Stolen Songbird (The Malediction Trilogy, #1)(108)

“I’ll be quick,” she said, ignoring the tears flooding down my face.

Once we were through and I’d composed myself, I pulled the yellow gown on, balancing myself against the furniture when the room shook from another tremor. Ana?s flung open the curtains, went out onto the balcony, and looked up at the rocks. “If it were going to fall, I think it would have done so by now.”

She came back into the room and began placing fallen books back on the shelves. I helped her, and together we put the room back into some semblance of order. When we were finished, I sorted through smashed glassware for two unbroken cups and poured us both a heavy measure of wine.

“Thank you,” she said, sitting on one of the chairs and demurely crossing her ankles.

“I’m sorry,” I blurted out.

“I’ve plenty of dresses, Cécile.” She took a mouthful of her wine, watching me. “Although since you stole Lessa from us, I’ve had to stand for my own fittings. It’s most bothersome.”

“I don’t mean about the dress.” And I had no intention of apologizing about Lessa.

“Oh.” I saw the dark red liquid in her cup slosh as though there’d been another tremor, but the room was still.

“You thought I’d leave today, given the chance. That was why you helped us, wasn’t it?”

“I always help Tristan when he asks something of me,” she said, composure restored.

“You’d have helped even if you’d known I wouldn’t leave?”

“I’ve never said no to him before.”

I set my glass down on the table untouched. “Enough with these vague answers. You thought I would leave and that’s why you helped. Yes or no?”

Her eyes darkened. “Yes.”


“Because if I were gone, he would spend more time with you?”

“Yes.”

“You love him?”

She drained her glass and slammed it down next to mine, cracking it. I felt power and magic roil through the room. She could snap my neck without moving. Toss me so hard against the wall my bones would shatter. But I wasn’t afraid. As much as she might hate me, she wouldn’t, couldn’t, break her word to Tristan.

“Yes.”

“Because if I were gone, then there’d be a chance he would be with you instead?”

“No.”

“You’re lying!”

Ana?s shook her head and the weight of power in the room fell away. “I cannot lie. If you’d asked me if I desired to be his wife, my answer would have been different. But it has been a long time since there was a chance of that happening.” Reaching for my untouched glass, she drained it. “For one, he has never felt that way about me. And two, I am flawed. Unfit. And there was nothing I could do to make up for it.”

I choked back a laugh of astonishment. “If you’re flawed, what does that make the rest of us? I might not like you very much, Ana?s, but you’re still the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.”

“And I might as well be the most ugly for all the difference it makes.” She touched her chest. “My flaw lies within.”

Hefty personality flaws didn’t matter much to men when the outside was pretty, I wanted to say; but I didn’t think that was what she meant.

“You know about my sister? How she died?”

I hesitated, then nodded. “Marc told me. She bled to death.”

She scowled. “He would know. Regardless, since she had the blood sickness, I have it too.”

I shook my head. “You got your fair share of scrapes during the earthshake and they’ve already healed. If you had the sickness, that wouldn’t have happened.”

“Just because it hasn’t manifested doesn’t mean I don’t have it, Cécile. It’s in me. I’d pass it down to my children.” Her shoulders slumped. “I am an unfit wife, for the future king or for anyone. I have been told so to my face by the King himself.” I watched as all her cool composure fell away, her body trembled with unshed tears. “I wasn’t good enough to marry Tristan. I am not good enough to marry anyone. No one will even touch me for fear of tarnishing my reputation. I will always be alone.”

A knock at the door interrupted her.

“Yes?” I called out, feeling rattled by the swell of sympathy Ana?s’s confession had inspired in me. The door opened and Victoria walked in, shoulders bent with exhaustion.

“Well?” Ana?s snapped. Her composure was back in place again, and I half wondered if I’d imagined her losing it in the first place.

“Six dead in the city, a dozen more injured. Two mineshafts collapsed – we think there are five gangs of half-bloods trapped, but there could be more. Miners’ Guild is waiting for the tremors to finish before they go after them, but there isn’t much hope of reaching them in time.”

I gasped and leapt to my feet. “We have to help them! They have no way to get themselves out.”

“She’s right.” Ana?s got to her feet and began pacing back and forth like a caged animal. “They may not have much time.”

“No sense risking more lives. We don’t even know if they are still alive,” Victoria said, picking through broken glass, trying to find an unbroken cup and eventually giving up.