The Impostor Queen (The Impostor Queen, #1)(46)

“Freya, is Maarika a wielder?”

She gives me a sharp look as we reach a shelter near the back of the cave. “No. Why would you think that?”

I blink at her. “No reason.” Except that I’ve spent at least an hour each night watching beads of sweat turn to frost across Oskar’s forehead. The suspicion on Freya’s face is enough to shut me up, even though I’m wondering about their father, too. None of them ever mention him.

“Harri,” Freya suddenly calls out, waving to a young man with curly black hair who has a shelter full of fine weapons, several cloaks and pairs of gloves, and even a small pile of copper baubles like those worn by the wealthier women of the city. He trades us a new hunting knife for Oskar in exchange for a bundle of elk sticks, a beaver pelt, and the next turkey Oskar bags.

“Tell him it had better be fat,” Harri says with a laugh, revealing deep dimples in his cheeks.

Freya puts her hands on her hips. “You know Oskar would never give you a skinny bird to pay for goods.”

Harri puts his hands up. “I’d never challenge him on it. He’s way too grouchy.” He winks at me. “But maybe our new girl is putting him in a better mood?”

I wish that were true and am about to say so when Freya’s mouth drops open. “Harri, you are the cheekiest boy in these caves.” Her face is flushed. “Apologize.”

My eyebrows shoot up. “For what?”

Harri laughs as he steps in front of me and bows low. “Dearest new girl—”

Freya pokes his arm. “Her name is Elli.”

Harri’s head hangs. “Dearest, dearest Elli, of the coppery hair and lovely blue eyes”—I take a quick step back, nervous that he’s noticed my features, but he continues, his tone playful—“please forgive any thinly veiled insults, implications, innuendos, insinuations, intimations—” He looks up and grins, and I can’t help but smile back. “Am I forgiven?”

When I nod, he straightens up. “And can I also assume that you and Oskar are not . . . erm . . . entangled?”

I gape at him, finally grasping why Freya was offended. “Yes. Please assume.” Now my face is probably flushed.

Harri folds the beaver pelt over his arm. “Then I will definitely see you around.”

Freya steers me toward the community hearth in the center of the cavern. “He’s the biggest flirt in this camp. The biggest pickpocket, too. He’d never dare here, but he sneaks into the city—there are ways to do it—and he’s always coming back with stuff.” She holds up Oskar’s new knife. “I doubt he came by this honestly.”

Maarika is kneeling next to the hearth, kneading dough in a stone trough along with two other women. Her eyes meet mine as we approach, and I wish to the stars I could read minds. Freya waves the new knife at her, and the older woman smiles. “Looks nice and sharp,” she calls out.

The other women look up, and their faces twist into identical looks of mistrust when their gazes land on me. The one on the left, a young woman about my age with thick black hair and light-green eyes, looks particularly sour. “That’s Aira. She’s Ismael’s daughter,” Freya whispers. “She’s got a little thing for Oskar, and she hates that you’re living in our shelter.”

“Isn’t she the one spreading the rumor that I’m pregnant by a stable boy?”

Freya chuckles. “It would be convenient for her if it were the truth.” She waves at Aira and gives her a sugar-sweet smile.

“We’ve been wondering when you’d emerge from hiding,” Aira says as we reach the trough. Her hands are crusted with sticky brown dough.

I glance around. Apart from the other woman, who’s older than Maarika, with one eye that’s cloudy and another bright blue, there’s only one person at the hearth—a slender man no taller than I am, with a dented nose. He looks me over and grunts. “She emerges all right—whenever she wants to spy. Tell me, girl, when will the constables and priests be showing up?”

“Hopefully never,” I reply. “But if they do come, it won’t be on account of me.” I hope that’s true, and that for the sake of the people, they’re looking for the real Valtia instead of wasting time trying to hunt me down.

“Luukas,” says Maarika in a flat voice. “Elli was freshly injured when she came to us.” She gestures at my right hand, my lurid pink scars and missing fingers. “If she is a spy, that’s a fairly elaborate disguise.”

Luukas chews on the inside of his cheek as he stares at my hand, and then his eyes rise to mine. “What happened to you, then?”

“I was a servant,” I say, hoping he can’t hear the tremble in my voice.

“In what household?” Aira asks.

I bow my head, my heart drumming a frantic beat against my breast. “I would . . . rather not say.” I gesture at my back, praying to the stars that this is a believable story. “I was accused of stealing. I didn’t do it. But my mistress didn’t believe me. She whipped me and threw me out. And then I was banished from the city for stealing a meat pie. I was just so hungry.” I glance up to find a bewildering array of reactions.

Maarika’s brow is furrowed in what appears to be sympathy. The cloudy-eyed woman is on the verge of tears. Luukas’s lips are pursed, like he’s trying to find the lie. And black-haired Aira is scowling. “So you’re a thief,” she says. “And we’re supposed to take your word that you were banished instead of fleeing from a worse punishment? How do we know for sure your mistress hasn’t sent the constables after you?”