Page 96 of The Winner's Curse
“Oh no? Look at this list. Half of them are former blue bloods, like you.”
“Half of them aren’t.” Arin sighed. “It’s just a list, Cheat. You decide.”
Cheat gave him a measuring look, then scratched out some names and wrote in others. He signed with a flourish.
Arin said they should begin taking land outside the city, capturing farms and bringing in grain and other foodstuffs to prepare for a siege. “The Ethyra estate would be a good first choice.”
“Fine, fine.” Cheat waved a hand.
Arin hesitated, then offered him a small but full and heavy satchel. “You might find these books interesting. They’re on Valorian wars and history.”
“I’m too old for the schoolroom,” Cheat said, and left Arin with his hand outstretched.
* * *
Kestrel began to hate her rooms. She wondered what kind of family Irex had had, that a lock workable only from the outside had been added to a suite so sumptuous that it must have belonged to his mother. The lock was Valorian brass, intricate and solid. Kestrel knew it intimately by now, since she’d spent enough time testing it to see if it could be picked or forced.
If she had to choose which aspect of the suite she despised most, it would have been a hard call between the lock and the garden, though these days she nursed a particular grudge against the curtains.
She hid behind them to watch Arin leave the house, and return—very often on her horse. Despite the way he had looked after the battle, his injuries weren’t serious. His limp lessened, the bandage on his neck disappeared, and the raging bruises muted into ugly greens and violets.
Several days passed without any words between him and her, and that set Kestrel on edge.
It was hard to rub out the memory of his smile—exhausted, sweet.
And then that waterfall of relief.
Kestrel sent him a letter. Jess was likely to recover, she wrote. She asked to visit Ronan, who was being held in the city prison.
Arin’s reply was a curt note: No.
She decided not to press the issue. Her request had been due to a sense of obligation. She dreaded seeing Ronan—even if he agreed to speak with her. Even if he did not loathe her now. Kestrel knew that to look upon Ronan would be to come face-to-face with her failure. She had done everything wrong … including not being able to love him.
She folded the one-word letter and set it aside.
* * *
Arin was leaving the general’s villa, which had become the army’s headquarters, when one of the new officers saluted him. Thrynne, a middle-aged man, was examining a batch of Valorian horses captured from the battle. “These will do well for our march on the Metrea estate,” he said.
Arin frowned. “What?”
“Cheat’s sending us to capture the Metrea estate.”
Arin lost his patience. “That’s idiotic. Metrea grows olives. Do you want to live on olives during a siege?”
“Er … no.”
“Then go to Ethyra, where they will have stores of grain, plus livestock.”
“Right now?”
“Yes.”
“Should I ask Cheat first?”
“No.” Arin rubbed his brow, deeply tired of treading so cautiously around Cheat. “Just go.”
Thrynne took his troops.
