Page 134 of The Ragpicker King
Anjelica Iruvai is fleeing the Palace tonight. Go quickly and convince her to remain. Should she leave, I do not need to tell you how dire the consequences to Castellane will be.—Andreyen
The door to the Castel Pichon was locked.
Kel paced back and forth before the blank face of the Little Palace, the feeling of ice in his veins. He had never seen the castle deserted, not since Anjelica had been in residence. Usually two of her brothers would be outside, often playing cards or even relaxing in the grass. Now the Pichon was lightless, the doors sealed, the place utterly silent.
He thought about shouting Anjelica’s name, but that would only bring the Castelguards. Who would summon Lilibet, Jolivet, Mayesh—all of Marivent would be roused. Andreyen’s note had begged Kel toconvinceAnjelica not to leave, not to bring the weight of the Aurelians and the Charter Families down upon her.
It was then that Kel noticed the window about ten feet from the ground, facing out toward the needle of the Trick. If memory served, it was most likely one of the windows in Anjelica’s suite of rooms. Swearing under his breath, Kel summoned up his lessons with Jerrod, flexed his fingers, and leaped to catch hold of the wall.
Fortunately, the Castel Pichon was not made of smooth stone. Its bricks were uneven, offering easy footholds and handholds. Kel scrambled up to the window in a matter of moments and flung himself inside.
He landed awkwardly on the wooden floor, rolled, and came up on his feet. He was in Anjelica’s bedroom, which was lit only by moonlight. The bed itself loomed on his right. The colorful tapestries that hung on the walls were drained of color by the dim white light.
“Anjelica?” Kel called softly. There was an air of disuse to the room, a quality that felt empty and abandoned. Surely she could not be already gone? What could have driven her so suddenly from Marivent? None of this was making sense.
It was then that he saw movement in the shadows, at the far end of the room, where double doors opened into a small study.Curtains, he thought, blowing in the wind from open windows. Windows that faced the disused garden at the back of the Palace—
Kel slid his dagger silently from his wrist brace, a flick of silver in the gloom. He took a step forward, only to freeze in place as a shadow emerged from the blacker shadows of the study. For a moment he saw only the outline of a woman in darkness and thought of Elsabet Belmany. Then a lamp in her hand flared to life and he saw her.
Anjelica.
“Oh, Kel,” she said sadly.
She was dressed for travel. A linen cloak, fastened in the front, soft leather boots, a dark tunic. The curls of her hair had been gathered into a knot at the back of her head. She carried nothing save the lamp in one hand, and in the other, a short, straight-bladed knife, not unlike Kel’s dagger.
“I wish you hadn’t come,” she said. “There’s nothing you can do.”
One look at her face told him that she meant it. She was not leaving because she was angry, not stalking away in a temper or even a state of hurt or distress. She was calm and decided.
Before he could ask why, a sound came from outside the window. A man’s voice drifted up through the night air, cautious, a little worried. “Anjelica?”
She turned her head. “A moment, Laurent. It’s Kel.”
Kel heard the privateer swear. Something about his voice was oddly familiar—possibly he had heard him speak at the Solstice Ball? “Kel’s up there?” he called. “Well, tell him to get the gray hell out of Marivent, too. There’s enough room on Sedai.”
“Laurent Aden.” Kel kept the knife steady. “You’re running away with Laurent Aden.”
Her dark gaze was steady. “It’s nothing to do with you, Kel. The less you know, the better.”
“It does have to do with me. Because it has to do with Conor. You’ve lied to us since the beginning, Anjelica.”
She glanced away. So she wouldn’t try to deny it. Memories were running through his mind, everything tinted differently now, as if he had seen events unfolding before only through distorted glass, and now it had become clear.
“It was a lie that Laurent was in love with you and you spurned him,” Kel said. “You loved him. You have always loved him. I saw you at the ball—I saw the way he looked at you. I told myself it was nothing, but I was being a fool, wasn’t I? He was meant to come get you the moment you landed in Castellane—that’s why you were so unsettled when I got you from the harbor. You kept looking around for Aden. Isn’t that right?” Kel recalled her tension when he had fetched her from the Kutani ship, the way she had scanned the harbor over and over. Looking for Laurent, but not in the way he’d thought. She’d been hoping to see him, not afraid.
He took a step forward. Anjelica moved only a very little, the knife in her hand flashing, but it was enough to stop him. He could see by the way she held the blade that she knew how to use it.
“You are clever,” she said. “Laurent was meant to take me directly from the ship when it docked in the harbor. When he didn’t come, I thought he might have been killed.”
“I have to applaud you,” he said, wondering how long he could keep her here, keep her talking. “You showed none of your distress.”
She tossed her head. “I am a Princess. I have the same practice in not showing what I feel as Conor does. And in a way, I was honest with Conor that day. When I told him I did not require him to playact at love, and that I would not do it myself, I said only what I meant.”
“Because you were in love with Aden.”
“And Conor, too, is in love with another,” said Anjelica. “You must know that.” She looked at him speculatively. “We do not have much time,Királar. But I thought you should know. I had been told many things about Conor—that he was a monster, selfish, cruel. He is not. He has a gentle heart that even years of politics have notdestroyed. And if you asked me, I would say it was because of you. You have kept him human all this time. Perhaps that is not a Sword Catcher’s duty under the Law, but it ought to be.”
Kel ignored this. He could not touch it, not now. “That story about the blackmail. All of that was a lie. You used me to get in touch with Laurent through the Ragpicker King.”
