His white moustache was stark against his cheeks as they grew redder than the flowers in the palace gardens. His stout chest puffed up as he drew in his belly and held it there. “No bother at all, young lady,” he purred, although not nearly as demurely as Brooklynn had. “You just let me know when your party’s set to go. I don’t mind waitin’ a bit.”
Aron’s eyes rolled so hard I thought they might actually pop out of his head.
Brook flashed a meaningful grin at him as the engineer strolled away, a boyish skip in his step.
“I don’t believe it. Are you sure you didn’t drug him or something?” Aron scoffed at her.
“I can be pretty persuasive when I want to be.” She didn’t need to remind any of them that part of her work with the underground rebellion had been to convince the men of Sabara’s army to give up information. And she’d rarely had to use force.
Aron shook his head, and I wondered if he was really so unaware of Brook’s appeal. If growing up with her, the way I had, had somehow made him immune. “I’m gonna see if Sebastian needs help. He looks like he has his hands full.”
I glanced over again and saw fleeting glimpses of Sebastian’s red bandana between hindquarters and muzzles and the long, muscled legs of the horses. He looked harried and frustrated, and shouted orders to the men who barely paid him any attention. He’d clearly not mastered the commanding presence of his position.
I felt like that sometimes. Like I hadn’t quite found my voice.
Or rather, like a queen with two voices . . . neither of us strong enough to rule.
As if listening to my thoughts, I heard her—Sabara—unfurling within me. Together we can do it. Together, we’re invincible.
I squeezed my fists, searching for that inner quiet that seemed harder and harder to find. I didn’t want to hear her. I didn’t want to listen to her toxic oaths.
“Your Majesty?”
I jolted, turning to face Zafir. The unease in his expression told me I’d missed something. “What?”
“Do you—?”
I blinked. “Do I what?”
“Do you want me to get that coat now?”
I looked down at myself, shivering and clutching my arms. I couldn’t tell him the truth. I couldn’t tell him it wasn’t the chill that had gotten to me.
It was her.
Instead, I nodded, and he signaled to someone I couldn’t see. “Stay close to me,” he instructed as he pushed me to start walking. “Let’s see what there is out here.”
brooklynn
The hairs on the back of Brook’s neck prickled and she glanced once more over her shoulder.
Beneath her, the horse continued to thrash, tossing his head up and down, fighting the metal bit stretched between his lips. But Brook didn’t think it was the bit that was bothering him.
She felt exactly the way her way horse did. Spooked.
She tugged the reins, cautioning the animal to settle down. He stomped his feet in reply, prancing anxiously and setting her teeth on edge.
“Quit it,” she hissed as she reached down to swat at his neck. She didn’t need his alarm contributing to her uneasiness.
Finally he settled, but she couldn’t say the same about herself as her heart quickened. She suddenly wished that she’d followed her own orders and stayed closer to town, that she hadn’t wandered so far from the train station . . . and from the safety of her men. She’d only meant to be a few minutes, half an hour at the most, as she searched for a better vantage point from which to see how far the Scablands stretched.
She pulled one rein sharply, demanding the horse turn in a full circle, allowing her a 360-degree view of the terrain. There wasn’t much to see: some buildings in the valley below her, including the train depot, and at her back, the threshold of a dense, shadowy forest that stretched as far as she could see. On all sides were rocks and stones and black dirt.
The weather up here was even harsher than it had been down at the station, but despite the cutting wind that slashed at her face, a thin layer of sweat prickled Brooklynn’s skin. She winced, shielding her eyes from the gusts as she tried to urge her mount forward. She thought she’d get a better view on the other side of the rocky hillside, but the animal dug in, refusing to go any closer.
Finally, she dismounted, dropping the reins and inching closer to the bluff.
She eased forward, balancing carefully as she reached the drop-off. It wasn’t too sheer, but the gravel beneath her feet was loose, unstable. She crouched low, surveying everything around her from this new position. Now wasn’t the time to second-guess her instincts, and at the moment those instincts were screaming at her, warning that something was off.
She was only planning to take a few tentative steps down the embankment, but the moment her boots hit the gravel, she felt the pebbles beneath them shift and slide. Her stomach lurched as she reached out, trying to stop herself by clawing at the scraggy clumps of grass and shrubbery. All she managed to do was to rip the skin from her palms, abrading them until they were raw and bleeding. As she slid, she leaned as far back as she could, trying to keep from rolling headfirst all the way down. The last thing she needed was to break her neck on a routine scouting mission.
It wasn’t until she slammed, feetfirst, into a thick stand of thorned bushes, that she realized that the sounds she’d heard—the grunts and the curses—had been coming from her.
“Damn,” she swore again when she glanced down and saw the tear in her pant leg. She collapsed backward on the solid ground with relief. She dug out a ledge for her heels to make sure she didn’t slide any farther, then sat up, pulling a twig from her hair. Her hands were killing her. She lifted them so she could examine the dirt-caked scrapes that ran across both palms.