Page 13 of Secrets of Graves and Gold

“No,” Rheave says brightly. “I came to you because you helped me with the butterfly. Even though I could see you were nervous about being near me, you helped. And I could sense by then that you didn’t really like what they were doing. I didn’t tell them that either.”

I can’t help glancing over my shoulder at him. His beautiful face is utterly placid, as if he doesn’t find anything about what he just said all that meaningful. But my chest has constricted around my heart.

He isn’t wrong, is he? I lent him a hand with the injured butterfly that’d landed on his sleeve—because it realized he was something more than human?—for pretty much the same reason I haven’t yet told him to take a hike.

My monstrous magic has left me with one firm principle I’ve never strayed from. If I can do some good for the people around me, balance the scales of the harm I’ve dealt and might deal in the future a little, then I do it.

Well, Julita says doubtfully. I suppose that makes a certain kind of sense.

Casimir lets out a soft laugh. “I think he sees the same things in you that we all do, Kindness.”

I shoot him a teasing grimace at the nickname, but before I can say anything in return, a slim figure bursts through the doorway.

“There’s a patrol coming this way,” Luzia says breathlessly. “They’ll be here in less than five minutes. You’d better get going.”

She gives me a hasty but encouraging nod. As soon as she heard that her father had agreed to help me, she insisted on pitching in.

The men clamber onto their mounts, and we hurry out onto the street at a trot. If we go any faster, we’ll only give away that we’re fleeing rather than a patrol ourselves.

Clouds have congealed overhead, dimming the sun. A distant rumble of thunder sends a quiver through my nerves.

I set up our escape. My men are all counting on me.

What if Garom’s tactic fails, and we end up arrested?

I’ve been prepared for that final fate for years. It won’t feel so much like a tragedy as an inevitability.

But if I drag the men I’ve come to care about so much down with me…

Shaking off my worries, I will myself to stay focused.

We take the first side street and continue on a winding path to ensure the soldiers behind us don’t catch sight of our group. It’s only a short ride to the outer walls.

Garom monitors the schedule of the guards at the city gates and knows that they usually change at the sixth bell. If we get there right before the current sentinels are due to be relieved of duty, they’ll be at their most restless. Eager to get on with things so their work can be done.

As we come out onto the main thoroughfare that leads to the gate we’re aiming for, we arrange ourselves into a more formal procession. Rheave, who’s still technically an actual guard, takes the lead with Casimir and I behind him. Stavros and Alek, in their heavier disguises, bring up the rear where they’ll be less visible.

I hold my posture stiffly straight, as if I can add a few inches to my meager height, and form an expression with the sort of arrogant disdain I’ve witnessed on dozens of Crown’s Watch soldiers in the past. With my chin raised, I peer down my nose at the pedestrians we pass.

There’s a line of civilians along the right side of the road—mostly merchants with carts or wagons of goods they’re hoping they can still take out of the city today, as well as a couple of carriages. They’ve been waiting long enough that many of them have perched amid their merchandise to talk with their neighbors in line. The muttering intensifies as we trot by.

Then a voice catches my ears, one I haven’t heard in years but so familiar it cuts right down the center of me. “Oh, we were supposed to have these tracts to the Temple of Sunlit Skies three hours ago. I don’t see why they can’t let legitimate business people like us through.”

My gaze flicks to the side before I can catch it. And there she is.

My mother perches on our old cart next to several stacks of thin books. Her pale hair is wound back in one of her usual buns, as much gray as blond now. Her thin lips slant at the disgruntled angle I can still vividly remember deepening into outright fury.

A prickle runs down my back through the scars she inflicted with the regular lashes of her belt. My breath freezes in my lungs.

I yank my gaze away, but Casimir has already picked up on my reaction. He peers at me with concern, keeping his voice low. “Ivy, what is it? Do we need to divert course?”

It takes far too much effort to drag the humid air into my chest. I grip my reins and will my voice to stay steady. “It’s fine. I just didn’t expect—I saw my mother.”

There’s a rustle as Stavros shifts in his saddle behind me. His words come out in a dark mutter. “What? Where is she?”

Alek speaks in a similarly hardened tone. “The cart with the books, I’d imagine? That’s the woman who?—”

He cuts himself off with a muted growl.

---