Incendiary (Hollow Crown #1)(91)

“I won’t tell anyone, I swear it.”

Behind us there’s a loud clattering and pots and pans fall to the floor. I leap to my feet and position myself in front of Davida. Fear tightens in my belly as I open the storage closet door.

“Judge Alessandro,” I say as fear floods my body. Not for me but for Davida.

Alessandro stands in the empty kitchen, an alman stone in his fist. It pulses with a memory of Davida and me. His face is twisted in cruel delight as he brandishes it. Davida tugs at my sleeve, and I try to give her a reassuring look.

“Leo didn’t believe me when I told him you’ve been faking your injury. He wanted proof before we went to Méndez. Imagine needing to prove my word against someone like you.”

Did Leo tell him where I would be? I think of the moments we’ve shared, the secrets we keep. No. I have to believe Leo wouldn’t. . . . But I can’t think of that now. I need to get Davida to safety.

“I don’t know what you think you’ve seen,” I say, raising my gloved hand and my exposed bandaged one in the air. “But we are simply sharing a midday meal. Or is there a new order that outlaws that?”

“No more from you!” Alessandro shoves the alman stone in front of my face. His slender body is taut with fear. I’ve seen carnival hands feed caged wolves this way. I shield my eyes from the brilliant light of memory in the crystal. “Every word you speak is a falsehood. There’s nothing wrong with your hand, and now Justice Méndez will see it.”

“Who’s going to read the stone?” I ask, voice calm despite my screaming thoughts. “There are hundreds of judges. There is one Robári.”

“Bestae.” He spits at my feet. “You overestimate your worth.”

“I only stated something we both know to be true.”

“You’re right, Robári, that I can’t touch you. Not while you have the good justice blinded and bewitched. But”—his cold eyes shift to Davida—“if I recall, some of the ladies have reported jewels missing. Do you know what the punishment is for thieves?”

Their fingers are broken, then healed, then cut off. Davida makes a terrible choking sound. I stand directly in front of her, but I can’t shield her from Alessandro for long.

“The torture she’ll endure,” Alessandro says, and his eyes light up with something more than fear. There’s a cruelty there that I hadn’t seen before because I dismissed him as a sniveling apprentice. He’s far more dangerous than that. As he unsheathes a dagger, I see the part of him that feeds on inflicting pain. “Pity. But I’ve heard she’s no stranger to punishment. I do not believe the king will forgive a second infraction.”

No matter what I do, someone is going to fear me. The maids, the courtiers, the judges. I chose to return to the palace. I chose their fear. Davida didn’t. She’s Moria, living in secret. And I’ve put her in danger. I’ve bought myself time until my hand heals in the eyes of Justice Méndez, but what after that? Alessandro will not forget this.

Unless . . .

I get on my knees and hold my hands up in supplication. “Please,” I beg the young justice. “Don’t hurt her. I have been lying. Arrest me. But let her go.”

Davida yanks at my sleeves and shakes her head. I shove her off as the rattle of a manacle clangs. When I look up at Alessandro, his smile is arrogant.

The moment he yanks my hand to clap it in irons, I grab his face with my bare fingers and grind my teeth against the rapid burn of my magics. I drain his memories of the last day. I watch his day unfold. Slinking barefoot into the kitchens with the alman stone, taking one from the vaults, shouting at Nuria, demanding answers from Leo. His mind makes me sick because it leaves me with hate. Hate for myself. Hate for things I don’t know. It slithers like pus from a festering sore, and when I let him go, I fall right beside him.

I rest my head on the cool kitchen floor. Pinpricks of light race across my vision. Davida drops down at my side.

“I’m all right,” I say, and take the hand she offers to help me stand.

We have a mutual understanding as we look at the unconscious judge at our feet. I survey the kitchen and find a bottle of clear liquor. I unstopper the cork and spill it on his pristine black robes.

Davida raises an eyebrow and signs, Where do we take him?

“The only place he won’t be able to make excuses,” I say.

Together, Davida and I drag him through a side door in the kitchens and down a service hall that leads to Justice Méndez’s office. We prop him on a chaise. Davida removes the almost empty bottle from her apron. She unstoppers it with her teeth, takes a swig, then wedges it in the crook of Alessandro’s arm.

When we hear the cathedral bells marking the end of the midday break, we slink out of the office’s main doors. The corridor is empty.

“He won’t remember,” I assure her.

Be careful, she signs.

We walk back to the main tower in silence, where the festival preparations have doubled. We are two servants walking to our next task hand in hand. When Davida stops trembling and we reach the kitchen entrance, she takes my hands in hers and kisses my cheeks. I summon all my strength to swallow the desire to be held, to have something so close to a mother’s touch.

“I’m sorry I brought this to you,” I whisper. “I’m supposed to protect you.”