Page 69 of The Ragpicker King
He made a restless gesture. The moonstone ring on his finger flashed; it was etched with a lion’s profile, head back, mane flowing. What was it the sailors said?Castellane roars, and the world trembles.
“I ought to be there. But I find myself in a situation now where I must balance multiple needs at once. Kel can manage the banquet.It is more important for me to attend to the situation with my father.”
Lin couldn’t help her next question. “And your fiancée doesn’t mind the substitution?”
“Anjelica knows I have a Sword Catcher. And Kel is difficult to dislike.”
“Do you think of yourself as easy to dislike?”
He said dryly, “Charm is a skill anyone can learn, but one must make an effort to be charming. And right now I have too much else to concentrate on.” He indicated the books on the central table. “I’ve taken the liberty of gathering up our most comprehensive volumes on florticulture, if you’d like to have a look.”
“Florticulture— Oh.” Lin glared, made an impatient noise, and flopped down in a high-backed chair near the table. She couldsenseConor’s amusement from across the room.
The books were a motley collection: different sizes, different languages, different dates. For a short time, Lin lost herself in the research, turning to Conor—who had taken the seat across from hers and was watching her through narrowed eyes—only when she came across an unfamiliar language.
“Here,” he said, pushing a small book across the table toward Lin. She glared down at the tome, so old that most of the ink had faded into illegibility. “Look at this one.”
Lin picked up the book with a frown. It was a small volume, bound in cracked leather, the sort of thing you could buy in Fleshmarket Square. The title was printed in dull gold:The Flower Book of Morwenna Aurelian.
“Aurelian?” Lin looked up. “Who wrote this?”
“My great-great-grandmother,” Conor said, leaning his elbows on the table in a princely disregard for manners, “and strictly speaking, she was breaking several Laws in doing so. But royals can get away with things ordinary people can’t.”
Lin shot him a look. “I’ve heard that.”
He grinned and popped a fig into his mouth. “QueenMorwenna was fascinated by plants, especially those with certain properties. She kept a garden of them. She wished to know the history of every plant, its uses in healing and... in magic.” He sat back. “I’ve found the book useful myself in the past. It has an excellent section on hangover remedies.”
Lin rolled her eyes as she bit into a rosewater-soaked pastry, then suppressed a sound of pleasure at its deliciousness.Concentrate on the book,she told herself, though she was aware that Conor was watching her as she read.
Queen Morwenna had handwritten the text in a style long out of date and only barely legible. Lin found blackroot described near the end of the book:Sports beautiful obsidian flowers, has no scent, blossoms and leaves are toxic to animals and people. Legend has it that, before the Sundering, blackroot was used to suppress the effects of magic. Sorcerer-Kings were known to have slipped it into the cups of their enemies before a duel, in order to blunt the edge of their power.
She looked over the top of the book at Conor. “This is interesting,” she said. “Blackrootispoison, that is in no doubt, but it also works to suppress magic. Is there some possibility that Fausten was trying toundothe effect of a spell?” She frowned. “But no, that couldn’t possibly—”
“Let me see that.” Conor reached out a hand for the book. As he did, the lace fell away from his wrist, and she saw the red mark of a burn on his skin, one that had not been there when she saw him shirtless in his apartments.
She must have betrayed something with her expression, for he shook his sleeve down quickly, covering the wound. But Lin looked at him squarely. “You have a burn on your wrist.”
He shrugged. “It’s nothing. A spill of candle wax.” But he would not meet her eyes.
“Let me see it.”
He set down Morwenna’s book with a characteristic scowl. “If you insist,” he said, and held out his arm to her.
She had not quite thought ahead this far. But Lin was aphysician above all other things, and she had treated Prince Conor before. She took hold of his hand and turned his arm over so she could study the inside of his forearm, where the skin was a shade lighter, nearly as pale as her own. She could see the blue veins running like a map beneath his skin, see the long delicate lines that crossed his palm, the light calluses on his thumb and fingertips. His skin was warm against hers.
He leaned in closer, looking down at the burn on his wrist just as she was. The wound was pale red, almost glossy, unusually shaped. Lin ran her finger lightly over the skin, feeling the smoothness of the burn. She heard him suck in his breath and jerked her hand back.
“Did I hurt you?” she asked, worried.
“No.” There was a strangled something in his voice that made her look up at him. He was staring at her, his eyes hot and silver, his white teeth sunk into his lower lip. His hair was a riot of dark softness around his face, and she wanted to brush it back so badly, she felt it as an ache. A hard ache deep in her belly.
She tried to breathe. The air between them was thick and hot, as if the room were filled with smoke. She was still holding his hand. For a long, long moment, neither of them moved. She could not stop looking at him. He was normally talking, laughing, gesturing, scowling. She had never seen him so still. She had never seen that he had a freckle on his left temple, or the way the colors seemed to change and shift in his eyes, as they did in the moonstone of his ring.
When he spoke at last, his voice sounded as if it had been dragged over gravel. “How serious is it, then, Goddess?”
She felt dizzy. “How serious—?”
“My burn.”
