Once Broken Faith (October Daye #10)(123)

“You’re a nerd,” said Cassandra. There was a deep fondness in her tone. He didn’t seem to notice.

For her sake—for his sake—I hoped he’d notice it soon. Immortality is hard enough without spending it alone. “Nerd or not, whatever you need, you’ve got it. I want my brother back. You have the resources of my kingdom at your disposal.”

Master Davies turned to look solemnly at me. “I’m not going to insult you by asking whether you mean that. Instead, I’m going to ask you to leave.”

I stared at him. “What? No.”

“Yes. I need to analyze his blood. I need to figure out the roots of this spell, and I need peace and quiet while I do it. So I need you to go. Take Cassie with you. She can help with anything you need that isn’t this.”

“Yeah,” said Cassandra. Her eyes were on the air above Nolan’s arm, unfocused again, like she didn’t know what she was looking at. She was frowning. That was what really stood out. She had good reasons to be nervous—she was locked in a small room with the Queen in the Mists and the Crown Prince, even if it was sometimes difficult for me to remember that those august personages were me and my brother—but she didn’t have reason to frown like that.

“What are you looking at?” I asked.

Cassandra jumped, flinching away from me. “Nothing,” she said.

She was lying. I knew she was lying, and sadly being queen didn’t come with magical truth-sensing abilities, so there was no way for me to prove it. “You keep looking at something,” I insisted. “If you know something . . .”

“I don’t know anything,” she said. “I’m not an alchemist, and I’m not pre-med. I’m a physics major. A tired, hungry physics major who wasn’t planning to be in the royal knowe tonight, so I’m a bit freaked out right now, your, um, splendidness.”

“Not a standard form of address, but we’ll roll with it,” I said, and sighed, running a hand through my hair. “Master Davies, we’ll be in the kitchen if you need us. Cassandra, if you’ll come with me, I can help with the ‘hungry’ part of your problem.”

She cast an anxious glance at Master Davies before turning back to me. “Lead the way,” she said.

There was no more reason to stay, and quite a few reasons to go. I led her to the door, and out into the hall. The last thing I saw before the door swung shut was Master Davies leaning over my brother, the scalpel once more in his hand. Then the wood blocked my view, and I was grateful.

A hand touched my arm. I turned to find Cassandra looking at me with the sort of honest, uncalculated concern that I hadn’t seen since the last time I’d talked to Jude. “He’ll figure it out,” she said. “If there’s anyone who can do it, it’s Walther. The man works miracles in his spare time.”

“Walther,” I echoed. She looked at me quizzically, and I shrugged, feeling sheepish. “I couldn’t remember his first name, and it seemed rude to ask when I was already asking for his help.”

Cassandra’s laugh was bright and surprised. “Oh, that’s awesome. No, really. You’re just a normal person with a crown, not some sort of, like, mystical fairy superhero.”

“See, that’s what I keep trying to tell people, but they keep bowing anyway.” I started down the hall, beckoning for her to follow me. “The kitchen’s this way.”

“Great.” Cassandra trotted to catch up, rubbernecking shamelessly as we walked. I took a moment to look where she was looking, trying to see the knowe through her eyes.

October thought—and had explained to me, at great length—that knowes were alive, capable of changing and rearranging themselves on a whim. I didn’t think she was wrong, exactly, but I thought she was discounting the work of the many craftsmen and artisans who had poured their hearts and souls into the very walls.

If the knowe is alive, it’s because so many people bled and dreamt and spent their magic like water to wake it up. I liked to think it knew that, on some level; that it remembered my father, and my grandparents, who had done everything they could to make it grander, and more worthy of being the seat of the Mists, which had been the largest, grandest Kingdom in the West for so long.

The hall was sparsely decorated, leaving the focus on the carved redwood walls. Panels set at eye level told the story of my family’s time in the Mists, carved in a style that was half-representative, half-symbolic. I didn’t think my grandmother had actually coaxed the moon down from the sky to light her way when she was courting my grandfather, for example, but I was sure it had felt that way, at least to her.

They died long before I was born, victims of the long, slow dance of regicide. It was because of them that my father chose to hide the fact that he had children of his own. He knew what happened to kings and queens. I sometimes thought that they had saved my life by dying. There’s no amount of gratitude that makes up for that. But I still wish I’d had the chance to meet them.

“You don’t do your own dusting, right?” asked Cassandra. “Because if you do, you should quit.”

“I’m not allowed to quit,” I said.

“Who says?”

“October.”

Cassandra snorted. “Naturally. Aunt Birdie is great at telling other people to step up and do their duty, but did she hold onto her County? Nope. Passed it off to the first out-of-town noble she could find.”