“Play louder!” Genevieve orders. “So if the elemental’s coaches pass by they will hear it!”
Everyone raises a cheer, and the musicians play harder. Katharine wishes that Mirabella could hear all this. See all this. But though coaches from Rolanth may pass by carrying priestesses, Mirabella will not be with them. The elemental queen and her Westwoods traveled to Wolf Spring by sea, where they can control the currents and shifting winds, and, of course, where they were sure not to run into any poisoners.
Margaret Beaulin approaches the table and bows. Then she leans against it, so drunk that her left eye has begun to wander in its socket.
“An inspired move, bringing the bear inside,” she says. “The only thing better would be if it were Arsinoe’s body lying strapped in the wagon.”
Katharine’s eyes narrow.
“A vanquished queen is deserving of her burial rites, Margaret,” she growls in a different voice. “She is worthy of the people’s love and affection.”
Candles have burned in the windows of every town they passed through, in honor of Queen Arsinoe. And that is the way it should be.
Margaret waves her hand, oblivious to Katharine’s grave tone.
“Let them mourn and be done with it. Her name will not be spoken after your crowning. It will be lost in time. Like a pebble in a river.”
Katharine’s gloved fingers grip the wood of her chair so tightly that it squeaks.
“Katharine?” Pietyr asks. “Are you all right?”
Katharine snatches up her cup of tainted wine. She wants to throw it into Margaret Beaulin’s face, leap upon her, and pour it down her war-gifted throat.
Perhaps someday. But not now. She stands, and the musicians stop playing. The poisoners stop dancing midstep.
“A toast. To my sister Queen Arsinoe.”
Jaws drop slightly. They titter as if expecting a joke. But Katharine is not joking, and eventually, Natalia walks to her wine cup and holds it aloft. After a moment, the others follow suit.
“It would be easy to hate her,” Katharine says, thinking of her sister, her eyes losing focus on the crowd. “Another queen standing in the way. But Queen Arsinoe was an innocent in this. Just as much an innocent as I. Before that bear”—she gestures toward it—“before Beltane, the people felt about her what they felt about me. That we were weak. Born to die. Sacrifices to the chosen queen’s legend. So let us not forget the queen we truly hate. The darling of Rolanth and the temple.”
Katharine holds her cup high.
“So I toast to Queen Arsinoe, my sister, whom I killed with mercy. It will not be so when I kill Queen Mirabella. Queen Mirabella will suffer.”
THE BLACK COTTAGE
By the time Jules reaches the Black Cottage, she is too exhausted to be cautious. She pushes the spent horse the last strides through the trees; in the stream, he nearly stumbles and falls. She has to jerk up hard on his poor head to keep him on his feet.
“Caragh!”
She trots across the dirt path through the edging of waxed-leaf shrubs. Her voice is strained and odd-sounding. It seems like forever since she heard any voice at all. For hours it has been nothing but hoofbeats and rustling trees.
“Caragh!”
The front door of the cottage opens, and her aunt Caragh steps cautiously outside.
“Juillenne?”
“Yes,” Jules says. Her shoulders sag. They ache beneath Arsinoe’s weight. “It’s me.”
Caragh does not speak, but her chocolate hound bounds through the door and down the stone steps to jump at the horse and bay happily.
“Aunt Caragh, help us!” The words come out thin as air as she slides sideways out of the saddle, dragging Arsinoe’s body with her. But she does not hit the ground. Caragh’s arms are there to catch her.
“Jules,” Caragh says. She cups Jules’s face between her hands and then feels all up and down her bones. Beside them, her hound sniffs excitedly all over Camden, collapsed in the grass. Finally, Caragh pushes Arsinoe’s short black hair away from her face. Her lips tremble when she sees the scars.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” Jules whispers.
Footsteps shuffle through the cottage door onto the porch, and Jules looks up at an old woman dressed all in black and stout as a small ox. Stark white hair falls over her right shoulder in a long braid.
“Caragh,” she says. “They cannot stay here.”
“Who is she?” Jules asks. “I thought you were alone. I thought your banishment . . . your punishment was to be alone here until the new queens come.”
“That’s Willa,” Caragh explains. “The old Midwife. Someone had to teach me.” She looks toward the old woman. “I won’t turn my niece away.”
“It is not her I care about.” Willa nods toward Arsinoe. “That is a dead queen. And no queen may return here once she has grown. Not unless she is carrying her triplets.”
“She’s not dead!” Jules shouts. “And you will help her!”
Willa snorts.
“Such orders,” she grumbles as she walks down the steps. “I see the resemblance now between you and your aunt.”
“Turn her, Jules,” Caragh says. “Let me see.”
“Be careful. Don’t touch it. It’s a poisoned bolt.”
Caragh’s hand stops in midair.
“A poisoned bolt? Jules, there’s nothing to be done about that.”
“No, you—” Jules hesitates. But what does it matter if Caragh knows their secret? Everyone on the island thinks Arsinoe is dead. That she is really a poisoner makes no difference now.
Jules opens her mouth to speak, but stops when she sees Willa’s unsurprised expression.
“You knew,” says Jules. “You knew all along.”
Willa reaches down and grasps one of Arsinoe’s arms.
“Get her inside,” she says gruffly. “She is barely alive, but we will see what can be done. I am a poisoner as well. I can handle the bolt.”
Jules jerks awake in an unfamiliar bed. It is full dark out, and she reaches across the blankets to Camden so the big cat can soothe her with a purr. Then she remembers. They are at the Black Cottage. With Arsinoe. And Caragh.
Removing the poisoned bolt, cleaning and sewing the wound closed went easier than Jules had expected, mostly because Arsinoe never regained consciousness. Willa’s sure hands twisted and pulled, rubbed and tugged until the queen lay beneath a soft blanket, looking as calm and serene as if it were no more than a well-earned nap. Afterward, Caragh helped Jules down the hall to another room, where she and Camden were asleep as soon as they closed their eyes.
Jules slides out of bed, still in her clothes and shoes, and Camden stretches and jumps to the floor. There are lights casting shadows in the hall. Caragh or Willa must still be up somewhere.