“Well,” Joseph says, and pushes back from the table. “Shall we go? Or do you want another order of fried clams?”
Jules shakes her head, and they walk together out into the street. The early-evening light is softening, and the water of Sealhead Cove glitters cobalt and orange, visible between the buildings. As they make their way down toward it, Joseph slips his fingers into hers.
His touch still gives her a pleasurable jolt, even if it is tainted by what happened between him and Mirabella.
“Joseph,” she says, and holds his hand up. “Your knuckles.”
He lets go of her to make a fist. His knuckles are split and scabbed from working the boats. “I always said I would never work in the shipyard with my father and Matthew. Though I don’t know what else I thought I would be doing.” He sighs. “It’s not a bad life, I suppose. If it’s good enough for them, who am I to think any different? As long as you don’t mind me smelling like a barnacle.”
Jules hates to see his brave face. And how trapped he seems.
“I don’t mind,” she says. “And anyhow it’s not forever.”
“It’s not?”
“Of course not. It’s only until Arsinoe is crowned, remember? You on her council and me on her guard.”
“Ah,” he says, and slips his arm about her shoulders. “Our happy ending. I did say something like that, didn’t I?”
They walk companionably through the alley between the Heath and Stone and the Wolverton Inn, Camden hopping up and down on stacks of wooden crates full of empty bottles.
“Where did Arsinoe go off to tonight?” Joseph asks.
“To the bent-over tree, probably. To find Madrigal and do more low magic.”
“Madrigal is with Matthew. She met him on the docks, the moment he came in off The Whistler.”
Madrigal and Matthew. Their names together make her wince. Her mother’s fling with Joseph’s older brother should be over by now. Matthew at least should have come to his senses. He should realize how flighty and fickle Madrigal is. He should remember that he still loves her Aunt Caragh, banished to the Black Cottage or not.
“They ought to end that,” she says.
“Maybe. But they won’t. He says he loves her, Jules.”
“Only with his eyes,” she spits. “Not with his heart.” Joseph nearly flinches when she says that, and she glances sideways at his handsome profile. Perhaps that is how all men love. More with their eyes than with their hearts. So maybe it was not the storm and the circumstances. The delirium. Queen Mirabella is certainly more to look at than she is, and maybe it was nothing more complicated than that.
Jules pulls away.
“What?” Joseph asks. They round the corner at the end of the alley, and a small group spills out from the doors of the Heath and Stone. When they see Joseph, they stop short.
Joseph wraps an arm about Jules’s shoulders.
“Just keep walking.”
But as they pass, the nearest girl, brave on too much whiskey, cuffs Joseph in the back of the head. When he turns, she spits on the chest of his shirt.
Joseph exhales in disgust, but does his best to smile.
Jules’s temper flares.
“It’s all right, Jules,” he says.
“It’s not all right,” the girl snarls. “I saw what you did at the Beltane Festival. How you protected that elemental queen. Traitor!” She spits again. “Mainlander!” She turns to walk away but warns him over her shoulder, “Next time it won’t be spit. Next time it’ll be a knife between your ribs.”
“That tears it,” Jules says, and Camden leaps. She knocks the girl to the ground and pins her to the worn stones of the street with her one good paw.
Underneath the cougar, the girl trembles. The whiskey-courage is gone now, but she manages to curl her lip.
“What are you going to do?” she challenges.
“Anyone who touches Joseph will answer to me,” Jules says. “Or maybe to the queen. And her bear.”
Jules motions with her head, and Camden backs off.
“You shouldn’t protect him,” one of the girl’s friends says as they help her up.
“Disloyal,” says another as they back away and turn down the street toward their homes.
“You shouldn’t have done that, Jules,” Joseph says when they are alone.
“Don’t tell me what I should and shouldn’t do. No one’s going to touch you as long as I’m around. No one’s going to so much as look at you wrong.”
“And here you were worried that you and Camden would seem weak with your matching limps. I think they give you a wider berth even than before.”
“They must sense that we’re more ill-tempered now,” Jules says wryly.
Joseph steps close and tucks a lock of wavy brown hair behind her ear. He kisses her softly.
“You don’t seem so ill-tempered to me.”
ROLANTH
“Are the preparations made?” Mirabella asks.
“Your guards and the decoy carriage will be ready tonight,” replies High Priestess Luca. “Though the people would have you wait until morning for a proper send-off.”
Queen Mirabella’s heart thumps. She is seated on one of Luca’s small sofas, elbow-deep in striped silk pillows, and looks for all the world to be a queen at ease. But she has been waiting for this night ever since Arsinoe betrayed her by sending the bear across the Quickening stages.
The door of Luca’s chamber opens, and Elizabeth enters. She closes the door quickly behind her to shut out the ruckus from the rest of the temple. There is no peace to be found in Rolanth Temple anymore, except for the quiet space of Luca’s personal rooms. Everywhere else is busy from sunrise to after dark. The apse bustles with visitors lighting candles for their elemental queen or leaving offerings of scented water dyed to a bright blue or dark black. The priestesses are constantly occupied with sorting the gifts and crates of supplies arriving in the city daily: all they will need to lavishly entertain the coming suitors.
Luca tells the queen that they are sorting the supplies. But everyone knows that since Katharine has returned, they are checking each parcel for poison.
“Elizabeth,” Luca says. “What kept you? The tea is nearly cold.”
“Forgive me, High Priestess. I wanted to bring some honey from the apiary.” She sets a small clear jar on Luca’s table, half-filled with fresh honey still leaking from a piece of comb. Luca dips a spoon into the jar and sweetens their cups as Elizabeth brushes dirt from her initiate robes and takes a seat. Her cheeks are rosy from hurrying, and a fine glow of sweat sits on her deeply tanned forehead.
“You smell like the garden and hot summer air,” Mirabella says. “What is that in your pocket?”
Elizabeth reaches into the skirt of her robes and pulls out a small spade fitted with a leather cup and bracelet.
“I had it made in the central district. It affixes directly to my stump.” She holds her arm up so Mirabella can see the scarred end of her left wrist where the priestesses cut her hand off as punishment for aiding Mirabella’s escape from the city. “I can buckle it one-handed, and it makes tending the vegetables much easier.”
“That is wonderful,” Mirabella says, but her eyes linger on the scars.