“Why not?”
Saints and martyrs, her wretched yowling voice unnerves me. “Nobility doesn’t pick up strays for pets.”
She blinks her bright red eyes at me. There’s a faint glow to them even now. “You are not noble.”
“And you’re not a cat. We’re both pretending to be what we aren’t.” I push her off the wrap. “Hide in the carriage house tonight. You can come find me tomorrow.”
“I have a different idea.” Ragne crouches and seems to vanish. Then I feel tiny paws grasp my gloved hand and crawl up my sleeve. I yelp.
“Everything all right, Prinzessin?” the driver calls out.
“Fine,” I call back through gritted teeth, glowering down my sleeve, where a tiny black mouse with vivid scarlet eyes is now wiggling its nose at me.
I hate this perhaps more than I hate the ruby on my face.
That reminds me, I need either an excuse or a way to hide it. Eiswald had the decency to tear the jewelry from my satchel without ruining the jars inside, so I pick the least-foul-smelling opaque ointment and dab it over the stone as we roll up to the castle’s magnificent gilded double doors. I’ll make some excuse about an insect bite tonight if I need to, and tomorrow I can call the ruby teardrop a new trend.
Besides, castle staff have much more important things to worry about.
“Welcome back, Prinzessin,” the understeward, Barthl, says dourly as he reaches spidery fingers for my cloak.
I register the muffled uproar of servants rushing through the halls. “You’ve heard about the margrave.”
“Yes, Prinzessin.” Resignation is etched into his long face. He’s near Adalbrecht’s thirty years, and never approved of me, but I do feel a pang of sympathy. It’s his job to make sure the whole of Castle Reigenbach is pristine before tomorrow’s surprise inspection. “Will you need anything further tonight?”
“No.” No need to make more work for them, and better to keep eyes off me. I force my voice into a semblance of airy disinterest. “I’m retiring for the evening, and not to be disturbed.”
“Understood.” He bows quickly and hurries away.
I too hurry up the stairs to my wing of Castle Reigenbach. Technically, there’s a faster way to get to my chambers, but Gisele isn’t supposed to know about that. The servant passages are the domain of Marthe the Maid.
When I arrived a year ago, the first thing I did was filch a servant uniform, stow away my pearls, and run around the castle, begging for directions. I’m on an errand for my lady, can you tell me how to get to the stables? The ballroom? The library?
They showed me every shortcut and servant passageway in the castle, too busy to do anything but warn me not to hassle the resident kobold, Poldi. Once I drafted an order to the guards to let my maid Marthe come and go as she pleased, no door in Castle Reigenbach could hold me.
I suppose I could have kept the name Vanja, but there is a scant handful of people in Minkja who still know me by that name. “Marthe Schmidt” has no history, no baggage, no agenda. No scars. And I can stop being Marthe whenever I want.
There’s a fire in the hearth when I walk into my chambers, and a lit candelabra on the credenza by the door. That’s Poldi’s doing, for I know the worth of a friendly kobold, and the peril of a slighted one. Castle Falbirg’s kobold nearly lit Gisele on fire when he thought she had laughed at him. My first night in Castle Reigenbach, I scrounged up a bowl carved of boxwood, filled it with grits and honey, and placed it on my hearth with a small goblet of mead.
I awoke in the middle of the night to find Poldi on the hearthstones in the form of a fiery, squat little man no taller than my knee. I sat up and raised my own goblet from where I’d left it on the nightstand. “To your health, and to your honor.”
He toasted me back and vanished, leaving an empty bowl and a roaring fire in the hearth. I’ve been sure to put out grits and honey every night since, and it has always, always paid off.
I light a few more candles, then crash onto the bed facedown. Ragne scurries out of my sleeve and begins investigating the bolster and coverlet, whiskers twitching.
Part of me desperately wants to stay like this, maybe even fall asleep in my fine gown and let the laundresses steam the wrinkles out in the morning. I’ve burgled a small fortune, temporarily evaded a prefect, been cursed by a god, and been lectured by my godmothers.
It has, you could say, been a very long night.
But there’s a satchel full of stolen jewels in the carriage house, and I have to get rid of them before Adalbrecht returns. With a groan, I slide off the bed and onto the plush midnight-blue carpet. It’s almost as comfy as the coverlet. I make myself stand anyway, then shed my gown and pearls.
There’s a wine stain on my shift, so I draw a new one from my bureau. A small sachet falls out, and I tuck it back in with the soft linen.
When Gisele’s trunks were delivered to my rooms from Sovabin, I promptly dug out all the sachets of dried lavender that I’d sewn myself months ago, that I’d slipped between layers of cotton and silk, just as she’d asked. Then I threw them all into the Yssar River. I requested the steward bring me every scent I like, dried orange peels, vanilla pods, rose petals, even cinnamon sticks, all riches to me when I’d spent most of my life reeking of cheap tallow-and-ash soap. It was an unthinkable luxury to be as clean as I wanted to be, when I wanted. To decide what I would smell of.
By the end of the month, the last traces of lavender were gone, and every last stocking smelled of me.
I wonder if Gisele will return to lavender when I give it all back.
I can’t think about that now. I’ve just pulled the soiled shift over my head when Ragne’s voice pipes up. “Were you in a fight?”
I jump and whirl around, clutching the shift to myself. I’d forgotten she was there. Otherwise I never would have bared my back. “None of your business,” I snap.
Ragne’s taken the cat shape again, loafing at the foot of my bed. She blinks. “Are you angry? Those are good scars. I would be proud to survive such—”
“Shut up already.” I yank on the clean shift, face burning. “I said it wasn’t your business.”
Ragne just yawns at me. “You are very odd.”
I don’t dignify that with a response. Instead I finish changing into a servant uniform, hiding my hair under a plain knit cap this time. I also clasp my dowdy woolen cloak with a badge that marks me for a servant of House Reigenbach. Depending on what part of Minkja I’m walking, that badge can make me a mark or it can make me untouchable. My fence, Yannec Kraus, works in a tavern right on the border between them.
When I check my reflection in the vanity mirror, I see the ruby peeking through the ointment. That’s no good. Yannec has one rule: Everything I steal, I sell to him and him alone. He’s also a superstitious man, or at least gods-fearing enough that if I admit the ruby’s a curse, he won’t risk vexing a Low God by doing business with me.
There’s a small medical kit hidden in the vanity for any scrapes I collect on my heists. I plaster a bit of gauze over the ruby and hope it’ll stick better than the ointment did. As I do, something in my reflection catches my eye.
A ghost is in the mirror, a girl haunted by familiar unease and doubt now that the enchantment of the pearls can’t cover it up. I thought I left that girl back at Castle Falbirg.