Home > Capture the Crown (Gargoyle Queen #1)(6)

Capture the Crown (Gargoyle Queen #1)(6)
Author: Jennifer Estep

I might have cut and dyed my hair and stuffed myself into a miner’s uniform, but I hadn’t bothered to change my name. Gemma was very common, thanks to, well, me.

After I had been born, the name had become quite popular in Andvari, just as Everleigh had taken on a frenzied popularity in Bellona ever since Everleigh Blair had been crowned queen some sixteen years ago. All the royals’ names were in vogue to some extent, so I had felt safe enough using my real name in Blauberg. Besides, not having to remember to answer to another name made my spying much easier.

I smiled back at the other woman. “Yeah, I’m still finding my way around the city, and I went down the wrong street. Why are you late, Penelope?”

I had met Penelope when I’d started working in the mine two days ago. There weren’t many women here, so she had come over and introduced herself. I had liked her immediately, especially given her inherent cheerfulness, and Penelope had been showing me around ever since. A few butterflies of guilt fluttered in my stomach that I was using her to gather information on the other miners, but I swatted them away. As a princess and especially as a spy, I couldn’t afford to indulge in such a treacherous emotion as guilt.

Penelope smiled again. “Oh, my daughter needed some extra help getting ready for school.”

We reached the mine entrance, and she fell silent and faced forward.

Going from the morning sunshine into the darker confines of the mine was like stepping into a different realm, as though I had traveled through a Cardea mirror, an enchanted glass that let people see and talk to each other over great distances, as well as move from one place to another. In an instant, the crisp mountain air turned ten degrees cooler, and the natural sunlight gave way to black iron lanterns filled with round fluorestones. The lanterns hung on the walls like strings of popcorn on a yule tree, while the glowing fluorestones inside ranged in shade and intensity from cool, moody blue to bright, piercing white. The combined lights and colors painted the inside of the mine a pale, muted gray.

This first, topmost level was called Basecamp, since it was the base for all the mine’s operations, both aboveground and below. The front part was an enormous hollow dome, with a hard-packed dirt floor, curved walls, and a ceiling that soared several hundred feet overhead. Carts filled with chunks of ore and buckets of tools squeaked, creaked, and rattled along the metal tracks that crisscrossed the ground. Adding to the commotion were the miners loading carts, hauling empty buckets away, and calling out directions to each other.

I drew in a deep breath to steady myself. Then I exhaled, reached out with my magic, and carefully skimmed the thoughts of everyone around me.

When I was first learning how to use my magic, Alvis had told me to picture my mind magier power as some task that I could complete, that I could control. Skimming thoughts was like leaning over the deck of my tiny internal ship and dipping my fingers into the sea of emotion that constantly ebbed and flowed all around me.

In some ways, skimming thoughts was much harder than moving objects. I could easily ignore the strings of energy surrounding people and objects, but once I dipped my fingers into that endless, churning sea, anything could happen.

Oh, I could hear people’s whispered thoughts easily enough, but dealing with their emotions was much more difficult. Alvis had told me to treat other people’s feelings as things that I could experience for a moment, then set aside. Like someone’s seething jealousy was only a pinprick of pain, as though a thread master had accidentally poked me with a needle. Or boiling anger was nothing more than heat from a fireplace warming my face. Or bitter rage was merely an icy rain pelting my skin before dropping away. Brief discomforts that I could brush aside as quickly as I could close a book I had finished reading.

But try as I might, I couldn’t always close that book.

Sometimes, people’s thoughts and feelings were so strong, so vivid, so intense, that they completely overwhelmed me. Sometimes, if enough people were thinking and feeling the same things all at once—like fear, panic, dread, and terror—then my internal ship capsized in that raging sea of emotion, and my own magic crippled and paralyzed me, rendering me as useless as a fountain that had frozen over in the winter.

Just like I had been useless and frozen during the Seven Spire massacre.

A familiar combination of guilt and shame bubbled up inside me, burning like acid in my throat, but I shoved it down and focused on the people around me.

Gotta get back down into Shaft 3 . . .

Need to replace this cracked bucket . . .

Hope the baker has raspberry tarts for lunch . . .

The usual chatter whispered through my mind, and no strong emotions jumped out at me. Everything was normal.

I shuffled along behind Penelope and the other miners, heading toward the main checkpoint. The domed ceiling tapered down, morphing into a much smaller square shaft that was only about thirty feet high. Before they reached the shaft entrance, every miner stopped at a table where a man was sitting and shuffling through documents.

He was a large, bulky man, with thick arms and a round stomach that was slowly giving way to fat as he advanced into middle age. He wasn’t wearing a helmet, and his dark brown hair was oiled and slicked back from his forehead. His eyes were also a dark brown, as was the bushy mustache that adorned his upper lip like a trapped fuzzy, woolly worm, but his skin had the unnaturally pale look of someone who had spent more time underground than above it. The Ripley snarling gargoyle crest was stitched in black thread over his heart on his gray coveralls, marking his importance—Conley, the head foreman, and my top suspect.

Conley was one of the few people who had access to the entire mine, as well as the neighboring refinery, and if anyone could make shipments of tearstone disappear, then it was him. Especially since Clarissa—the second, or under, forewoman, the one who had died in that supposed accident—hadn’t been replaced yet.

Conley checked each person’s name off on his master list and handed them a small paper map indicating which section they would be working in. As I neared the table, I reached out with my magic again, this time focusing solely on Conley.

Gotta get more production out of Shaft 5 . . .

Can’t believe that idiot Horace broke another pickaxe . . .

Wonder if Wexel will be pleased with the latest shipment . . .

That last thought caught my attention. Who was Wexel? On the face of things, there was nothing truly incriminating about Conley’s musing. Sending out shipments was one of the foreman’s responsibilities, and it was only natural that he would be concerned about what his customers thought about their goods.

That thought skipped away in Conley’s mind and sank like a stone in a pond, but others sprang up like weeds to take its place, mostly about what he wanted for lunch—grilled pumpernickel bread piled high with red-pepper-crusted turkey, melted Swiss cheese, crunchy kale coleslaw, and extra onion dressing. He even pictured the bulging sandwich in his mind, and the image was so tempting that my own stomach rumbled with anticipation.

I could have probed a little more, but Conley might have sensed my magic. Most people didn’t notice when I skimmed their surface thoughts, but trying to hear someone’s deeper, more serious and private musings took much more power, skill, and control, and the person could sometimes feel that something was wrong, like the difference between a mild spring breeze ruffling their hair versus a cold winter wind chapping their cheeks. So I decided not to take that next step into Conley’s mind. I needed to keep a low profile until I was certain that he was the thief.

Hot Books
» House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1)
» A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire
» From Blood and Ash (Blood And Ash #1)
» A Million Kisses in Your Lifetime
» Deviant King (Royal Elite #1)
» Den of Vipers
» House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City #2)
» The Queen of Nothing (The Folk of the Air #
» Sweet Temptation
» The Sweetest Oblivion (Made #1)
» Chasing Cassandra (The Ravenels #6)
» Wreck & Ruin
» Steel Princess (Royal Elite #2)
» Twisted Hate (Twisted #3)
» The Play (Briar U Book 3)