Incendiary (Hollow Crown #1)(106)

I’ve never heard her sound so despondent, but I know I have to let her talk through this. I know when I’ve been the one like this, nothing anyone could say would make me feel better. After a long silence, I work up the nerve to speak.

“I haven’t given up, Margo. You haven’t either.”

“I thought that. When we were in the market,” Margo says, “we watched an olive vendor get arrested. All he was doing was resting with his cart on the corner of a street. I watched him beg for his life, but the guards simply rattled off what they usually say. That’s what they’re doing. Creating panic. It felt the same as the first King’s Wrath. I’ve spent most of my life fighting, but the only time I ever felt that helpless was when my family was killed.”

“How did you get into the palace?” I ask.

She looks with steady eyes that unnerve me. “A week ago. One of Illan’s informants sent word they needed new entertainment for the festival night.”

“You always were the best dancer.” Weariness aches deep in my marrow, but I remember how beautiful she looked in her festival dress. Even if she didn’t wear her true face. “Did you know the informant?”

“In a way.” Margo shakes her head. “It was the Magpie, though they only communicated through messages of where to go and the songs the king preferred.”

The Magpie who was supposed to help Dez escape. Someone with access to the prince, to the hidden places of the grounds, the court, the king. She has the freedom to come and go from the palace. My dear husband let slip . . . I breathe a sigh of certainty.

“What is it?”

“I’ve been here for weeks and I’ve just realized who the Magpie is.”

Margo cocks her eyebrow. “Well, they knew you. Asked us to come help you.”

“What?” Tears spring to my eyes. She knew all along. The shame of underestimating her hits me.

“Keep the spy’s name to yourself. I would not trust myself not to betray it under the right circumstance.”

She means torture. But I know that Margo would never reveal the name. Still, I will keep Nuria’s secret.

“It was risky, using my magics,” Margo continues, picking at a strand of hay in the mud. “But as long as the illusion is on me and not on others, it wouldn’t have such a strong effect.”

“That was reckless,” I tell her. That was something Dez would do.

“That was the only thing I could do to put an end to this. That man is responsible for thousands of lives. His entire family has destroyed our homes, destroyed everything. Why does he get to live?” She juts an accusatory finger in my face, voice escalating. “Why did you save him?”

“Because anything you did would only befall the Moria tenfold. Even if I was killed immediately after. It would be worse for everyone else. The weapon would have been deployed before I could find it. We were trained to think of the bigger picture, Margo.”

Margo sits back. Shivers again. I wonder just how bad things have become to make her this rash, to act without thinking.

“What landed you down here after being the Moria hero?” she spits petulantly.

“I attacked Prince Castian. After Dez was executed—”

“Murdered,” she says.

“After that, a prisoner gave me a memory. The prince was taunting Dez with what was in this box. I believed it was the weapon.”

“Did you find it?”

I make a growling sound of frustration. “If I had, I wouldn’t be here with you.”

I think back to the move that caused me to slip up. I tried to steal Castian’s memories. I felt his thoughts slipping into my mind, but then there was nothing. I couldn’t break through those walls. How did he do it? I tremble from the cold and the anger of having Castian speak my name. Nati. How did he know that name?

“It must have been hard to focus on the weapon while living in the lap of luxury.”

I meet her gaze. “Are you serious? I ate and I bathed and I smiled at the man who took me from my family when I was a child. I bled for the king who killed my parents. Could you have done the same?”

She turns away, but I don’t let it drop. “Answer me, Margo!”

“Leave it alone, Renata,” she snarls like a wolf.

“You’ve always hated me. I could never tell if it was because of what I am or because Dez chose me for the unit despite your protest.”

She grabs a handful of dirt and throws it at me. “Do you think so little of me that I would hate you because of Dez? Dez was my unit leader. And the bravest of us all. You’re weak, Renata. Consumed with your past, living in it and rejecting the people around you. That’s why I hated you.”

I’m breathing fast and hard, and I want to hit her, but her words weigh me down.

“You even managed to hurt Sayida, every time you chose to be alone rather than with the rest of us.”

“The Whispers had no love for me, which you reminded me of daily,” I respond, kneeling forward so she’s forced to look at me.

Her voice is hard and jagged. “Illan disciplined every single person who hurt you. He even separated units to make life easier for you. I hated watching you act as if the fate of our world was yours alone to bear and the rest of us were simply there to torment you. You had to get the alman stone and you had to be the one to find the weapon. Have you even considered that if you trusted us we would have done the same? But no. Dez is dead. You should have been on that executioner’s block. Not Dez. You, Renata.”