheeke?” I say, because I want to be absolutely sure.
He swallows hard against the dowel. The burn scars against his throat have an unusual pattern—not like someone who’s been caught in a fire. Like someone who’s been exposed to fire over and over again.
“Yes,” he chokes out.
“Are you passing secret messages about Oren Crane to the king?” I say. “You have the means to get word to Galen Redstone?”
“What are you doing?” Lochlan hisses.
Ford looks back at me, and his expression shifts as he studies me. But that only lasts for a second before his eyes flick back to Penny. “My daughter—you have to let her go—”
“I’ll let her go if you answer honestly.”
“Don’t tell them anything,” Penny is saying behind Lochlan’s hand. “It’s a trap.”
Then she must bite him because he yelps and jerks his hand away.
And then she starts screaming.
It’s only for a second before Lochlan clamps his hand over her mouth again, then braces his back against the wall as she redoubles her struggles. He’s practically panting from the effort to keep her still. “Either get it done, or we’re going to have to run. The guards probably heard that.” Now he sounds aggrieved.
I press the blade against Ford’s neck. “I don’t work for Crane,” I say. “But I need to know if I’m speaking to someone who truly has the means to get word to Redstone. Tell me now.”
He studies me again. “Your accent. You’re from Kandala.” Realization dawns. “Penny—Penny, stop!”
His daughter goes still.
I don’t look away from Ford. “Yes. We are. Your turn.”
He nods, then winces as his chin touches the cold steel of the blade. “Yes. I can get word to the king. Who are you?”
I take a deep breath and hope I’m not making a mistake here. I withdraw the blade, then the dowel. I sit back and let him go.
“I’m Prince Corrick,” I say. “Younger brother to King Harristan of Kandala. We were separated from the Dawn Chaser on our journey to Ostriary and captured by Oren Crane.”
Ford pushes himself to sitting, but at that, he goes still. His voice is very quiet. “I received word that the prince was killed.”
“I’m very much alive.” I glance at Lochlan, who’s let Penny go. She’s staring at me, too. I look back at her father. “Master Cheeke, forgive the violent intrusion, but we need your help.”
