Shaking off her disquiet, she made her way to the basin to wash her hands and found that soap and lemon had been left in a delicately carved dish. The best practice to ward off any permanent ink stains was that her wardrobe was already black, but she scrubbed and dried her fingers. Her gaze lingered on the silver ring. The awful truth stared back at her.
No matter how much she might have wished it otherwise, Nim would have to decline Warrick’s plans. There was no way she could set herself up to be queen. Even if that day was far off and unimaginable, the risk was there. Stewart was right—someone tied to magic by bargain had no business near anyone who might take the throne. And Warrick, well, he was already a risk. If the public found out he was son of the head of the Trust, there was no telling what might come of Inara. It had been a tightly held secret for a reason, and all that was holding the kingdom together was that the Trust played a long game. They had pieces remaining in play.
Nim had removed Calum, but he had not been their only marker. Wesley had said the Trust had someone in place, should the king not produce an heir, and—fates forbid something happen to Warrick—that a council would decide on a new king from among one of the older lines. The Trust had a man in position who would be king, tied to their magic and under their command. Nim did not know precisely who that man was, but she intended to find out.
“My lady.” Maris’s voice cut through the thought, and Nim turned to find that the maid had already set dinner and was waiting for Nim’s approval.
“Thank you,” Nim said. “Please, sit with me and eat.” Maris started to protest, but Nim waved it off. “You have to do as I’ve asked. You’ve already admitted as much, and besides, I’ll never get through so much food alone.” She crossed to stare at the spread. “Honestly, it’s almost insulting that they think I would.”
Maris pressed her lips together hard but managed to suppress a smile.
It might someday be nice to be able to catch a smile so easily amidst the many rules of propriety, but the idea made Nim miss her steadfast valet even more. She was grateful that she would see him on the morrow. Allister had been her only constant for so long that it was hard not to look for him each time she woke, when dinner was called, or when a message arrived. Her candles were still lit and her clothes pressed, and Nim was not without someone at every turn, but she felt his loss in each of those things nonetheless.
She settled onto a chair, snatching the napkin from Maris as she prepared to snap it in place, and ordered the woman to sit. No matter what else, Nim had much to be grateful for. Whatever the Trust had taken from her, whatever they planned to do, Nim wouldn’t have to face it alone. Not any longer.
Chapter 7
Nim jolted upright in bed, choking on the phantom sensation of long fingers wrapped around her neck. Sweat dampened her shift, and the blankets were like a tangle of writhing serpents around her limbs. She jerked free, nearly falling in her haste to escape, her feet landing heavily on the cool floor of her room as her fingers raked the bare skin of her throat. She stared through the darkness, searching for the source of the lingering magic snaking over her skin. The muddled feeling of having woken when she’d not meant to fall asleep faded like mist in the sunrise, and she drew in a sharp breath. On the pillow beside her rested two dark gemstones.
It had not been a dream that had woken her but something far, far worse. Nim cursed and yanked a dark robe over her shift. She shoved her feet into slippers and crossed to a low table. The steel shears were gone. She grabbed a long, solidly-built candleholder instead, gripping it tightly enough that her knuckles went white. A rustling sound came from the other side of her doorway, but Nim did not wait to see if Maris had stirred. She snatched a small taper, which she lit from the tinderbox, then strode straight to the hidden panel, slipping into the dark corridor with no more than a single flame to light her way.
She did not turn on the path that was familiar, her feet instead drawing her toward the slithering magic that had invaded her peace. It was not that she wanted to reward him or to let him think he’d somehow won, but that she needed to be sure. She had to see with her own eyes that it hadn’t been real and that Calum was indeed still in his cell.
The passageway was narrow, the air stale, but all she could feel was the draw of magic. She followed it through the corridors. The first door she tried was blocked by something immovable, but the second opened into an empty hall behind a heavy tapestry. Barely managing to escape with her flame intact, she checked the halls for any sign of the guard then strode toward a darkened stairwell, its steps twisting down through air that was too damp and too cool against the exposed skin of her throat. She drew the robe tighter around her neck.
Two men stood posted at the hall before the dungeons, but that was not where Nim felt the magic’s draw. She crept through the labyrinth of corridors to a passage even farther down. It was windowless and dark. Her flame barely illuminated her way, and Nim startled when a staff shot across the path before her.
She drew back, sucking in air as her eyes adjusted. Nim shifted the flame of her taper, hoping the candlestick she brandished in her other hand as potential weapon was obscured by dim light and the material of her robes. A guard gave a plainly disapproving look to Nim’s escapade. There was a soft noise somewhere behind her, but she wasn’t certain how many more might be standing in wait. Calum was close—she could feel it. Shifting her light, she took in the second guard’s face. His expression was decidedly worse.
“Lady Weston.”
His voice was deep, and though it was the first time she’d heard it, she knew just who he was, the guard she’d knocked from the wagon with Wes’s magic-bought sword. It was less likely that it was bad luck and more likely that he’d been assigned watch in a dark dungeon precisely because he’d failed to keep her under control.
She straightened. “Excellent. You know who I am.” His resulting smirk and a quick assessment of her situation resolved any hope she might have harbored that she’d be able to sneak by. She might have tossed her candle toward them and ducked into the shadows, but the door would be secured, and she’d no time to pick a lock before they found her again. Even the magic-bought sword, should she have had it, wouldn’t have given her the time she needed.
“Yes, my lady, I know who you are,” the guard said. “And I have express orders not to let you pass.”
“I see,” Nim said coolly, the candlestick she was wielding like a mace heavy in her hand.
The first guard’s gaze narrowed. She cleared her throat.
A thick silence followed as she considered her next move.
Then a new voice came from the darkness—Warrick’s. “Let her pass.”
Nim’s shoulders stiffened, but she managed not to turn around. She felt Warrick move closer behind her, and though she was certain his face would hold its usual sober-as-a-seneschal expression, she was surprised he sent her nothing more than a vague intimation about confronting Calum in not much more than her shift.
She bit back any remark she might have made, keeping her gaze steady on the guard. Warrick would have had no way of knowing she’d come, no time to have been alerted, surely, and that only firmed her resolve to see Calum with her own eyes. Warrick must have felt something too.