Nim’s voice was weak. “You put too much faith in me, Wesley. It is the king who will protect Inara. With Warrick at his side.”
Wesley’s mouth tweaked into a lopsided grin as if against his will. “Aye, my lady.” His finger tapped the ring that circled Nim’s own. “And who will stand at Warrick’s side?”
Her face went hot, and she had the startling urge to sit right where she stood. Fates, but she was a fool, time and again. Warrick was heir, not some courtier who might someday retire. He was to be king, and she—well, she had to have lost her mind to agree to marry him. “It’s ridiculous,” she argued. She really had not thought the scenario through. Surely, she’d planned to be dead by then, at the very least. “I can’t contemplate such a thing. Wes, please do not make me.”
He snickered. “As you wish, my lady. But I think you’ll make a quite dashing queen.”
Her gaze narrowed on him. “Dashing, is it? Are you working on my introduction?”
“Oh no, I’ve sorted that already,” he said with all seriousness. He straightened. “Her Ladyship Nimona Weston, Royal Constable and Adviser to the Seneschal…” His brows knitted together. “Or will it be Nimona Spenser, then?”
“Please stop, Wesley. I feel as if I might be sick.”
“It could be worse.” He raised a shoulder in a shrug. “You at least have some chance of setting things to right.”
Nim’s heart squeezed. Wesley’s parents had made sacrifices, as hers had, in the hopes that the boy would someday become a great swordsman. But he had been left with nothing but an aversion to blades, unable to wield the magic-bought sword which had cost those he loved their lives. It was the kind of perversion bargains usually brought, stealing away the very thing a person wanted in a way they didn’t expect, a subversion of the terms. “Because of you,” Nim said, “I am able to live. The sword they bargained for allowed me to best Calum. And you at my side was all that helped me through. This is ours, Wes. This chance belongs to both of us.”
His hazel eyes came to hers. “I owe you for that as well.” He held a gloved hand up to her. “It was Calum who wound these scars through my hands, Calum who stole my ability to use the sword. He’s locked away now. Thanks to you, I feel safe even when Warrick is not at my side.”
“Calum? He’s who did that to you?”
Wes nodded. “After the bargain, when I was just a boy and my parents were gone, he tricked me, tore the sacrifice from me, and gave me nothing but pain in return. Warrick found out, thank the fates, and saved me from something worse. But what you did, Nim… none of us could have done that.”
Us. “Wesley, are there others like you and me?”
His eyes darted toward the door. “I’m not supposed to talk about it, my lady. I’m sorry I brought it up. It’s just that, well, I trust you. But there are things I should never say, no matter what. They aren’t like us, the others who made sacrifices. Calum got to them first. All Warrick could do was save them from the undercity, from a cell where the magic might take hold. It was too late for them.”
Warrick had taken ownership of their situations, Nim realized, as he’d done for Wesley and Nim. Those sacrifices had been made in his name, to secure an heir and save Inara when Warrick was the only surviving heir. He had tried to free them from Calum and from the Trust.
Nim truly did feel as if she might be sick. It had been Calum all along, not the magic. Every bad thing she’d ever felt had come from Calum and the queen. She shook off the shiver that trailed down her spine. “You’re right, Wes. There are things to keep put away.” She squeezed his hand briefly. “Thank you for trusting me.”
He seemed to shake himself but quickly returned to his duties to draw a letter from inside his robes. “Warrick has sent a message for you. Instructions for your tasks.” As Nim took it, Wes added, “I’ll see you tomorrow to escort you to Hearst manor and to call on Lady Margery.”
“I look forward to it,” she told him. “And I’m certain both have prepared a delightful selection of cakes for our visit.”
“You recognize my heart, Lady Weston.” He gave her a final crooked grin before he bowed and turned to stride from the room.
Nim took in the massive space once more, turning slowly to gaze over every surface of the room. It was too much, all of it. And yet, warm in her hand was a missive from the man who was second only to the king.
She stared down at the letter, running a finger over its fine wax seal. Within the seal was the magic that was Warrick, protecting the message in the way he had protected Wesley, the way he had protected her, a magic that felt safe and warm and right in all the ways Calum’s had felt so wrong. The seal cracked easily, revealing Warrick’s elegant hand.
My Lady, it said, the sentiment somehow more personal than it had ever been. The message included a detailed list of instructions for her post and, to her great surprise, that should she desire to follow up on information found during her research, she would be afforded the ability to call in noblemen and commoners alike for questioning. She moved to the nearest desk and sat heavily in a chair. Fates save her, but Warrick had given her a station that granted her real power. It seemed vaguely reckless, but she supposed it offered more protection than simply hiding her away. Only a brazen fool would have risked gaining the ire of the seneschal, let alone that she could make any courtier’s life as difficult as she pleased, given the proper motives.
Only a day before, a king had warned Nimona that one misstep would be the death of her, and yet, she felt the safest she’d ever been. Calum was locked away in the dungeons of Inara Castle, under guard and bound by blood and magic, and not only had she been returned to the castle in which she’d been born, but she had gained a station far beyond her imaginings… because of Warrick.
Nim was constable. She wasn’t certain she was up to the task, but if any one thing might be able to save her, it was knowledge of what the magic was and how it worked. She needed to answer the question that had plagued her since she was child—why does the magic want me?
Chapter 6
By late afternoon, Nim sat before the largest of her new study’s desks, its surface blanketed in ledgers and scrolls. There was far more information than she’d anticipated, insight the likes of which she’d never had access to before, no matter how many hours she’d spent researching assigned marks for the Trust, too many missives and accounts the king’s guard had deemed suspicious. She couldn’t say that they were wrong, though. Every seized document was tied to unusual occurrences similar in description to tactics used by the Trust. But Nim did not sense magic in them. Whatever illicit ventures the messages might have aided, they had not been sealed with blood in the way the most incriminating documents were.
She made a note to inquire about two royal posts she was not familiar with and backgrounds on several lords and ladies mentioned in a particularly confounding missive. She’d been out of good society for far too long to know everyone, but she understood how court maneuvering worked. She understood the types of citizens the Trust would target, and since the last moon, since meeting Warrick, she was beginning to understand why.