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It wasn’t a surprise that Elwyn hadn’t invited her to the hot spring. That would have required Elwyn to speak with her. Walter had suggested at breakfast that maybe the princess needed “some more time,” and normally Rada would have been happy to wait. But her conversation with Vikker had alarmed her, and she worried Elwyn might be in real danger now.
All morning, her ring had been glowing and flashing with odd little lights, as if reacting to scattered remnants of magy all around. Yes, there were often random traces, here and there, even in the most unlikely places. But never this many all at once. She couldn’t help but wonder if Vikker was up to something. So she spent an hour riding up the valley as far as Lake Almis, and then down it on Ghatee Road. She got nearly halfway to the confluence with the River Darunadi before it occurred to her that Vikker might very well be doing this as a distraction to keep her busy, and she turned back for town.
Her first thought was to ride straight back up to the palace, but then the lights in her ring grew brighter as she passed the turn for the Garam Hot Springs. “Oh, holy Finster,” she thought. “That’s where Elwyn and Andras are!”
With horrible visions of torture and murder racing through her mind, she urged her horse to a trot and headed up the road, using the ring as her guide to pick her way among all the little paths and trails. A low, sulfurous fog drifted down through the trees, and at every turn, she expected to meet Vikker. She didn’t want to fight him. He was a real hillichmagnar, and there wasn’t much she could do against him. But she kept her thumb on the stone of her ring, and a spell ready on the tip of her tongue, just in case.
In minutes, she arrived at a little clearing around one of the springs, and when the steam parted, she saw Andras, wrapped in a towel and lying on a blanket alone. She ran toward him, thinking he might be injured, but then he let out a long, lazy snore and turned on his side. An empty wine bottle rolled out from under his arm and settled in the grass.
He was clearly naked under that towel—she could see his clothes now, lying nearby and neatly folded. And though Rada didn’t have much romantic experience, she didn’t need to see the faint, dreamy smile on his lips to know he hadn’t gotten naked to go swimming.
Rada raised an eyebrow. Apparently he had succeeded in his challenge, and the princess had yielded to him. But where was Elwyn? She hadn’t run off and left him there, had she? That would be rather odd, even by her standards.
Careful not to wake him, she tiptoed around and approached the tent, and as she did so, she heard a low sniffling sound, and a hiccup, and a soft, plaintive moan. It was a girl’s voice, clearly, and she was crying. This had to be Elwyn. Again, Rada thought of all the horrible things Vikker might have done to her, and she ran the last few yards, throwing open the flap of the tent and looking breathlessly in.
A girl was there, but she wasn’t Elwyn. She was tall and blonde and dressed in men’s clothing. Seated at a little writing desk, she seemed to be trying to compose a letter. Judging from the puffiness of her face and the tears running down her cheeks, the letter wasn’t going to be a happy one.
“Hello?” said Rada. “Can I help you?”
The girl jumped with a little cry of alarm, dropping the quill and splattering ink across the desk. She wiped her eyes on her sleeve and turned to Rada, shaking with fright. “Who are you?”
“My name is Lady Rada Kaur. And you are...?” There was something oddly familiar about the girl, like maybe Rada had met her before, or at least seen a painting of her. Was she someone famous? A lot of famous people came to Briddobad for the cool air and the waters. Probably this was some rich merchant’s daughter Andras had seduced to ease his longing for Elwyn. Or maybe she was even a courtesan. One never knew.
“I’m...I’m a friend of Andras,” the girl said tearfully. “But I’ve got to leave before he wakes up.”
“That’s not a very friendly thing to do,” said Rada. She nodded at the letter. “Are you breaking up with him?”
The girl shook her blonde head. “No, we were never together. Or, I mean, we were together, but it was just this one time, and it was a terrible, terrible mistake. I don’t even know why I did it.”
So, not a professional courtesan, then. Rada felt indignant at Andras on the poor girl’s behalf. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
A tiny sob escaped the girl’s lips. “No. I’m writing him a letter to apologize for what I did.”
Rada wanted to give her a hug. “I live at the Pradivani Palace, and if you come up there with me, maybe we can get you some tea and a bite to eat.”
“No. I...I should be going,” the girl said, looking from her unfinished letter, to Rada, and then back again. She started to stand, but as she did so, Rada caught sight of a copper-colored ring on her finger. The stone in it flashed, and Rada’s ring flashed in answer.
“Where did you get that?” Rada demanded, pointing at the girl’s hand.
“This?” said the girl, looking guilty. “Someone gave it to me.”
“Do you know how to use it?”
“Yes, he showed me how,” said the girl, sitting again and shrinking away.
Rada tried to smile reassuringly, in spite of her rising anger. “And this man who gave you that ring, was his name Vikker Sarassen?”
The girl didn’t even need to answer. The look of surprised recognition in her eyes was enough. “He...he gave it to me because he said it was important to stop Andras from marrying Elwyn Sigor.”
“Are you supposed to kill him with it?” Rada asked, stepping forward and trying to get a better look at the ring. She was pretty sure it was one of Pallavi’s, but she didn’t know which one, or what spells it might have.
“Kill him? Oh, Earstien, no!” cried the girl, looking offended at the very idea. “I was supposed to make myself...um, more appealing to him.”
“Oh? How?”
The girl blushed and couldn’t seem to answer. It was rather odd. She was pretty. Very pretty, with a nice figure, as far as one could tell in those clothes. Rada couldn’t see how anyone who liked women could object to this girl in her natural state.
Then that notion—of girls liking other girls—seemed to jar something loose in her mind. She thought of how she had first met Andras, and what he had been doing in that inn. She thought of what she knew about his sexual preferences. And now she remembered when Pallavi had shown her that ring before, and what spells it had.
“Oh,” she said, feeling the blush creeping up her neck and over her cheeks. “Oh.” She cleared her throat. “It’s ‘Viparit Vanao,’ isn’t it? That’s the spell you used. That’s how you...er, made yourself more attractive.”
The girl cringed, turning pink with mortification, and nodded. “I should never have done it. I’m sure it must be a terrible sin. I can’t think what made me do it, except I had a little too much wine.”
Rada picked up an empty bottle, idly examining the label, and as she did so, she saw another little flicker in the stone of her ring. Oh, Earstien, it couldn’t be. She held the bottle up to her nose and sniffed. Oh, holy Finster, it was. She could smell the damiana, nutmeg, and jasmine.
It was her love potion, the one she’d made for the earl. The only way it could have gotten into the wine was if his lordship had put it there himself—put it there hoping it would ensnare both Elwyn and Andras. Except the snare had caught this other girl, instead. With a shaking hand, Rada put the bottle down.
“It’s awful, isn’t it?” the girl sniffed.
“It’s not your fault,” said Rada, feeling ill.
“I wouldn’t even be here at all, except that Andras is in danger. Not just him, but his whole family.”
“From Vikker, you mean?”
“Maybe. Maybe from other people. And from Queen Muriel. I think she knows what’s going on, and she’s planning to charge the Byrnes with treason when she has evidence.”
“Well, that’s....” Rada stopped and thought about the girl’s last sentence for a moment. “Wait. How do you know what the queen is planning to do to the Byrnes?”
“I, er....” The girl cringed. “Well, you see...I’m, um...in the royal household.”
Again Rada’s memory got the little shove it needed, and she recalled where she’d seen someone who looked like the girl before: in an official portrait of the Gramiren queen of Myrcia at the ambassador’s house in Roshan. But the girl wasn’t nearly old enough to be Muriel. And that meant.... “You’re Princess Donella, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve met your brother,” said Rada coldly.
It had been exactly once, when Broderick the Younger had made the bowshot that killed Rada’s beloved Misha. Right before Faustinus and Moira had assassinated poor Daryna. On the very worst day of Rada’s entire life. For a second, hate surged through her, but then she remembered that Daryna would have wanted her to be kind. This girl wasn’t a soldier, and she had nothing to do with that war.
“You know Broderick?” The girl’s lip quivered. “Can you...can you help me go home?”
Rada was sorely tempted to say “yes.” Donella had clearly been through a lot, and at least part of her ordeal was Rada’s fault, because she was the one who had given the earl that blasted potion and trusted him not to use it.
But at the same time, Donella was part of Vikker’s plan, and she had to be stopped. For her own safety, if for no other reason. Rada didn’t know exactly what Vikker had in mind, but it was pretty obvious he couldn’t care less about Donella’s wellbeing or anyone else’s. If Rada let her go, there was no telling what might happen to her. Maybe something even worse than strange, magysk sex practices.
And above and beyond all that was the simple fact that Donella was a Gramiren princess, and here she had wandered right into the middle of the Sigor exile community. If Elwyn decided to sneak back to Formacaster and she were caught by Gramiren agents, would they simply let her go? Rada doubted it. No, this was an unparalleled opportunity for the Sigors, and even if Rada wasn’t feeling especially generous toward the Earl of Hyrne at the moment, she knew she still had a duty to help him. Those were her orders, after all.
“I promise I won’t hurt you,” said Rada. “But I need you to come with me. You’re going to have a little chat with someone.”
Before Donella could react, Rada reached out with her own ring, touched the stone lightly to the princess’s temple, and whispered, “Nidra.” Sleep. Instantly Donella slumped in the chair, completely unconscious.
As Rada tied Donella over her saddle and took her up to the Pradivani Palace, she kept thinking of the pathetically hopeful look in the girl’s eyes when she had asked for help. Rada hoped she was doing the right thing, but it felt an awful lot like she wasn’t.