Page 117 of Once the Skies Fade

“Jocelyn, are you sure the remedy you’ve been providing the queen is sufficient? With the citizens’ forum approaching, she can’t afford to not have an adequate hold on her shadows.” The harsh tone had to be the healer Ami.

Jocelyn’s softer voice answered. “Yes, Ami. I am. I used the same for her mother for many years prior.”

“Yes, but her mother didn’t have a propensity for rage and a hidden power that could kill so easily.”

“Calla is stronger than you all give her credit for,” Jocelyn argued.

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Ami noted darkly.

Feet shuffled, jars clinked together, and something fell onto a solid surface before Jocelyn spoke again.

“I will need more ingredients soon, though. She requires a larger dose than her mother did, and my supplies are quickly dwindling. Do we have the status of the latest shipment?”

“It’s been delayed,” Ami said. “Transport is taking extra precautions with the tournament. We’re under a bit more scrutiny with some troubling questions being raised about the king’s passing.”

Jocelyn hesitated before timidly asking, “What kinds of questions? Raised by whom?”

“Some have been led to believe that it may have been poison,” Ami said, her voice thick with suspicion. “Where could they have gotten that idea?”

“Possibly from their own experience?” Jocelyn offered, and I smiled at the hint of sass in her tone. “The king’s family had their fair share of trouble with the poison. It would only be logical for them to consider it as a possibility.”

Slow footsteps filled the resulting silence, and then Ami’s voice lowered into a menacing hiss. “I never said anything about his family. Why assume?—”

Jocelyn’s exasperated sigh interrupted her question. “They are the only ones whose skepticism would have you worried like this. I told you we should have told them the truth from the beginning, but what are you implying? That I went behind your back and informed them somehow?”

“Did you?” Ami asked pointedly.

“And what could I possibly hope to gain by doing that?” Jocelyn asked.

Sharp footsteps cut through the uncomfortable silence that followed. Ami whispered, “A lot could go wrong if a certain neighbor of ours starts poking around in our business. What happens if they link the poison to the queen, hm? Did you ever think of that?”

“She didn’t do it, though,” Jocelyn protested.

Ami scoffed. “No one knows that for sure, and now that they have reason to believe it wasn’t natural or an accident, they’ll be ramping up their own investigation rather than trusting us to handle it.”

“We should just destroy the remaining poison we have on hand, then,” Jocelyn said.

“No,” Ami said, her tone once again darkening. “They need it for the next trial.”

“What? They can’t do?—”

“They can, and they will, Jocelyn. That’s why I need you to make more of the antidote. You’re the only one with the skills to do it.”

“We should have destroyed it all before the general got poisoned,” Jocelyn said. “Do we know for sure that male didn’t get it from our supply?”

“General Marlowe is still investigating that, but in the meantime, we’re taking precautions.” Ami’s voice lowered, sounding almost gentle. “All you need to do right now is worry about getting the antidotes ready.”

Jocelyn mumbled a quiet, “Fine.” Heavy footsteps echoed through the now-quiet room, growing louder, closer—my cue to get back to my room.

Chapter 51

Calla

If Isa knew what had happened between Matthias and me, she never let on. Actually, the absence of her chastisement almost made me feel guiltier for what I’d done. Almost. For the next few days, life went on much as it had before the tournament, even before Brennan’s death. Quiet time spent in the solar, poring over reports from the provinces, reading up on the grievances that I may have needed to address in the upcoming citizens’ assembly.

With the next trial postponed until after we met with my subjects, there was no reason for me to see or visit with the competitors, but every night when my room was too quiet, I felt that pull to the hidden passage that would take me to Matthias’s room. I didn’t know if it was my shadows, my heart, or my body that yearned to be close to him, but somehow—even with the bottle of brandy I’d brought down from the solar—I refrained.

He didn’t come to me, either. Not that I expected him to. Stars, he probably didn’t even know where my room was—though, as a general, surely he could have found it if he wanted to.

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