Page 41 of The Dead Queen

We both burst into mortified laughter. I try to stifle mine in the crook of his neck as he pulls me back toward him, tenderly this time. He places a kiss at my temple, pausing to breathe in the scent of my hair.

“I’m sorry, but I have to go.”

I nod. “I know.”

He meets my eyes. “We’ll continue this conversation later.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Was this a ‘conversation’?”

We both grin.

He kisses the tip of my nose. “Perhaps we’ll continue all of it later.”

“Perhaps.”

He squeezes my hand as he turns to leave. Only when he’s gone do I realize my hand is still smeared with his blood.

Chapter 14

This time, when I sneak into the pre-dawn kennels, I have a burning mission inside of me. I’ll get the Wolf to tell me about my grandmother.

Now.

I can’t help him escape. If he wants to live, he needs to play by my rules. I have the upper hand here. Answer my questions, or die in the kennels.

The guard outside the kennel is too sleepy to ask many questions of the girl with a hood pulled low over her face. I lug a pail of well-water through the door, careful not to spill it on the stairs as I descend.

The kennels are eerily silent while the foxhounds sleep. My light casts shadows through the bars and into their cells as I walk down the aisle. Mixed into the filthy, scattered hay on the stone ground are gnawed bones and carcasses. Rabbits, mostly. Flies buzz around them, taking the opportunity to feast on the dead flesh.

In the furthest corners of their cells, the foxhounds sleep. They’re curled up in tight balls of matted copper fur. To the unwise, they might look like nothing more than household pets. But when one of them lifts its white-tipped tail to peer at me from the shadows, the illusion is broken. His copper-colored eyes shine with hunger. A low, rumbling growl follows me as I hurry past.

The Wolf isn’t asleep in the back of his cell. He watches me through swollen black eyes as I set down the pail of water and walk up to the barred door. I won’t risk opening his cage. These bars are my best bargaining chip.

“You haven’t died yet,” I say, by way of greeting.

He laughs humorlessly. “No. Not yet.” He squints at my orb of light, trying to adjust from the pitch darkness he’s been sitting in.

I reach into the bag that I strapped underneath my cloak. I pull out the bread I stole from the kitchens late last night. “Hungry?” I ask.

He doesn’t move.

I wait.

“I expect there’s a price.” He watches me through the curtain of dark hair covering his face. There’s a long, grisly cut along his cheekbone that’s sealed together with dried blood, and the skin around his eyes is mottled with purple bruises. Probably from the broken nose, though it looks like he straightened the cartilage back into place.

I shrug. “Isn’t that true with everything?”

His face doesn’t betray his thoughts. He merely waits.

I hadn’t intended to show my hand just yet, but I suppose the sooner the better so I can retreat before I’m discovered.

“I need information.”

His iron chains rattle as he slowly stands, never showing the pain he must be in. Hunter doesn’t have strong healing power. He couldn’t have done much more than keep the Wolf from dying.

“As I said before, you can get it.” He holds my eyes in his cool, gray gaze for a long moment. “For a price.”

“Escape.”