Selena offered one back. “You’re welcome, niece.”
Something small and warm and bright squirmed inside my stomach at hearing the word, even under all the weight of what I had to do. She walked me to her door, and I felt her eyes onme as I passed through it, the perfect little book cradled in my hands.
53
Maren
Diara burst into tears when she saw me.
She pulled me through the door of her little servant room with a bone-crushing hug, weeping into my hair, then yanked me down onto a chair too small to fit us both—though we managed to squeeze in together—and demanded every detail of the last two months.
I recounted what I could after freeing my face from the wild briar of her sun-streaked ginger hair, leaving bloody details unsaid. Kriska’s garrote around Kye’s neck, the blast of lightning I’d sent into Captain Cenek. The strip of skin flayed from my back. She listened, shaking her head in consternation.
“We didn’t know where you went,” Diara said. “We searched the castle, and then Prince Hadrian took one direction and his servant took another while I climbed down to the beach. I found your dress and boots on the way back up. Then the ship passed, headed north, and I realized you must be on it. I ran back and found the prince and we hurried to town to find a dockmaster. But by then you were in open sea.”
“Cerleriteships are fast,” I said, hoping to soothe the guilt in Diara’s voice. “Any merchant ship you might have found docked near Cynthus Castle wouldn't have been able to catch up.”
Diara swallowed, nodding with bright eyes. “I brought your things back. They’re in your tower room.”
“You did? Thank you.”
She sniffled, the peak of her nose red. “I was a lady-in-wait for two days. I took my role seriously.”
I smiled, eyes drifting around her room. I’d never been inside the servants’ quarters before. Two small beds took up residence on either side of the narrow space. Unlike Kye’s tower, there was not a shard of glass to be found on the walls or ceiling. Stone locked away all natural light, rendering the stagnant air almost as damp as the Deadman’s House in Rivea.
“Who sleeps in the other bed?” I asked.
“No one,” Diara said, glancing at the straw mattress in question. “I use it for laundry, but I’m all caught up today.”
My eyes continued to travel. A small wardrobe stuffed so full the doors propped partially open. A desk of opened letters, stacked unharmoniously to the side. Behind it, a thin, curved piece of wood shoved between the sculpted desk leg and the wall. “You keep a bow in your room?”
Her gaze flitted to the weapon, and she smiled. “And? I’m sure there’s more than one in your tower.”
The corner of my mouth lifted. “Only because I’m married to a man.”
Diara shrugged. “Even more reason to keep one.”
I slid off the chair cushion, landing on the floor at the desk’s feet, and wiggled the bow out from behind the wall. Diara followed, smiling as I grasped the handle and stretched the string.
“Secure the bow grip along your palm’s lifeline,” she said, adjusting my hold for me. “And make sure the fleshy pad underyour thumb meets it. Relax your fingers here. You’re holding a bow, not shaking a hand.” She raised a brow. “Want an arrow?”
I barked a thin laugh. “Might as well.”
Diara flipped her hanging bedspread up over her mattress, revealing a flat chest under her bed. Then dragged it out by a leather handle and tossed the lid back on its hinges. A barrage of arrows lay inside, most of them old and worn, though their iron heads rang sharp. Diara shuffled the pile around, selecting one of the few dull ones, and fit it into the bow for me.
“Nock it on this silver ring, then hold the tail end here—firm, but not tight. Stretch it out,” she smiled, watching me, “aim, and release.”
My right bicep protested immediately as I pulled it back. “Release it inhere?”
She shrugged. “Sure.”
“Insideyour room?”
Diara grinned. “Just try.”
I let go.
The arrow popped out of my hand, unceremoniously drooping from the fingers holding the bowstring, then slid entirely from my grip, falling from the bow.
