Alistair laughs and I scowl at him. “I’m not joking,” I say.
He palms the kronet, shoving it back in his pocket. “You’re not my only choice.”
“But I am your first one.”
His smile fades and he gives me an appraising look. “You are,” he says. “Your mother would have wanted it to be you.”
I jolt forward, goose bumps erupting down my back. “What?”
“I made my offer,” he says. “Will you take it?”
“What do you know about my mother?”
“Yes or no?”
I tense, prepared to strike, but he shakes his head in warning. “Yes or no,” he repeats. “Final chance.”
I stare at him, searching his face for any hint he might be lying. But even if he is, what choice do I have? I need that money; I need those tunnels.
I need him.
“Yes,” I say.
“Good.” Alistair smiles. “This is going to hurt.”
He grabs my shoulder, hard. A needle flashes in the light before biting into my neck. I cry out as he depresses the plunger, emptying a syringe of fluid into my veins. My blood slowly hardens into ribbons of ice until I’m frozen, staring at him in accusation before my body turns to stone and I shatter.
And Alistair Pembrough holds out his arms and catches me.
Five
I WAKE WITH A BODY full of lead in a room full of diamonds.
Not diamonds, only firelight reflecting off glass and an assortment of iron instruments, their shapes blurred beyond recognition by the frost clouding my mind. Closing my eyes again, I catch the scent of smoke and charcoal beneath something sweeter, like ladies’ perfume, and something darker, like dead things left rotting in the gutter.
The heat of the fire licks at my skin, thawing my body in bits and pieces: eyes, lungs, fingertips, toes. I feel each awakening in turn, wincing at the needling pain that lingers.
This is not my bed; this is not my room.
Where am I?
I’m lying on a table, hard and unforgiving against my spine. To my right, I see Alistair sitting on the floor with his back to a curved wall of gray stone, darkened by age and water. Ignorant to my gaze, he lights a match and watches it burn to the tips of his fingers, grimacing as the flame touches his skin before he flicks it out and lights another. A cigarette dangles unheeded from the corner of his mouth. He’s removed his overcoat and his dark waistcoat hangs unbuttoned to the white shirt underneath, sleeves rolled to his elbows. Scars line his forearms like rungs of a ladder, too perfectly even to be accidental. Self-inflicted.
Glancing up, he startles when he sees me, the cigarette nearly falling from his mouth. “She’s awake,” he says, standing.
Movement rustles on my other side and I struggle to roll my head toward it.
“Mild sedative my ass,” a girl says. “Good god, Pem, I thought you killed her.”
“An executioner only kills when he intends to,” Alistair says darkly.
The girl’s face falls into focus and I inhale, flooded with panic. Princess Bryn, the seventh heir to the throne of Brindaigel—and Alistair’s future wife. Their engagement was announced the day she turned sixteen, half a year ago, and they celebrated by being paraded through the kingdom in a carriage made of glass, flinging handfuls of copper tretkas into the crowd. We threw back flowers the guards had handed us moments before they arrived, but Cadence had kept hers, carrying it home cradled to her chest, out of view of the boys she often fought with. It had died a day later, the dyed petals faded to the color of ash.
Bryn was beautiful from a distance, even more flawless up close, with golden skin and dark red hair combed high off her forehead, hanging in a knotted rope down her back. She smells warm, a silky blend of perfume and musk that hints at an evening of dancing. Freckles darken her shoulders and the bridge of her nose, half hidden beneath a layer of shimmering powder.
Leaning her palms against the table, she gives me a careful, painted smile. “Hello, Faris,” she says.
“Where am I?” My voice comes out dry, cracked.
“The most private room in the castle,” she replies, eyebrow arching. “Scream all you’d like; the walls have heard it before.”
Blood. That’s what I smell beneath her perfume. Blood and fear and gasping final breaths. I’m in the torture chamber.
Jolting upright, I roll off the table, wavering on my feet. Vertigo strikes and I back up to the wall, jostling rows of hanging chains and fraying ropes that dangle from hooks above my head. Twisting away from them, I land on my knees with a crack of bone, palms flat against a clammy floor. It’s a gesture of defeat in the fighting ring, and I close my eyes, woozy and disoriented.
“You drugged me,” I accuse.
“Necessary precaution,” says Alistair. “Some of these tunnels are mine alone, and on the off chance you can run a straight line out of here, I couldn’t risk you memorizing the way. Here.” He crouches in front of me, a cup of water in one hand. I draw back, but he persists and I finally accept. The water is warm and tastes like smoke, but I swallow it down in one gulp, fingers clutching the wooden cup, estimating its potential damage.
Alistair pries it out of my hand with an apologetic smile.
“I thought you said she could fight,” Bryn says, hands on her hips as she frowns down at me.
Fear brines my mouth. Do they expect me to fight the princess? I’ve heard enough stories to know the wealthy have unusual appetites and money enough to whet them. A girl fighting royalty wouldn’t be the strangest thing they’ve paid to see.
“Give her a minute,” Alistair says, irritated. “I had to guess the dosage based on her size, since you refused to help me—”
“My father will overlook your experiments so long as they only involve you and your prisoners,” she interrupts. “You are not allowed to poke holes in his daughter’s arms. Nor drug her with homemade poisons in the interest of science.”
“Not until we’re married,” Alistair says with a brittle, humorless smile. He slides an arm around me to help me stand, but I recoil from his touch. Fifty gold kronets, he promised, but at what cost? This is not a place meant for second chances.
I shove him away with a pathetic, open-palmed gesture. He dutifully rocks back, expression inscrutable as his eyes flick from me to Bryn and back again.
“I assume Pem warned you before he dragged you through the streets,” says Bryn. “You know why you’re here?”
The room shifts and I close my eyes, begging it to stop. “A job,” I manage to croak. What drugs did he use? Now that the frost has melted from my blood, I feel like I’m on fire, burning from the inside out. Goose bumps stud my arms like a rash, itchy and tight. Swallowing back the taste of bile, I cut a dark look toward Alistair, laced with unspoken accusation. Gold, he promised. Freedom. My sister—
My mother. “My mother,” I say, half question, half lingering surprise.
“Was a thief,” says Bryn, pulling the conversation—the attention—back to her.