The Queen's Assassin (The Queen's Secret #1)(23)

Aunt Mesha places her apron over the back of a chair. “I have an idea,” she says.

A few minutes later we’re all crowded onto my bed, the way we used to when I was a little girl and had trouble getting to sleep on my own. Aunt Moriah and Aunt Mesha take turns voicing characters from my favorite childhood storybook, a collection of legends from all the different lands of Avantine. Most are said to date from the Deian era, before the kingdoms fractured. Instead of tales about great kings and battles and enemies, they are about people, even animals, and how they sometimes do good things and sometimes do bad things, but in the end they always do the right thing.

My aunts read the entire book, cover to cover. By the time they’re done with “The Adventures of Landy,” about a girl who pretends to be a boy and sails a great ship across the sea to save the prince, I’m half asleep. I feel each of them kiss me on the forehead before slipping out the door and down the stairs.

I close my eyes for a few minutes but sleep won’t come. This is it. I have no time left.

I can’t stop thinking about what’s coming, so I climb out of bed.

My new gowns are hanging from hooks on the attic wall. They look strange and out of place in my simple room. The same way they look on me, I think.

Beneath the dresses is a small trunk that holds matching pairs of satin slippers for each outfit and a variety of underthings designed to squeeze my body into an unnatural shape. A for-all-intents-and-purposes immobile, unnatural shape. One can hardly sit in these clothes, let alone run or kick or, well, breathe. I suppose that’s the privilege of the rich.

There’s a box in the trunk as well, but I didn’t have an opportunity to look at its contents until now. I retrieve it and sit cross-legged on the wood floor, placing it in front of me. Inside I find a smaller, hinged rectangular box, nearly flat, lined in velvet. It contains a set of gold and diamond jewelry I’m to wear when I go tomorrow: a pair of diamond stud earrings, each gem the size of a large pearl, and a glittering multi-strand collar necklace to match, as well as a wide diamond bracelet to wear over my arm-length white gloves, and two diamond rings—one designed in the shape of a flower, with emeralds as petals, and the other set with a huge square Argonian emerald, the rarest sort, surrounded by more flawless round diamonds.

I try the necklace on in front of the mirror. The weight of it chokes me. How will I wear this? It feels like it’s clinging to my throat. I unclasp it quickly and place it back in the velvet box.

The only other thing in the small box, aside from the jewelry case, is a black leather pouch filled with gold coins. Presumably this is mine to spend as I wish, since there are no instructions included.

I spill the coins out on the floor. I hold a bunch in my hand, just to feel the weight of them. All are fresh-minted, shiny. Generic profiles of the late king and his widow are etched on one side; the royal seal—a Renovian rose surrounded by three circles to symbolize eternity—is on the other.

The idea arrives as swiftly as a bolt of lightning.

Heart pounding, I bring one of the coins to my desk and take out a stick of sealing wax. I warm it over the fire and when it melts enough, I drip some on a torn bit of paper. Then I smash the coin onto the wax, carefully lifting it out with my fingernails. It leaves a perfect mark.

The order I received from the queen is in the trunk. I rush to grab it and carry it back to the desk so I can compare the official seal with this one.

They’re nearly identical. Sure, the official seal is cleaner and a touch bigger, but at a glance, the average person would not notice. A sloppy seal could simply be the result of a hasty hand. A distracted guard wouldn’t take the time or effort to worry about it, not for this.

The only difference is that my wax is red. The royal wax is purple. Only the royal wax is purple.

I look around, trying to find a solution. My eyes land on the inkstand. I drip some wax onto paper again, then open the top of the jar and dip the end of my pen into the dark bluish-black ink, then let a drop fall onto the melted red wax. I swirl the ink into the wax, quickly, so it doesn’t set, and as it blends together, it becomes purple.

My heartbeat quickens and happiness bubbles into my throat. I want to scream. I want to dance around my room. It worked. It worked!

I place a fresh sheet of paper over the queen’s order. Dip the end of my pen into the ink again. Carefully, I trace the letters: HRM LILIANNA, QUEEN REGENT OF RENOVIA. Then the next line: REQUIRES YOUR PRESENCE. Under that, in my best formal cursive: as Stable Hand at Deersia.

After I make more purple wax in as close a hue as I can, I use a gold coin to forge the royal seal. This is a serious crime, and I know it. But then that vision of Mother flashes in my mind, the one I had in my dream the other night, and determination crystallizes in my veins. I must live my own way . . . or not at all. Follow your path, she had said.

I intend to do just that.

Next problem: Women are prohibited from the prison grounds. In “The Adventures of Landy,” the heroine figures out ways to disguise herself. I glance around the room, chewing on my thumbnail. Gowns and frippery everywhere. I have black pants and something that could pass as a boy’s jacket well enough, but I don’t think that will suffice.

My eyes fall on the bedsheet.

I pull it off the bed and tear a long strip from the bottom so that I have a generous length of soft linen. I stand in front of the mirror and tie that around my chest to flatten it, turning sideways to consider my new shape. With the right shirt, I think it will work fine. I use an even longer one to thicken my waist so I look less curvy, which also helps me shift my walk from my hips to my shoulders. My voice and face could probably pass for those of a young boy, but my hair might be a problem. It isn’t unusual for boys to have long hair, but mine is longer than any stable hand’s I’ve ever seen, and thick. I also have a habit of twisting it with my fingers and fussing with it in ways that could give me away.