She locked eyes with him, and silence stretched between them for a moment. He had the clear impression that she was assessing his character and deciding if she could trust him. He did a quick inventory: sword held loosely, blade pointed down, free hand uncurled and relaxed, boots solidly on the floor, no fighting stance visible. Keeping his eyes on hers, he waited.
Finally, she said, “How long until you can have my weapon ready and begin training me to use it?”
“Two days. Three at the most.” If he gave up sleep and pushed himself.
She nodded. “I’ll see you in two days.”
“Or three.” Panic was a quick skitter of nerves up his spine. He had to figure out how to balance the weapons. How to make them both deadly and light enough to carry comfortably.
Scraping the iron into shape was going to be the easy part.
She smiled. “I have confidence in you. I’ll see you in two.”
He was already pulling iron out of the sack before she finished walking to the door.
SEVEN
MORNING MIST ROLLED off the sea and crawled along the merchant district’s canals as Ari and Cleo disembarked from the palace’s long, sleek narrowboat and stepped onto the dock. Two of Thad’s newly hired royal guards followed them. It had been over a week since Thad’s coronation and the unsettling appearance of the little man with the cold smile and magic in his fingertips.
Or in his blood. Or wherever fae magic was kept.
Ari hadn’t yet found an opportunity to question Thad privately about his bargain with Teague. Her brother had been beleaguered with responsibilities from early morning until long into the night. Closed-door meetings with high-ranking nobles, visits with dignitaries from neighboring kingdoms, heated discussions with the Kosim Thalas steward over the rise in crime, and Assembly sessions that he’d required her to attend as part of his push to get her ready to rule in his place. She’d protested because, after her lunch with Lady Tassi, Ari had her own list of things she needed to do, none of which included dying of boredom in an Assembly meeting, but Thad refused to budge.
When she wasn’t busy enduring the meetings, Ari had spent the last few days reading up on the fae and the isle of Llorenyae. She hadn’t learned anything from the palace library that she hadn’t already heard from Lady Tassi.
The one useful thing she’d done was to gather iron from the palace smithy and charge the (very intriguing) weapons master with making something deadly and not too heavy. With the creation of the weapons under way, Ari had turned her attention to getting some bloodflower poison. The palace physician didn’t keep any on hand and had looked at her strangely when she’d asked for it. That left a trip to the market and her favorite spice shop. Preferably not on Mama Eleni’s regular market day—nobody killed a perfectly good plan faster than Mama Eleni.
“It’s odd coming into the city without your mother,” Ari said, trying to ignore the throb of pain that ached in her heart at the thought that she’d never come to the city again with her own mother. Missing Mama was a wound that refused to close. It was a dark hole in the corner of her heart that hurt every time she brushed up against it, and she knew that no matter where she went or what became of her, that pain would belong to her for the rest of her days.
“Just pray Mama keeps believing you had an early lunch with Lady Zabat. If she finds out we came to the markets on one of her non-market-going days, she’s going to kill us.” Cleo paused for effect. “Actually, she can’t kill you because you’re the princess, so I’ll take the fall for us both.”
“She’ll never know.” Ari linked her arm through Cleo’s as they left the dock and entered the merchant district.
Crowds were already starting to move along sidewalks paved in white stone. Merchants stood outside their shops, splashing buckets of water on the pastel walls or briskly sweeping dust from their stoops. Friendly poppies in riotous colors peeped out of window boxes and lent their sweet scent to the smell of baking bread and spiced tea as the girls passed a café and turned west.
“Spice merchant first and then lunch?” Cleo asked, sniffing appreciatively at a display of sweet cheese pastries. “Oh, and can we stop at the glassblower’s? I want to see if he has any broken bits he’ll part with.”
“What are you making this time?”
Cleo’s voice brightened. “I got scraps of leather from the tanner’s last week, and I’m going to dye them in the prettiest colors. I might have to use a lot of dye . . . Maybe don’t mention this project to Mama.”
“My lips are sealed. What does broken glass have to do with leather scraps?”
“I want to create a portrait that marries the delicate beauty of glass with the tough resilience of leather. I’m going to call it Girl.”
“Sounds perfect. I need to stop at the bookstore first to do more research. The spice shop is north of there, and the glassblower’s is closer to the docks, so can we do that last?” Ari steered Cleo to the opposite side of the street.
“I didn’t hear you mention stopping for pastries. I didn’t sneak behind Mama’s back only to skip our usual pastry break.”
Ari laughed. “Never let it be said that I skipped our pastry break. We’ll do that after the spice shop.”
The Open Page was a blue rectangle at the end of a narrow street, just past a milliner’s. Rahel, the owner, was a thin, birdlike woman with narrow features and a soft, pleasant voice.
There was another customer in the shop when Cleo and Ari entered, leaving their pair of guards outside the door. Both Rahel and the customer quickly bowed when they recognized Ari. She waved at them to rise and continue with their transaction as she turned to peruse the shelves of leather-bound books and scrolls of parchment.
“You have to stop doing that,” Cleo whisper-hissed in her ear as she took a book of her own off the shelf.
“Doing what?” Ari stared at her friend.
“Acting uncomfortable when people bow to you.”
“Well, I am uncomfortable.”
“But they have no choice. If they don’t bow and their disrespect is reported to the city guard, they’ll be fined. You can’t wave it off when failure to show you deference could cost them more than they make in a month.” Cleo flipped a few pages of her book and then set it back on the shelf.
Ari was silent for a moment as she considered Cleo’s words. “You’re right. I hate that it’s so awkward. I’m just me. If they spent any significant amount of time with me at all, they’d realize how ridiculous it is to bow to me all the time.”
“You’ll get no argument from me there.” Cleo grinned at Ari, and then turned as Rahel ushered her previous customer out of the shop and approached the girls.
“Your Highness, Cleo, what a delight to have you in my shop this morning.” Her eyes darted toward the store’s entrance. “But . . . this isn’t your usual market day. Where is Mama Eleni? Does she know you’re here?”
“We have guards with us, and Ari is the princess now, so she can do what she wants, and Mama Eleni doesn’t need to hear about this. Ever.” Cleo’s words tumbled from her mouth in a rush.