Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass #4)(49)

Shouts were now erupting behind, accented by the whiz and thud of arrows and the bleating of dying men.

“Four blocks,” she panted. “Just four blocks.”

That didn’t seem nearly far enough away to be safe, but he had no breath to tell her. Keeping upright was task enough. The stitches in his side had split, but—holy gods, they’d cleared the palace grounds. A miracle, a miracle, a mir—

“Hurry, you hulking ass!” she barked.

Aedion forced himself to focus and willed strength to his legs, to his spine.

They reached a street corner bedecked in streamers and flowers, and Aelin glanced in either direction before rushing through the intersection. The clash of steel on steel and the screams of wounded men shattered through the city, setting the throngs of merry-faced revelers around them to murmuring.

But Aelin continued down the street, and then down another. At the third, she slowed her steps and rocked into him, beginning to sing a bawdy tune in a very off-key, drunken voice. And thus they became two ordinary citizens out to celebrate the prince’s birthday, staggering from one tavern to the next. No one paid them any heed—not when all eyes were fixed on the glass castle towering behind them.

The swaying made his head spin. If he fainted … “One more block,” she promised.

This was all some hallucination. It had to be. No one would actually have been stupid enough to try to rescue him—and especially not his own queen. Even if he’d seen her cut down half a dozen men like so many stalks of wheat.

“Come on, come on,” she panted, scanning the decorated street, and he knew she wasn’t talking to him. People were milling about, pausing to ask what the palace commotion was about. Aelin led them through the crowd, mere cloaked and stumbling drunks, right up to the black carriage-for-hire that pulled along the curb as though it had been waiting. The door sprang open.

His cousin shoved him inside, right onto the floor, and shut the door behind her.

“They’re already stopping every carriage at the major intersections,” Lysandra said as Aelin pried open the hidden luggage compartment beneath one of the benches. It was big enough to fit a very tightly curled person, but Aedion was absolutely massive, and—

“In. Get in, now,” she ordered, and didn’t wait for Aedion to move before she heaved him into the compartment. He groaned. Blood had started seeping from his side, but—he’d live.

That is, if any of them lived through the next few minutes. Aelin shut the panel beneath the cushion, wincing at the thud of wood on flesh, and grabbed the wet rag Lysandra had pulled from an old hatbox.

“Are you hurt?” Lysandra asked as the carriage started into a leisurely pace through the reveler-clogged streets.

Aelin’s heart was pounding so wildly that she thought she would vomit, but she shook her head as she wiped her face. So much blood—then the remnants of her makeup, then more blood.

Lysandra handed her a second rag to wipe down her chest, neck, and hands, and then held out the loose, long-sleeved green dress she’d brought. “Now, now, now,” Lysandra breathed.

Aelin ripped her bloodied cloak away and tossed it to Lysandra, who rose to shove it into the compartment beneath her own seat as Aelin shimmied into the dress. Lysandra’s fingers were surprisingly steady as she buttoned up the back, then made quick work of Aelin’s hair, handed her a pair of gloves, and slung a jeweled necklace around her throat. A fan was pressed into her hands the moment the gloves were on, concealing any trace of blood.

The carriage halted at the sound of harsh male voices. Lysandra had just rolled up the curtains when stomping steps approached, followed by four of the king’s guard peering into the carriage with sharp, merciless eyes.

Lysandra thrust open the window. “Why are we being stopped?”

The guard yanked open the door and stuck his head in. Aelin noticed a smudge of blood on the floor a moment before he did and flinched back, covering it with her skirts.

“Sir!” Lysandra cried. “An explanation is necessary at once!”

Aelin waved her fan with a lady’s horror, praying that her cousin kept quiet in his little compartment. On the street beyond, some revelers had paused to watch the inspection—wide-eyed, curious, and not at all inclined to help the two women inside the carriage.

The guard looked them over with a sneer, the expression deepening as his eyes alighted on Lysandra’s tattooed wrist. “I owe you nothing, whore.” He spat out another filthy word at both of them, and then shouted, “Search the compartment in the back.”

“We are on our way to an appointment,” Lysandra hissed, but he slammed the door in her face. The carriage jostled as the men leaped onto the back and opened the rear compartment. After a moment, someone slammed a hand onto the side of the carriage and shouted, “Move on!”

They didn’t dare stop looking offended, didn’t dare stop fanning themselves for the next two blocks, or the two after that, until the driver thumped the top of the carriage twice. All clear.

Aelin jumped off the bench and flung open the compartment. Aedion had vomited, but he was awake and looking more than a bit put out as she beckoned him to emerge. “One more stop, and then we’re there.”

“Quick,” said Lysandra, peering casually out the window. “The others are almost here.”

The alley was barely wide enough to fit both of the carriages that ambled toward each other, no more than two large vehicles slowing to avoid colliding as they passed. Lysandra flung open the door just as they were aligned with the other carriage, and Chaol’s tight face appeared across the way as he did the same.