Page 129 of The Witch Queen

It’s exactly the advice I would have given her. But something in me shrivels at hearing her say it. Joan is an eternal optimist, always believing in the good in people. Even, somehow, in me. This version of her is…wrong. Like the reports of the poison snaking through the realm. A dark thought wends through my mind:

Am I the one who poisoned Joan?

Fitz barks, diverting my attention to the right, where an annoyingly familiar laugh carries down the path. Margaret and a trio of other ladies round the corner. The duchess spots us, then waves and veers in our direction. Wonderful.

“Your Majesty!” she calls. “Marquess! Just the two people I hoped to see.”

Fitz is about as enthused as I am. He growls, laying his ears flat as the duchess approaches.

Margaret frowns down at him. “I don’t think that animal likes me very much.”

“Don’t mind him,” I say. “He’s probably just acting on instinct. Like your falcon.”

The scratches on the duchess’s face are almost fully healed, only faint pink lines remaining beneath her powder.

“Speaking of poor Vengeance, she never did return,” Margaret says, clicking her tongue.

“Maybe she preferred the wild,” I reply. Or simply preferred being away from Margaret.

“I hope so,” she says with a sigh. “But it’s far more likely that she’s lying dead in the forest. Not everyone can handle being given so much free rein.”

She plasters on one of her courtier’s smiles.

“You said you wanted to see us?” I ask.

“Yes.” The duchess goes on. “I’m hosting a party for the victors of the Wisdom trial. With all the fuss, they never got to celebrate. Did you hear—it’s down to just two now. Blodwyn and that Warbeck boy.”

I didnothear. At the council meeting, I was told that there were still three remaining. Which means Margaret has no doubt been meddling. I wonder what she offered the boy from the eastern provinces.

“Who knows,” the duchess says with a light shrug. “There’s still over a week left. Perhaps evenhewill withdraw. And then things will finally be back the way they should be.”

Without you,her gray eyes say.

She scrapes the barest of curtsies and then sweeps down the path with her ladies in tow.

“Aparty?” Joan asks, tugging Fitz along, who is still growling in the duchess’s direction. “Does that woman care about nothing else?”

“Nothing that doesn’t serve her own purposes,” I comment. “You should have seen her after the ball. I think she was thrilled about the attack. It gave her another opportunity to dangle her army in front of our faces. Remind us that she’s not lifting a finger unless Blodwyn wins the trials.”

“Do you think the princess will win? Now that it’s down to two?”

“She’ll have to sway the majority of the nobles,” I say, doubtful. “With so many having fled court, and after what happened at the ball…”

Talk of the curse—and Blodwyn’s part in it—has reached a fever pitch since that night. I’ve even overheard some suggesting that the princess should be sacrificed to the creature, as maybe that will end the current crisis. If Blodwyn is pitted against the Warbeck boy, who didnothave an undead princess promising to exact revenge against him, I’m not sure she’ll stand a chance.

Which is what you wanted,that voice reminds me.She is your enemy.

Maybe. But in the hours we’ve spent studying the books in Ignatius’s lair, I’ve seen more of Blodwyn than in the last three yearscombined. We may not be friends, but I catch glimpses of her true nature through her icy veneer. The princess is smart and talented. Witty. And…afraid. Just like I used to be, terrified of a life that loomed too large for me. Desperate for anyone to pull me back.

Above my head, crows circle.

Five—a warning.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Ayleth

That night, I dream of the lost princess.