Her lungs burned with the effort of running as the bag bounced off her hip, the sword tight across her shoulders. She turned a corner and skidded to a stop as two drunken Spades strolled down an intersecting hallway before her. There was nowhere to hide; she was in the middle of a wide corridor. Dinah froze, certain that the guards could hear her heart pounding in her chest, her loud breathing, the sound of tears dripping off her face.
An eternity passed as they strolled past her, their eyes focused straight ahead, the sound of their laughter bouncing off the walls. From there on, Dinah clung to the walls, staying in the shadows as she wove her way through the palace, her face rubbing up against thick cobwebs and scurrying spiders. Charles’s apartment was in the southwest end of the castle, and Dinah was out of breath by the time she reached the hallway that led to his atrium. Trembling, Dinah set the bag down and ducked behind a massive statue of Stern Ravier, the greatest Club Card that ever lived, killed in a battle with the Yurkei.
She peeked around his leg muscles. There were two Heart Cards standing in front of Charles’s open door. Wind whistled down the corridor, the door bucking in the breeze. She leaned back against the statue, her heart fluttering with panic. What would Wardley do? He would send them away somehow, she thought. But if I try to do that, it will be my blood left behind. Dinah untied the bag. Inside were a few pieces of clothing, loaves of bread, and a seemingly random collection of items. She shook her head. There was a strange metal contraption at the bottom. It looked like some sort of ratchet with wheels, moving parts, and a siphon. It would do. Dinah closed her eyes, said a silent prayer and flung it down the adjacent hallway with all her might. It landed with a loud metal clatter that ricocheted up and down the palace walls. The Heart Cards, well trained, didn’t hesitate. Swords drawn, they ran in the direction of the sound.
Dinah pulled her cloak around her and slipped silently through the door into Charles’s apartment. All was still. The room was a bizarre tomb—a monument of hats, stairways, and twisted furniture. The animals painted on the domed ceiling watched Dinah, their mouths forever open in macabre smiles. Clear white moonlight fell in through open windows, illuminating a shiny red ribbon in front of Dinah’s feet. Horror spread through her veins as her eyes followed the ribbon into an open closet near the front of the room. Walking slowly, she made her way over ankle-deep hats to the door. It inched open slowly, and Dinah prayed that she wouldn’t see Charles’s face. Instead, she saw the lifeless open eyes of Lucy, staring straight at Dinah, her throat a river of black blood. Quintrell was slumped over her, his dagger lying beside him on the floor. His taut muscles looked like stone in the dark light, ruined only by the rivulets of blood that ran down them. His throat also had been opened, his chest stabbed. Dinah clamped both hands over her mouth as she opened her throat in a silent scream, and rocked back and forth, struggling to hide her loud sobs. Then she reached out and shut their eyes with her fingers.
She heard the stranger’s voice in her head, again and again. Time is ticking, Princess. Ticktock. You must go. She raised her head. “Charles?” she whispered, daring to hope. “Charles?”
Only the darkness answered back, howling wind from an open window. The window . . . her gaze drifted up to Charles’s favorite staircase, where an open window creaked and slammed in the violent wind. Oh please, thought Dinah, oh gods, no. She rushed up the winding staircase, for once not aware of how dangerous it was, a staircase that seemingly led to the heavens, a staircase with no railings and cluttered with hats of every color and shape. She followed the corkscrew up and up, climbing without thinking, her feet slipping precariously on the edges of the thinning wood.