House of Pounding Hearts (The Kingdom of Crows #2)(79)
“I haven’t seen him in days, so no.” The male cannot even be bothered to mind-stroll, which just goes to show I haven’t crossed his mind once.
“Okay, so what the underworld is eating at you?”
“Absolutely nothing.”
Her eyebrows writhe. “So learning to speak insults in Crow was—”
“Educational.” I rifle through the plethora of gowns, the wooden hangers clinking jarringly.
Syb tilts her head to the side and gives me a look. “You can lie to everyone else, Fal, but not to me.”
I study the pleats of an indigo chiffon gown so hard I’ve no doubt my forehead becomes just as pleated as the dress.
“What happened with Lore, Fal?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing, huh?”
“Yes. Nothing.”
“So it has nothing to do with the fact that he’s in Glace?”
“How do you know where he is?”
“I heard Antoni mention to Mattia that Lore couldn’t help because he was visiting the Glacins.”
More like visiting a certain Glacin . . .
“What I can’t wrap my head around is why in the world he’s marrying Alyona when, clearly, he’s—”
“She has a kingdom to offer him.” My fingers have grown so tight that the dress slips off the hanger and puddles at my feet.
“And you, a queendom.”
I hinge at the waist and scoop up the feather-soft cloth. “What do you think of this dress?”
Syb sighs. “So we’re really not discussing the serpent in the room?”
“Not tonight.”
“But tomorrow?” In a hushed voice, she asks, “Tomorrow you’ll finally stop lying to me, and to yourself?”
I neither nod nor shake my head.
“I really wish salt would work on you,” she grumbles. “Oh, the truths I’d pry from your stubborn tongue.”
“Speaking of salt . . . Did you buy some?”
“Obvs.” She fishes a small pouch from in between her breasts and drops it into my open palm.
As I close my fingers over the truth serum, my bathroom door flaps open and Catriona barges in. “I’ve changed—” Her palm lies flat against her heaving chest as she comes to a stop in my closet. “My mind!”
Syb’s eyebrows hook up. “About . . .?”
“I want—the silver headpiece.” A sheen of sweat glosses the courtesan’s forehead. “Orange—doesn’t match—my dress.”
Syb snorts. “You gave yourself heart failure over a headpiece?”
Catriona’s green eyes meet mine in the mirror. There’s something large and almost possessed about them. “You don’t mind, do you, micara?”
I turn toward her, raising a soft smile that does nothing to blot out her anguish. “Of course, I don’t mind.”
She jerks up her hand that’s strangling a tawny masterpiece. “Here.”
“I left mine on the writing desk.”
A single bead of sweat travels down her bobbing throat and stains the high collar of her dress.
I place my hand on her forearm, meaning to give it a squeeze when I feel it tremble. “Catriona, is this really about some headpiece, or is something else the matter?”
Her pupils grow and shrink. Grow and shrink. “You know I’m superficial to a fault.”
My eyebrows knit. “Except, you’re not.”
“My nickname was the Puddle of Tarelexo.”
I balk. “What are you talking about? I never heard anyone call you that.”
“Sybille has.”
Syb plucks the blue gown off the floor and lays it out on the central chest of drawers. “Dargento considered us all as dirty and shallow as puddles, Catriona.”
“Dargento is a fucking fool and a disgusting excuse for a human being,” I growl.
Catriona’s gaze dips to the blue fabric. “You’re going to rob everyone of breath in that dress.”
I don’t know about everyone, but certainly myself. That corset boning looks torturous. I snap my attention off the dress and refocus on Catriona. “Mark my words, one day, I will murder Dargento.” How I wish he’d been the man Bronwen saw in her vision . . . just for confirmation’s sake.
Her lips flex over a murmur. Although not a hundred percent certain, I think she says, “May you succeed where I failed.”
Catriona tried to kill Dargento? When? Why? Did he hurt her? As she spins away, I call out her name, but she doesn’t turn back.
“She said she tried to kill him, right?”
“I didn’t hear.” As we stare at the empty door which she closed behind her, Syb says, “She’s probably on her monthlies. Mine started two days ago, and you know how we’re all in sync from living atop one another.” She nods to my bathroom. “I stocked your bathroom with some disposable, wadded cotton pads. Did I mention they were disposable? Meaning we don’t have to wash them and reuse them.”
Although still worried for Catriona, I cannot help but return Syb’s contagious smile. “This may come as a surprise, but I am aware of the meaning of disposable.”
Syb proceeds to tell me how she’s planning on finding a way to make them affordable, so halflings and humans have access to them. After all, we’re the ones without servants to do our bidding.