The Orphan Queen (The Orphan Queen #1)(10)

Patrick held open his hand for the pen, and I placed it in his palm. “Can you copy mine?” he asked.

“Let’s see.”

He dipped the pen in ink and wrote on a scrap paper.

I, Patrick Lien, son of General Brendon Lien, do hereby swear my life to helping Princess Wilhelmina Korte reclaim her kingdom, no matter the cost.

I blinked up at him.

“Go ahead.” He slid the paper toward me. “Let’s see what you can do.”

Our writing was very different. Where mine was all elegant lines learned from a patient tutor, Patrick’s penmanship was scratchier, with uneven lines, and he allowed letters to fade at the end of words when the ink ran low on the nib. The letters weren’t the same height, and they didn’t have a uniform roundness. Those were mistakes my tutor would have drilled out of him, but perhaps his didn’t care, or his father wasn’t interested in his studies.

“It’s not as nice as yours.” Patrick shifted away a hair.

I dipped my pen into the ink. “I wasn’t thinking that. I was just studying the differences. But if you don’t like your handwriting, maybe I can help you change it.”

The motion was small, but he nodded. “I’d appreciate that.”

I hid my smile behind a strand of hair as I began copying his words. It was tricky; my training made his scratchy lines difficult to emulate.

The rough paper caught a tine, and all the ink sluiced out of the pen, making a huge inkblot over Patrick’s name.

I slammed the pen on the table and shouted a word I’d heard the older boys use.

“Wil!” Patrick’s voice was sharp. “Not as a queen. Would your mother have ever had an outburst like that? Used that word? Over a pen?”

My mother wouldn’t have lived in a freezing old castle, but I did. There wasn’t another choice. But I shook my head because I didn’t want Patrick to be angry with me.

“Try again.”

I dipped the nib into the ink and began writing. This time, I focused more, letting the point glide lightly over the paper to avoid the rough patches. I rounded or narrowed my letters like Patrick’s, noting which ones he tended to make the same way every time and which ones changed depending on where they were in the word. I caught myself refilling the pen where he’d have let the ink run out, though, so I pressed open the tines and let the black seep back into the bottle before completing the word.

Finished, I sat back to inspect my work.

“That’s not bad.” Patrick cocked his head. “Your lines are still more even than mine. See how mine taper at the tops and bottoms?”

I scowled. “You don’t even do the same things regularly, though. See this g here? You don’t curve the y descender the same way, even though they’re both at the end of the word.”

“That probably makes my handwriting easier to forge, since it’s inconsistent.”

“Oh. Hmm.”

“Try again,” he said. “Then we need to go out and train with the others. Our goals won’t be easy to accomplish, Wilhelmina, and we won’t get Aecor back this year, or even next year. But one day we will. One day you’ll take your rightful place on the vermilion throne, and your parents will be so proud.”

I muttered a thanks, not sure how to respond to such a heartfelt statement from Patrick, of all people.

When I finished the next attempt at copying his handwriting, he gave a sharp nod and minuscule smile. “You have a real talent for this,” he said. “I’ll make sure you have everything you need. Maybe I can even find a tutor.”

I wanted to hug him, but he was Patrick; he didn’t like hugs. Instead, I cleaned the nib, closed the bottle of ink, and said, “Thank you. I hope you know how much I appreciate you, and how happy I am that you’re here with me.”

He placed his palm on my shoulder, carefully, deliberately. “I’ll always be with you, Wilhelmina.”





FOUR


WE’D LEFT OUR disguises outside to accumulate mud and grime: Patrick and Oscar—who’d be playing the parts of our escorts—and Melanie and I hadn’t bathed since our last trip to Skyvale, either. My skin felt slimy as I wiggled into my dress; my hair wasn’t in much better shape, but I’d plaited it into a tight and complicated coronet that would hold up for days of travel.

Authenticity was the key to any deception.

Sometimes authenticity was disgusting.

After a quick rap on the door, Melanie walked in, wearing her dirty clothes. “Ready, Lady Julianna, Duchess of Liadia?” she asked, using an accent that thinned out her vowels. We’d learned it from refugees and had been practicing for weeks. She gave an exaggerated curtsy and giggled.

“Don’t look too happy.” I slipped the envelope with our papers into the side pocket of my bag, and hid my sheathed dagger inside my dress, at the small of my back. My other dagger, as far as I knew, was with Black Knife, assuming he’d taken it from that glowman’s hand. “If Patrick sees you smiling, he’ll send you to run laps around the castle until you’re not.”

“If it’s a crime to be excited about our future of hot baths, plenty of food, and walks through winter gardens, then I’m definitely a criminal.” She tugged at the sleeve of my dress, straightening it. “There. Don’t you have a shawl somewhere?”