“But . . .” My throat is tight. Most of the time, I try to hold the memories of Everless, of my childhood, at bay. But Amma’s face, full of hope, is bringing it all back to me in a flood—the labyrinthine halls, the sweeping lawn, Roan’s smile. Then, the memory of flames burns everything else away. My mouth suddenly tastes bitter.
“Haven’t you heard the rumors?” I ask. Her smile falters, and I pause, hating to puncture her happiness. But I can’t take the words back, so I plow on instead. “That they’re only hiring girls. Pretty women. The elder Lord Gerling treats servants like toys, right under his wife’s nose.”
“That’s a risk I’ll have to take,” she says softly. Her hands fall from mine. “Alia is going too, and Karina—her husband is gambling away their time.” I can see the anger in her eyes—Karina is like a mother to her, and it enrages Amma to watch her suffer. “No one has work. Everless is the only real chance I’ve got, Jules.”
I want to argue further, to convince her that the fate of an Everless girl is thankless and degrading, that they all just become the title without a name of their own, but I can’t. Amma’s right—those who serve the Gerlings are compensated well, at least by Crofton’s standards, though the blood-irons they’re paid are taken—stolen—from people like Amma, me, and Papa.
But I know what it is to be hungry, and Amma doesn’t share my hatred of the Gerlings, or my knowledge of their cruelty. So I smile at Amma as best I can.
“I’m sure it’ll be wonderful,” I say, hoping she doesn’t hear the doubt in my voice.
“Just think, I’ll see the Queen with my own eyes,” she gushes. While Papa secretly scorns the Queen, in most families, she is little less than a goddess. She might as well be a goddess: she’s been alive since the time of the Sorceress. When blood-iron spread through everyone’s veins, invaders descended from other kingdoms. The Queen, then the head of the Semperan army, crushed them, and has been ruling ever since.
“And Ina Gold,” Amma continues. “She’s supposed to be very beautiful.”
“Well, if she’s marrying Lord Gerling, she must be,” I reply lightly. But my stomach clenches at the thought of Lady Gold. Everyone knows her story: an orphan like so many, abandoned as an infant on the rocky beaches near the palace on Sempera’s shore as a sacrifice to the Queen. In light of the many attempts on the Queen’s life, especially in her early years, she refused to have her own child or take a spouse; instead, she promised to choose a child to bring up as a prince or princess—and if they were worthy, to inherit the crown when the Queen was ready to pass on the throne. Possibly Ina’s parents were even more desperate than the peasants of Crofton are. She caught the eye of the Queen’s lady-in-waiting, and the Queen chose Ina Gold as her daughter—and two years ago, officially named Ina as her own heir.
Now she’s seventeen. The same age as Amma and me—but she’ll inherit the throne, and the royal time bank, and live for centuries. And her time will be filled with feasts and balls and things I can’t even imagine, unconcerned with me and everyone else burning through our little lives outside the palace walls.
I tell myself the envy that sticks in my throat is because of this, and not because she will be Roan’s wife.
“You could come too, Jules,” Amma says quietly. “It wouldn’t be so bad if we were there to look after each other.”
For a second, I imagine it—the narrow servants’ halls and vast sweep of the lawn, the grand marble staircases.
But it’s impossible. Papa would never stand for it. We were forced to flee Everless, flee the Gerlings. It’s because of them that we’re starving.
Because of Liam.
“I can’t leave Papa,” I say. “You know that.”
Amma sighs. “Well, I’ll see you when I return. I want to save up enough time to go back to school.”
“Why stop there?” I tease. “Perhaps a nobleman will fall in love with you and sweep you away to a castle.”
“But what would Jacob do then?” she says with a wink, and I force a laugh. Suddenly I realize just how lonely I’ll be in the long months that Amma is gone. Seized by a sudden fear that I’ll never see her again, I pull her into a hug. Despite the long hours spent separating bone and gristle, her hair still smells like wildflowers. “Good-bye for now, Amma.”
“I’ll be back before you know it,” she says, “full of stories.”
“I don’t doubt it,” I say. I don’t say: I just hope they’re the happy kind.
I tarry with Amma for as long as I can, but the sun doesn’t stop sinking. My stomach heavy with dread, I trudge off to the time lender. I weave between stalls to find the end of the still-too-long line, winding toward Duade’s door with its burnt-in hourglass symbol. Behind it will be the flash of the blade, the powder that turns blood and time to iron.
I keep my eyes on the ground in an effort to avoid the sight of the people who leave the shop, pale and breathless and a little bit closer to death. I try to tell myself that some of them will never visit the time lender again—that next week, after they find work, they will go home and melt a blood-iron in their tea and drink it down. But that doesn’t happen here in Crofton; at least, I’ve never seen it. We only ever bleed, only ever sell.
After a few minutes, a commotion draws my eyes up. Three men are emerging from the store—two collectors, Everless men, the family crest gleaming on their chests and short swords swinging on their belts; and between them, the time lender, Duade, his arms pinned in their grip.
“Let me go,” Duade shouts. “I didn’t do nothing wrong.”
The crowd murmurs, and I feel panic cinch around us all. Certainly no small number of illegal happenings go on in Duade’s shop, but the Gerlings’ police have always let them pass with a wink and a nod and a month-iron slipped from palm to palm. The time lender might be an oily, greedy sort, but we all need him at one time or another.
I need him today.
As Duade struggles uselessly against the officers, the sound of hooves rings out through the square. Everyone quiets at once, Duade going still in the collectors’ grip as a young man on a white mare rounds the corner into the marketplace, hood drawn up against the cold.
Roan. In spite of myself, my heart lifts. Over the past few months, now that he is of age, Roan Gerling has started to pay visits to the villages his family holds. The first time he appeared, I scarcely recognized him, lean and blindingly handsome as he’s become—but now, whenever I go to market, I secretly hope to see him, though I know he can never see me. I want to hate him for his fine clothes, the way he looks around with that slight, benevolent smile, reminding us that he owns every tree and cottage and pebble in the road. But my memories of Roan run too deep for hatred, no matter how I try. And besides, the collectors are more lenient when he’s around. Whatever is happening with Duade, Roan will put an end to it.
But when I glance back at the storefront, the look on Duade’s face as he stands pinioned between the two guards isn’t relief. It’s pure fear.
Confused, I turn as the boy yanks down his hood. He has the right broad shoulders, golden skin, and dark hair. But he is all severity: stormy brows; hard nose; a high, aristocratic forehead.