“Your Highness!” Randalin protests.
“And yet you’re standing,” says a pixie. “How is it that you’re standing?”
“He must only have had the barest sip,” Jude lies. “Brother, perhaps it’s time to come away and rest.”
Perhaps it would be better if they got out of the Milkwood. He’s feeling somewhat unsteady on his feet. He’s feeling somewhat unsteady, period.
“Do you think I’m responsible?” Wren whispers, her hand still in his.
No, of course not, Oak wants to say, but he isn’t sure he can make his mouth spit out those words.
Did she poison the Ghost? Would she have done it for Hyacinthe’s sake, if he asked her to help? Had he found out a secret so great she would protect it, even if it cost a life?
“I will believe whatever you tell me,” Oak says. “Nor will I look for deceit in your words.”
She watches the shifts of his expression, almost certainly looking for deceit in his words.
The vulture shifts, watching him with bead-black eyes. Bogdana’s eyes, filled with rage.
“I’m sorry,” Wren says. He sees the hag’s talons sink into her shoulder hard enough to pierce flesh. A trickle of blood runs down her dress. But Wren’s expression doesn’t change.
He’s sure she feels the pain. This is what she must have been like back in the Court of Teeth. This is how she endures all that she does. But he doesn’t understand why she allows Bogdana to hurt her this way. She has the authority and power now.
Something is very, very wrong.
“You need to tell me what’s going on,” he says, keeping his voice low. “I can fix it. I can help.”
“I’m not the one who needs saving.” Wren lets go of his hand.
“It was her,” insists Taryn. “Her or that witch she has with her or the traitorous knight who tried to kill Cardan. I want the knight arrested. I want the girl arrested. I want the witch in a cage.”
Randalin blinks several times in surprise. “Well,” he says to Wren. “Aren’t you going to say anything? Tell them you didn’t do it.”
But again, she is silent.
The Minister of Keys sputters a bit as he tries to digest this. “My dear girl, you must speak.”
Cardan turns toward Wren. “I’d appreciate it if you went with my knights,” he says. “We have questions for you. Tiernan, show us your loyalty and accompany her. I am personally charging you with not letting her out of your sight.”
Tiernan looks in Oak’s direction in alarm.
Wren closes her eyes, as though her doom has come upon her. “As you command.”
“Your Majesty,” Tiernan begins, frowning. “I can’t leave my charge—”
“Go,” Oak says. “Don’t let her out of your sight, as the High King said.” He understands why Tiernan is concerned, however. Sending him away may mean that Cardan doesn’t want Oak to have anyone to fight at his side when the High King questions him.
Randalin clears his throat. “If I may, I suggest we move to Insear. The tents are already set up and guards sent ahead. We will not be so out in the open.”
“Why not?” says Cardan. “A perfect place for a party or an execution. Tiernan, take Queen Suren to her tent and wait with her there until I call on her. Keep everyone else out.”
The vulture on her shoulder jumps into the sky, beating black wings, but Wren makes no protest.
Oak wonders if he could stop them. He doesn’t think so. Not without a lot of death.
“Let me go with her,” Oak says.
Jude turns toward him, raising her brows. “She didn’t deny it. She isn’t denying it now. You’re staying with us.”
“Furthermore,” proclaims Cardan to the rest of his knights, “I want the rest of you to find Hyacinthe and bring him to my tent on Insear.”
“Why not suspect me?” Oak demands, voice rising.
Taryn gives a little laugh, at odds with the tears staining her cheeks. “That’s ridiculous.”
“Is it? I found his body,” the prince insists. “And I have a motive, after all.”
“Explain,” Cardan says, mouth a grim line.
Jude seems to sense what’s coming. There are too many people around, guards, courtiers, Randalin, and Baphen. “Whatever Oak has to tell us, he can tell us in private.”
“Then by all means,” says Cardan, “let’s depart.”
But Oak doesn’t want to be quiet. Maybe it’s the blusher mushroom in his blood, maybe it’s the sheer frustration of the moment. “He murdered my first mother. He’s the reason she died, and you both—you all—hid it from me.”
A hush goes through the courtiers like a gust of wind.
Oak feels the delirious abandon of breaking the rules. In a family of deceivers, telling the truth—out loud, where anyone could hear it—was a massive transgression. “You allowed me to treat him like a friend, and all the while you knew we were spitting on my mother’s memory.”
A drawn-out silence follows his last word. Oriana has a white-fingered hand pressing against her mouth. She didn’t know, either.
Finally, Cardan speaks. “You make a very good point. You had an excellent reason to try to kill him. But did you?”
“I urge you all,” interrupts Randalin, “if for no other reason than discretion, let us repair to the tents at Insear. We will have some nettle tea and calm ourselves. As the High Queen says, this is not a conversation to be had in public.”
Jude nods. This may be the first time Randalin and Jude ever agreed on anything.
“If my family had their way,” says Oak, “this isn’t a conversation we’d have at all.”
Then, from across the Milkwood, there’s a scream.
Moments later, a knight steps into the clearing, looking as though she’s run all the way there. “We found another body.”
Most of the remaining knot of courtiers begin to move in the direction of the scream, and Oak goes along, though he still feels unsteady. They know he’s poisoned, at least. If he falls down, no one will have many questions.
“Whose?” Jude demands.
They don’t have to go far, though, and he sees the body before she gets her answer.
Lady Elaine, lying in a heap, one of her small wings half crushed when she fell from the horse that is nuzzling the end of her skirts. Lady Elaine, her cheek stained with mud. Her eyes open. Her lips purple.
Oak shakes his head, taking a step back. Hand coming up to cover his mouth. Two people poisoned—three people, counting himself. Because of the conspiracy?
Cardan is watching him with an unreadable expression. “Your friend?”
The Roach moves to Oak, puts one green clawed hand against the middle of his back. “Let’s go ahead to Insear, as the Minister of Keys said. You’re upset. Death’s upsetting.”
Oak gives him a wary look, and the goblin holds up his hands in surrender, his black eyes sympathetic. “I had no part in Liriope’s murder nor these,” the Roach says. “But I can’t claim I’ve never done anything wrong.”
Oak nods slowly. He can’t claim that, either.
He mounts up again on Jack, who has obligingly become a horse again. The goblin rides a fat, spotted pony, low to the ground. Behind him, someone is saying that the festivities can’t possibly go on as planned.
Oak thinks of Elaine, lying in the dirt. Elaine, who was dangerously ambitious and foolish. Had she told the rest of the conspirators that she was quitting and received this in answer?
His mind turns to Wren, with the vulture’s talons digging into her skin. Her blank expression. He keeps trying to understand why Wren endures it without crying out or striking back.
Does it have something to do with Garrett and Elaine being poisoned?
Oak was a fool to bring Wren here. When he gets to the tents on Insear, he’s going to find hers. Then he is going to get them both off the isles and out of this vipers’ nest. Away from Bogdana. Away from his family. Maybe they could live in the woods outside her mortal family’s home. She’d said, back when they were questing, that she’d like to visit her sister. What was her name? Bex. They could eat scavenged berries and look up at the stars.
Or maybe Wren wants to go back north, to the Citadel. That’s fine, too.