“No, he won’t,” Sophie said. “We’re not interested in you, just who sent you.”
“Though, if you don’t tell us, then killing you would be simpler,” Cameron added. “So it’s best for you to be forthcoming and live to breathe another day. So. Who sent you?” He held the sword steady, not easing the pressure any. A bead of sweat ran down the man’s temple.
“All right. I’ll tell you what I know,” he growled. “But it won’t help you much.”
“Why not?” Cameron asked.
“Because I don’t know who she was.”
“She?” Sophie said. She swallowed against the sudden sick feeling in her gut. A woman had arranged this? Who?
“Yes. Some girl found me at my lodgings. Offered gold. Plenty of gold.”
“She didn’t give a name?” Cameron demanded.
“No. Just directions to this room and that I was to take care of whoever was in here tonight.”
“What did she look like?” Sophie asked.
“Like any other Anglion girl. Dark hair. Dark eyes. Taller than you. Older, too, I’d guess. Though she had smooth skin, and her hands didn’t look like someone who did rough work.”
An Anglion girl. One with either an indoor occupation or income enough not to have to work. Well, that wasn’t particularly helpful.
“What was she wearing?”
“A dress. A brown dress.”
Brown? As in the color the temple priors wore? Their robes were brown. And in her experience, they tended to favor brown even when they weren’t dressed for temple duties.
“Anything else that you can remember?” Cameron said.
Their captive shook his head. Cameron turned the sword slightly. “Are you sure of that?” The prisoner winced, and another bead of blood rolled down his neck.
“All right! She smelled like that incense the priors use. Made my room smell like a bloody temple for hours.”
Sophie went cold. Only the temples burned the incense used in their rituals. For the woman to have that smell embedded in her clothes, she would have to spend a lot of time in the temples. She had to be a prior or a devout.
Cameron stared down at him for a moment and then reversed the sword and neatly clipped the man on the temple. He slumped against the bathtub, unconscious.
“What did you do that for?” Sophie asked.
“He’s not going to tell us anything else useful,” Cameron said. “And we’re wasting time. We should leave. Go to Liam. Or Lord Sylvain.”
“No. Not them. They can’t help us. We need to leave, Cameron. Not just the palace. But Kingswell.”
“What?”
“Think about it. Whoever did this—tried to kill a royal witch—has to be powerful. Powerful enough to think they can avoid discovery. Or repercussions. That’s a limited list. He said the woman who hired him wore brown. The temple priors wear brown. Which makes me wonder if the Domina found out about what I did at the ball.” She shivered again as she looked at the man, and suddenly the familiarity of the sensation hit her. The same feeling she’d felt in the Salt Hall.
“If she did that, wouldn’t she just accuse you?”
Sophie bent and started going through the man’s pockets. “Not if she thinks she can kill two birds with one stone. Get rid of me and stir up the sentiment against Illvya.” She slid her fingers into the inner pocket of his jacket, feeling them go colder as she touched a leather pouch. She pulled it out, opened it. Tipped a flat silver disk stamped with an unfamiliar symbol onto the bed. The chill she felt grew stronger. “How much do you care to wager that that’s an Illvyan scriptii? I’m guessing he was supposed to leave it. Make it look like an Illvyan attack. There aren’t many people in Anglion who would be able to lay their hands on such a thing or manufacture one. But I’d imagine the Domina is one of them.”
“You really think the Domina wants you dead?”
“She seems the most likely candidate. She can’t control me. Which makes me a threat. She’s been working hard to have a position of influence with the queen. She’s not the type to waste that. Besides, even if I’m wrong, I think I’d rather learn from Lord Sylvain’s lessons and not take any chances. We can’t stay here, Cameron. He came into our room. He got past the guards and the wards. Someone helped him do that. We can’t trust anyone in the palace. If this was the Domina, then, yes, maybe she’ll be desperate enough to accuse me in public. If that happens, then I’m doomed. Or maybe she’ll just try again to get rid of me another way. I’m not going to sit here and wait for either of those things to happen.”
Cameron’s face had changed from surprised to angry. Anger was good. Anger would help them. “What are you proposing?”
“We need to get to Madame de Montesse,” Sophie said. “The portals in the palace are guarded. We can use hers to get away from Kingswell. Find somewhere to hide whilst we work out what to do.”
He blew out a breath. Then nodded, once. “All right. And this one?” He pushed at the man with his bare foot.
Sophie bit her lip. “You think we should kill him, don’t you?” She didn’t know if she could do that. Not in cold blood. Even if he had tried to kill her.
“It would be safest. We can’t risk him waking him up when we’re gone and alerting whoever sent him that he failed. No one’s come to investigate yet, so I’m thinking perhaps that the plan was to leave us to be discovered in the morning rather than anything sooner. So we have a window of time. Not too long, though.”