Chapter 3
I gaped at her, frozen in place by my shock. What in the kingdoms was going on?
“Besides, there’s no need.” She sat back against her seat, a smug smile transforming her face. “At least, not if you’re concerned about having lost this.” She pulled my missing object out of her sleeve.
I gasped and lunged toward it, but she quickly stuffed it back out of sight.
“You should be more careful with such valuable items, you know.” She chuckled. “You really did make it ridiculously easy for me.”
“What are you doing, Sierra?” I asked, a dangerous edge to my voice.
“That’s Your Highness to you,” she corrected in an amused tone that set my teeth on edge. “You should start practicing now.”
My eyes stayed focused on her sleeve and the treasure I now knew it carried. “If you think I’m permanently swapping places with you—”
“Then I would be completely right,” she said. “While you were so busy worrying about those tiresome girls, I was occupied with more important matters.”
My eyes flashed to her face, momentarily distracted. “What have you done to the others?”
“Me? Whatever do you mean?” she asked in a voice of overdone innocence. “I’ve been with you the whole time, as you well know.”
I growled at her. “What have you done with them?”
She shrugged. “I have no idea. They might have all gotten away for all I know. But you can be certain if they did, my men will ensure they keep running and they don’t look back.” She smiled sweetly. “It wouldn’t do at all to have anyone around Arcadia who actually knows what you look like.”
“Percy’s there,” I snapped.
“Ah, yes.” Her smile didn’t falter. “Dear Percy. Who I haven’t seen since I was a small child.” She batted her eyelashes coquettishly at me. “It’s remarkable how people change as they age, isn’t it? I wouldn’t have even recognized him. But I have such fond memories of the trouble we all got up to as children.”
My heart sank. All those times she had asked me to tell her stories about my childhood, exclaiming at how different life was in Eldon and the surrounding kingdoms compared to her island home. Whatever was going on here went much further than a moment of crazed rebellion by my maid. She must have been planning it since she came into my employ. Or before. I remembered recognizing one of my guards as her fellow islander.
A rush of cold down my spine brought back a flood of bad memories. I shivered and reminded myself I was no longer frozen by an enchantment as I had once been years ago. I was not helpless now as I had been then. Whatever Sierra wanted from me, I wasn’t going to let my friends pay the price. The Arcadians would capture her men, and I would make them tell us where to find the others.
As I recreated the scene of the attack in my mind, I noticed something I should have noticed at the time. The number of people on the road hadn’t increased. The unexpected fighting had made me assume we’d been attacked, but it had been treachery from within our own number. Which meant Sierra didn’t have a great many men, and the Arcadians should have no trouble capturing them.
“I know who I am,” I said. “And I remember far more about my childhood than I ever told you. I can be quite convincing, too.”
Sierra shook her head. “You can’t imagine I would leave you free to question my identity? Why do you think I needed this?” She lightly touched her sleeve.
I frowned. “That handkerchief is a family heirloom passed down for generations, but I’m not going to let you usurp my identity just to prevent you from destroying it.”
“Destroy it?” She sounded genuinely surprised. “I wouldn’t do such a wasteful thing. I intend to use it. Just not for its original purpose.” She paused. “Well, not only for its original purpose.”
I narrowed my eyes. “It can’t just be used to cast any enchantment. That’s not how godmother objects work. That handkerchief lets the owner know whether or not someone is telling the truth. That’s all.”
“Such narrow thinking. It’s no wonder you got yourself into such difficulties.”
I glared at her. “What have you done to it?”
“Nothing that will harm its original purpose,” she said. “At least, I don’t think so. I have merely…expanded it somewhat.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” she said, her voice turning brisk, “that you may not communicate the truth about our identities to any living soul. Not now, not ever. The enchantment will prevent you from doing so.”
“I don’t believe you,” I said, injecting more confidence into the statement than I really felt.
“Nevertheless,” Sierra said calmly, “it’s true. Your mother kindly sewed one of your hairs into the border of the handkerchief, thus extending its enchantment to you. However, I used a more powerful binding agent.”
She pulled it out again, holding it tightly this time, and showed me three reddish-brown drops on the white material. The handkerchief around the small stains had gone stiff and yellowed as if with great age. It looked, if such a thing were possible, as if it had been poisoned.
Bile rose in my throat. The unnatural appearance of the object convinced me far more than her words—perhaps she truly had twisted the object’s enchantment after all. It wouldn’t be the first time I had encountered a corrupted godmother object being used for evil. It was the way I had been trapped in an enchantment before. Celine had fought against a whole collection of such twisted objects.
“These aren’t just ordinary drops of blood,” Sierra continued. “They were made with a second object, enchanted long ago for protection. It had only a trace amount of power left, but it was enough to transfer with my blood into the handkerchief. Now this object carries the lingering remnants of its power, twined with the truth enchantment linked to you. We are connected now, and neither of us can speak the truth about our identities.”
Apparently Sierra had managed more than just pinning her hair while she was behind me on Arvin’s back. I revised my earlier guess. She must have been planning this for years. I could not believe she had done it all alone.
Anger clouded my mind, and my hand strayed down toward my boots where my dagger still hid. I would force her to return the handkerchief, and then, as much as it pained me to do so, I would destroy it.
“If you’re thinking of doing me an injury,” Sierra said, as if she could read my mind, “then I strongly urge you to reconsider. You are a maid now, and I am a princess. You would be wise not to give me a reason to order your execution.”
I hesitated, struck anew by the enormity of the deception Sierra had begun. I was thinking like myself—a princess with all the power and authority of a throne to back me up. But I had let myself be introduced to the Arcadians as a maid. If I now attacked Sierra, it would appear like a betrayal against the mistress who employed me.
Although, if I could destroy the handkerchief, I could tell everyone the truth. I hoped.
Of course, I didn’t actually know for sure if destroying the handkerchief would break the enchantment. And if I didn’t succeed in wresting it from her and destroying it, then I wouldn’t put it past her to attempt to have me executed.