19

A hand shook her gently awake. “Miss Cooper,” Holt said, “we should be on our way.”

Fiona sat up quickly, shaking wheat dust off her clothes. “What time is it?”

“Not sure,” Sebastian said. “My watch was ruined by the river. But it’s well before dawn. I don’t know how early these farmers wake, but I don’t want to take any chances.”

They saddled the horses, who didn’t seem bothered by the early morning, and led them one by one out of the shed. The sky had cleared, and the setting moon cast a dim glow over the farmyard. Smaller buildings of weathered board and tiled roofs lay scattered here and there, most of them windowless, a few with the same wide doors as their ersatz inn. There was a stable to the right of the main house, both of which were dark and silent. To the left was a chicken coop. Fiona heard the mutterings of the hens as they drowsed in their nests. The sound made her hungry. “I wish we could cook eggs,” she said as she prepared to mount Mittens.

“Or hens,” Sebastian said.

“I’d settle for eggs.”

“Leave it to me,” Holt said, handing his horse’s reins to Sebastian.

“Holt, I wasn’t serious.”

“There are other foods on this farm we can eat. Go ahead, and I will catch up to you in due time.” Holt nodded at Fiona and slunk away in the direction of the farmhouse.

Sebastian looked at Fiona. “He’s going to get caught,” Fiona said.

“Possibly, but I’m more worried about slowing down. Still, there’s nothing I can do to change his mind once he’s made it up. Let’s just do as he says. Sweet heaven, I wish the world would run as I want for once.”

They picked up the road almost immediately. It was muddy, and the horses slogged through it with none of their usual cheerfulness. Fiona patted Mittens’ neck and wished she had some way to reassure the animal that things would improve. She didn’t urge her on when Mittens stopped to graze in the tall grass by the road. The poor horse must be as hungry as she was, maybe hungrier.

“He’s coming,” Sebastian said, and Fiona looked back to see Holt loping along the verge, his arms full of something. When he came near, she saw it was a large burlap sack, bulging and lumpy.

“Enough for now,” he said, and dug into it. He held out a red, ripe tomato the size of Fiona’s fist. “To sustain us until we are across the border. Though if we are to stay with the road, I think it is no more unsafe to buy from the roadside stands than it is simply to pass them by.”

Sebastian took a handful of carrots and saluted Holt with them. “I’ve never seen anything more delicious,” he said, and bit down hard, ignoring the dirt that lingered on the vegetable.

Fiona took a bite of tomato as if it were an apple, then swiped away the rosy juice that spilled out of it. “Agreed,” she said.

They rode on, eating tomatoes and carrots and handfuls of shelled almonds from a couple of smaller sacks. The sun rose, turning the world golden, and brought with it the songs of a hundred tiny black birds that swooped past overhead, their wings making a rushing sound like wind through treetops. The road wound through the verdant hills, and from somewhere in the distance came the smell of burning wood, a warm, bitter smell that enhanced the bright greenness of the hills. Fiona wiped her mouth with her sleeve. It was easy to forget, on a day like this, that they were being chased.

The reminder stung Fiona out of her relaxed state. She’d been so tired the night before. “Holt!” she said. “Do you have the blackmail?”

Sebastian cursed. “I can’t believe I forgot,” he said. “Everything I was carrying got washed away by the river. Please say you’ve got it.”

Holt pulled up his horse and turned around to rummage in his bag. “I have what I was given,” he said. “Whether that is what we seek, I do not know.”

He withdrew two scroll cases, a flat leather portfolio, and a stack of folders tied with black ribbon, and handed them to Sebastian. “Do we have time for this?” Fiona said, removing the scroll case from inside her bag.

“It won’t take long.” Sebastian handed her the folders. “Untie that, would you?” He worked his fingernails into the cap of the first scroll case and wiggled it. Fiona picked at the knot until it loosened, then handed the folders back to Holt.

The scroll case she’d carried with her until she’d forgotten it was there was waterproofed leather, sealed at both ends with blobs of red wax unmarked by sign and shield, or whatever Veriboldans used to signify their noble ranks. She chipped away at one blob with her fingernails until it cracked and fell apart into a dozen shards. Beneath it, the cap was plugged into the case as firmly as a cork in a wine bottle. Fiona worked at it until finally she coaxed it out and shook free the last clinging remnants of the seal, wiping her hand on her trousers.

She tipped the contents into her hand. There were three sheets of expensive paper with a thick texture rolled up inside, two of them faintly blue-tinged, the other creamy white. All of them were barely water-spotted despite their submersion in the Kepa River. Fiona unrolled all three into a thin sheaf. Beside her, Sebastian cursed again and thrust a page back into his scroll case. “Not that one,” he said.

The paper on top, the white one, was covered in a scrawling handwriting, difficult to read, but Fiona had no trouble identifying it as a hunter’s affidavit. Hunters were supposed to procure proof that the people they captured had inherent magic and had used it against others, though this almost never stopped them from enacting vigilante justice against anyone even suspected of it. This one was signed and countersigned, but not stamped, meaning the hunter had identified a target but not yet brought that person in for trial.

She skipped back to the top of the page and began puzzling out its contents. The hunter’s credentials, his evidence, the name of the accused… It brought her to a stop, unable to read further. She’d found what Sebastian was looking for. It couldn’t be anything else.

She read the name again, her stunned brain insisting it was impossible. She gripped the paper in suddenly nerveless fingers. Oh, how Sebastian had deceived her. You might care if you knew who my parents were. He was so right.

“The documents in these folders are in Veriboldan,” Holt said. “Miss Cooper?”

Sebastian looked up. “That’s probably not it, but maybe you shouldn’t read those. I don’t want you to…is something wrong, Fiona?”

Fiona swallowed to moisten her dry throat. “This is a hunter’s affidavit swearing to the existence of a man whose inherent magic is to manipulate the minds of others to make them do his bidding. To make them believe it’s what they want. The hunter lists times and places this man has used his magic on people. I don’t know how he can prove something like that, but it doesn’t matter, he has all the right signatures.” She looked at Sebastian. Surely it just her imagination that he seemed to be a thousand feet away. “The man he accuses is Douglas North.”

Sebastian’s eyes widened. Then his expression changed to one of wary uncertainty. “Fiona, I can explain.”

“You don’t have to,” Fiona said. “This is what you were looking for, isn’t it? You’re Prince Sebastian North. Douglas North is your scandal-ridden younger brother. And this is one hell of a scandal.”

Holt gently took the documents from her. Fiona thought about fighting him for them, then realized she didn’t care. The memory of Sebastian kissing her flashed past her inner eye, and she wished she could lash Mittens into a gallop and ride for the border, leaving the men behind forever.

“These other pages are worse,” Holt said, turning over the blue-tinged sheets, which were written on front and back. “A copy of a death certificate, and a testimony by a doctor whose name I do not recognize. Taken together, they paint a picture that sickens me. The death certificate is that of one Melanie Tippets, named in the affidavit as one of Prince Douglas’s victims, and the testimony avows that Miss Tippets was, despite appearances, murdered. The implication is that Prince Douglas used his inherent magic on the young woman, for what purpose it does not say, then either murdered her himself or caused her to be killed to prevent her revealing his actions.”

Sebastian looked sick. “He can’t have. Doug is an idiot, true, but he’s not evil.”

“I fear it does not matter whether it is true or not,” Holt said, letting the pages roll back together. “This is evidence strong enough to convict him. Even without Miss Tippets’ death, the knowledge that the North family is tainted by inherent magic will lose Queen Genevieve the Crown.”

“No wonder Mother didn’t want me to know what Doug had done,” Sebastian said faintly. “She must have known…he can’t be allowed to get away with murder, no matter what his reasons.”

“But it will destroy your family if he’s publicly tried,” Fiona said. There, she’d sounded calm and rational. He couldn’t hear the tiny voice shrieking inside her head to run, forget the four thousand guilders and leave him in her dust.

“There has to be something Mother can do.” Sebastian looked at Fiona more closely, appeared about to say something, then shook his head. “Let’s move on,” he said. “We have to return to Aurilien as quickly as possible.”

“Can’t you just destroy the evidence?” Fiona said.

“Mother insisted I return with it. I don’t know why. She might want the reassurance of destroying it herself.” Sebastian gathered the rest of Gizane’s documents and shoved them roughly into the saddlebags. He glanced at Holt, hesitated, and said, “Would you ride ahead and…I don’t know. Just…give us some privacy, please?”

Holt nodded and spurred his horse onward. “Fiona, let me explain,” Sebastian said.

“Explain what?” Fiona said. Her voice shook with anger. “I already knew you were above my station. I just didn’t know how far. And you were so careful not to let me know.”

“That’s not how it went. I couldn’t tell you at first because you were a total stranger and it wasn’t my secret to reveal.”

“So when were you going to tell me? When you paid me off? And I’d almost forgotten this was a business transaction.”

Sebastian swore explosively. “Look, I know you’re angry, and you deserve to be—”

“Thank you for your permission, your Highness.”

“I didn’t have a choice! I swore I’d keep the family name out of it. By the time I knew I could trust you, it was too late to simply blurt it out. I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you the truth for the last three days. I’m sorry you learned about it this way.”

Fiona unclenched her jaw, which was painfully rigid. “And what about the rest? Am I supposed to be grateful that a prince deigned to give me his attention? How far were you going to take this, Sebastian? Did you want me to fall into your bed, or were you going to be satisfied with a few stolen kisses?”

Sebastian closed his eyes briefly and visibly controlled himself. “Fiona,” he said, looking at her, “I never lied to you about that. You’re the most amazing woman I’ve ever met and it thrills me to be near you. I was serious when I told you I wanted the chance to see if that feeling could grow into something more. As far as I’m concerned, we’re just a man and a woman learning to fall in love. My being a prince has nothing to do with that.”

Fiona’s hands trembled, and she clamped down on Mittens’ reins more tightly, as if she might bleed off her anger and confusion into the leather. “Maybe to you it doesn’t matter,” she said tightly. “It’s not exactly fair to me.”

“If I don’t care, why should you?”

His intent expression, his utter surety that he was right, struck her an almost palpable blow. “I’m not part of your world, your Highness,” she said. “I’m a divorced tradeswoman who’s never been closer to high society than watching the Queen open the Midsummer festivities at the Zedechen Bethel, and that was from so great a distance she was the size of an ant. I wouldn’t have the first idea how to act at a palace reception, I don’t know how to dance, and I’d probably insult any Count or Baron I was introduced to because I have no idea how to behave to nobility. You and I have no future. We never have. The only difference between us is you seem not to believe this.”

Sebastian’s hands closed tightly on his reins. “You can be anyone you want to be, Fiona. It’s part of what I love about you. Are you telling me you’d let such petty concerns as your birth and upbringing stand between what we might have together?”

“Petty?”

He winced. “That was the wrong word.”

“It certainly was.” Fiona flicked the reins, and Mittens stepped out after Holt, who’d gone just far enough ahead to be out of earshot and stood waiting for them to finish. “We need to keep moving. I don’t want to be caught by the Veriboldans.”

“Fiona—”

“I don’t think there’s any point in arguing more. Let’s just ride.”

She prodded Mittens gently into a faster gait, the fastest she could manage without falling off. Sebastian didn’t come up even with her. At least he had the decency to obey her wishes. Her heart was too angry for tears. She should have followed her instincts and spurned him. Her judgment when it came to men was truly abysmal.

They rode on eastward into dawn, the sun pinking the horizon, then flooding the hills with golden light. The skies had cleared, and it was going to be a pleasant day, warmer and drier than the day before. Fiona remembered being soaked to the bone and shivered. They were heading back to the uplands and a Tremontanan winter. Too bad they were wanted fugitives, because staying in Veribold’s warm climate had some appeal.

Holt fell back to the rear of their procession around noon, watching behind them for pursuers, but the road remained clear of all but a few travelers, heading west. They passed Fiona and Sebastian without so much as a nod of acknowledgement. Fiona superstitiously kept her eyes on Mittens’ ears, as if anyone might read her guilt on her face. What did Hien think of her now? The truth, probably, that she’d been at the Irantzen Festival solely for the purpose of stealing from the Jaixante. If the guard had told Hien about the mystery tokens, she no doubt believed Fiona had succeeded.

Put in such bald terms, it made her look like a criminal. Which she was—and for the sake of a murderer and…was it rape if Douglas North was capable of gaining consent by making women believe they wanted what he did? Of course it was, if a roundabout sort of rape. It was still evil.

As the hours lengthened toward evening, she became more incensed with herself. She’d deceived an honorable woman, and for what? She glanced ahead to where Sebastian rode, hunched in on himself as if the cool breeze were an arctic wind, and her heart softened. How much worse it must be for him, tricked by his mother the Queen into helping his brother escape justice. Fiona might be angry with him, but she couldn’t help feeling sorry on his behalf. He lied to you, a tiny voice inside her head told her, but she ignored it. She’d seen how he looked when the blackmail was revealed, and he’d been devastated.

Hooves pounding the hard road heralded Holt’s return. “There is movement on the road to the west at the limits of my vision,” he said. “Many travelers moving rapidly.”

“You think they’re pursuing us?” Sebastian said.

“I think we cannot take the chance that they are not.” Holt looked at Fiona. “Can you ride faster?”

“Maybe a little,” Fiona said, gripping Mittens’ reins more tightly.

“Even a little helps,” Sebastian said. He urged his horse onward, and the other two followed.

Fiona started glancing over her shoulder every half hour or so, straining to see signs of pursuit. Holt’s eyes must be better than hers. All she could see was Holt, still riding at the rear, backlit by the setting sun. Sebastian rode even more hunched over than before. They came to a town straddling the road and passed through it; nobody suggested stopping for the night. Exhaustion settled over Fiona like an iron blanket, her legs and bottom were sore, and she couldn’t remember a time when Mittens’ ears weren’t her whole world. “I can’t go on much longer,” she called out. “I’m sorry, but I’m going to fall off.”

“We cannot ride through the night,” Holt said. “But we also cannot stay near the road.”

“We’ll have to cut across country,” Sebastian said. “There’s another border crossing south of here, nearer where the Snow River crosses the Eskandelic border. It will add half a day’s travel to our journey, but if it keeps us from being captured…anyway, we’ll be sleeping rough for a couple of nights.” He carefully didn’t look at Fiona.

“I don’t mind,” Fiona said. “But let’s hurry. We need to get away from the road before they’re close enough to see where we’ve gone.”

Sebastian immediately turned off the road into the short, rough grass of the verge. Fiona and Holt followed. They had left the hills behind just after noon and had traveled steadily upward since then, into the desert plains so unlike the green richness of the Kepa Valley. The uneven terrain jolted Fiona back and forth in the saddle, making it even more difficult for her to hold on. On the other hand, it kept her awake, so there was something good to come of it. She prayed none of the horses would fall lame, and prayed even more fervently that whoever was following them wouldn’t see they’d left the road.

The sun set, and the moon rose like heaven’s half-lidded eye watching over them. Fiona’s body ached, and despite the rough terrain she found herself nodding off and jerking back awake, over and over again. She didn’t realize at first that Sebastian had stopped, and rode a few paces past him before he jogged ahead of her horse and grabbed hold of her reins. “We’re stopping here,” he said quietly, as if afraid someone might overhear, though there was no one but the three of them for miles around.

Fiona nodded, blinked tiredness from her eyes, and slid off Mittens awkwardly. When her feet touched ground, her legs wouldn’t support her, and she landed in a graceless heap beside Mittens’ feet. Sebastian cursed and dropped to the ground beside her. “You’re exhausted,” he said, putting his arms around her and helping her stand. “You should have said something.”

She clung to him for support, not caring what message that might send. “I didn’t realize,” she said, her voice coming out as a croak. She cleared her throat and went on, “We probably shouldn’t light a fire.”

“No, that would be as good as a beacon to draw attention to us,” Holt said. He offered Fiona her heavy cloak, which he’d removed from her saddlebag. “This is the only bedding I can offer you.”

“It’s fine. Thanks.” Fiona let go of Sebastian, who removed his arms from around her a moment later. She tried not to think about how comforting it had been to be held by him. Wrapping her cloak around her, she dug through her other saddlebag for something to rub Mittens down with and came up with her ruined temple clothes.

A hand reached over her shoulder. “Let me do that,” Sebastian said. “You need to sit before you fall over.”

She thought about pressing the issue and realized he was weaving in her vision. A moment’s reflection told her she was the one moving, swaying with weariness. “All right,” she said, and retreated a few paces to sit where Holt had unloaded his horse’s burden and was rubbing him with a spare shirt.

“There’s a river—more of a stream, I suppose—somewhere around here,” Sebastian told Holt. “We’ll come across it if we keep going southeast. Until then, we’ll have to go thirsty, unless you have waterskins tucked away somewhere?”

“I do, but the water should go to the horses,” Holt said. He finished his task and rooted around in the food sack, coming up with a handful of crooked carrots, and handed some to Fiona. “Eat, then try to sleep.”

Fiona took his offering and began gnawing on a carrot. It was dry and hard, but better than nothing. She watched Sebastian care for Mittens, then for his own horse, before settling on the ground some distance from her. She was grateful that he didn’t seem inclined to renew his attempts to reason with her. She still didn’t know how she felt.

She lay back with her head pillowed on the hood of her cloak. The night air was cold, and she pulled her cloak more tightly around herself and stared up at the stars, brilliantly white against the black sky. Roderick had claimed to be able to find his direction by the stars, but she’d never believed him. Now she wished she’d paid more attention to all his talk of constellations, because it would give her something to think about now that wasn’t dwelling on Sebastian and his lies of omission.

She was just drifting off to sleep despite her aches when she heard Holt say, “This is an impossible situation.”

“I know,” Sebastian said, his voice pitched low, and Fiona realized he thought she was asleep. “Mother had to know what information Gizane had on Doug. She knows what he’s done. Sweet heaven, Holt, what have we lent ourselves to?”

“We could hardly have done otherwise,” Holt said. “There are too many innocents who would suffer if this were to be made public knowledge. Think of Princess Emily.”

“I am. And my Great-Uncle Sebastian. Damn it, Holt, I still feel used.”

“The Queen is intelligent enough to know you would not have agreed to this had you known the truth.”

“And we dragged Fiona into this. I can’t forgive myself for that.”

There was a pause. Holt said, “Is that all you cannot forgive?”

Sebastian laughed once, a low, bitter hah. “I couldn’t have screwed that up worse if that had been my plan to begin with.”

“You think she will not forgive you?”

“I don’t think it matters. She’s convinced we could never have a future together. I don’t know what to say, Holt. I finally…” He let out a long, pained sigh. “Willow North was a common thief before becoming Queen. It’s not like there’s no precedent.”

“I do not believe anyone could call Queen Willow a common anything. But I understand your point.”

There was a pause. “I think I’m in love with her, Holt. How big a fool does that make me?”

“She is worthy of being loved. I do not believe that makes you a fool, to recognize that.”

Fiona realized she was holding her breath and let it out in a long, thin stream that steamed in the cold night air.

“But I think pursuing her aggressively, trying to change her mind, would be a mistake,” Holt went on. “A mistake, and an insult to her free will.”

“I know,” Sebastian said. “I just don’t want to give up entirely.”

“Give it time, and perhaps things will look different.”

“They could hardly be worse.” Sebastian sighed. “It’s another day and a half to the border. Anything could happen.”

Holt grunted in reply, and both men fell silent. The stars above were blurry, and Fiona blinked away the beginnings of tears. It didn’t matter what Sebastian felt. What they both felt, she had to admit to herself. They were too different to make a life together. How would Sebastian feel about giving up his world of wealth and privilege to be a commoner like her? He wouldn’t be so cavalier about their different worlds then. She would be a fool to let her heart override her head. She would travel with him long enough to get her four thousand guilders, and then she never had to see him again.