One Dark Throne (Three Dark Crowns #2)(8)

The scream tears through the hall again. It is so full of panic and pain. Priestesses are shouting, barking frightened orders. When Mirabella bursts through the door it is chaos, white robes flashing as priestesses run back and forth.

In the corner of the room, a young initiate jerks and cries, held still by four shouting novices. She is practically a child, perhaps fourteen at most, and Mirabella’s stomach goes cold at the sound of her screams. It goes colder when Rho, the war-gifted priestess with the bloodred hair, takes the initiate by the shoulder.

“You little fool!” Rho shouts. Baskets of goods topple; voices grow louder, talking over one another to soothe and question the girl.

Mirabella’s voice rings out over the erupting room.

“What has happened? Is she all right?”

“Stay back, Mirabella, stay back!” Luca says, and rushes to the corner. “Rho, what is it?”

Rho grasps the novice by the neck and jerks her arm upright. It is bloody to the wrist. Blisters rise and burst as they watch, traveling farther down the arm as the poison makes its way deeper into her body. Toward her heart.

“She has put her hand into a poisoned glove,” Rho says. “Stop squirming, girl!”

“Stop it!” the initiate begs. “Please, make it stop!”

Rho grimaces in frustration. There is no saving the girl’s hand. She holds up her serrated knife, considers it a moment, then tosses it clattering to the floor.

“Someone bring me an axe!” She bends the girl down across a table. “Hold out your arm, child. Quickly. We can take it at the elbow now. Do not make it worse.”

More priestesses join Rho to hold the girl and shush her gently. A priestess runs past Mirabella with a small silver hatchet.

“It was all I could find,” she says.

Rho grips it and flips it over, testing its weight.

“Turn her face away.” She raises the blade to strike.

“Turn yours as well, Elizabeth,” Mirabella says, and pulls her trembling friend close to hide her eyes and tuck the edge of her hood closed so the tiny, tufted woodpecker nestled in Elizabeth’s collar cannot fly out and be seen.

The hatchet comes down, one hard, chopping thud into the table. It is a testament to Rho’s war gift that she did not need to strike twice. The surrounding priestesses wrap the poor girl’s bleeding arm and steal her away to be tended. Perhaps they have saved her. Perhaps the poison, meant for Mirabella, has been stopped.

Mirabella clenches her teeth to keep from screaming. It was Katharine who did this. Sweet little Katharine, who Mirabella knows not at all. But Mirabella is smarter now. She made the mistake of sentimentality with Arsinoe. She will not make it again.

“When she is healed, I will have a spade fashioned for her. Just like mine. We will tend the gardens together. She will not miss her arm at all,” Elizabeth says tearfully.

“That is kind of you, Elizabeth.” Mirabella says. “And when I am finished with Arsinoe, I will silence Katharine so no one will have to fear poisoned gloves out of the capital ever again.”

That night, Mirabella and Bree and Sara Westwood meet Luca and the priestesses before the temple courtyard. Mirabella’s black dress is covered in a soft, brown cloak, and her riding boots are laced up tight. Bree, Elizabeth, and her escort of guards and scouts are all similarly outfitted. Anyone who sees them pass might mistake them for traveling merchants.

Mirabella strokes the muzzle of one of the long-legged black horses who will pull the decoy carriage toward Katharine and Indrid Down. The carriage is a beautiful, empty shell, lacquered and trimmed in silver, the horses so dark they would be shadows if not for the shine off their bits and buckles. They will be enough of a distraction for Katharine and the Arrons. Just enough to keep them from interfering with her in Wolf Spring.

“Here is Crackle,” Luca says, and places her stout brown mare’s reins into Mirabella’s palm. “She will not fail you.”

“I have no doubt.” Mirabella scratches the horse beneath the forelock. Then she moves to Crackle’s side and swings into the saddle.

“What are these?”

Mirabella turns. Her party is mounted, but one of the priestesses is tugging on Bree’s saddlebags.

“Leave off!” Bree nudges her horse a step forward. “They are pears.”

“We have not inspected any pears,” the priestess says.

“That is because I picked them myself, from the orchard at the edge of Moorgate Park.”

“They should not go,” the priestess says to Luca.

“And yet they are going,” Bree insists. “Queen Katharine is not so devious as to poison these three particular pears from one particular tree in one particular orchard in one of the many parks in Rolanth. And if she is,” she says to Mirabella through the side of her mouth, “then she deserves to win.”

Mirabella and Elizabeth suppress their smiles. But there is not much light; the moon is waning, and what slice is left is obscured by clouds. So perhaps the priestesses will not see how their sides shake.

“Ride fast,” says Rho. She has taken down her hood, and dark red hair spills over her shoulder. “And quietly. We have heard reports of another bear mauling near Wolf Spring. A man and his boy, disemboweled and necks broken. Your sister does not have control of her familiar. Or she does and is wicked. Either way there is no time to waste.”