I understand her skepticism. I’ve threatened to leave so many times before. I’ve ranted and raged and said I was fed up, but I always stayed. It was impossible to leave without a clear escape route.
“My parents have agreed to grant me a favor when I do this one last thing. Once the deed is done, I’ll be gone and they won’t have any dominion over me anymore.”
“So you’ll stay at the fort?” she asks.
I’m tempted to just tell her about the tunnel, but I’m so close to escaping. Bea is one of the most secretive people I know—yet, still, I can’t risk word of its existence getting out before I make my final escape.
“No. I’m going beyond the mountain.”
Bea stares at me for a beat. “And what of your husband?”
I scoff. “He’ll be glad to be rid of me and have the resources our marriage granted him.”
She purses her lips like she wants to say more. I understand her doubt, but the thing that has shifted this time is that I’ve left the city walls. Before leaving, it was unimaginable to think of life outside this fishbowl. Now, this boundary has been crossed and freedom feels within my grasp.
She rubs the back of her neck. “What about the Poison Vixen?”
The guilt is swift. I take my responsibility to the women of Lunameade seriously, but the whole reason I started that work was because I couldn’t help Aidia. There’s not a place in the city I could stash her that my parents couldn’t find her. They’ve already shown they have no problem marrying a daughter off again if it suits them. There’s no escaping them inside the city walls. If we stay here, sooner or later, we’ll get sucked back into their games.
“I can’t surrender the only chance I’ll ever have to leave to be a one-woman vigilante against an army of abusers,” I say. “I don’t want to let anyone down, but I thought about what you said about letting more women help. It’s going to take a while for me to make formal plans. I thought in the meantime we could brainstorm a way to develop our network and carry on the Vixen’s work.”
Bea looks around the room, anywhere but at me.
“You were the one who tried to get me to quit so many times,” I say. “I can’t believe you’re mad now that I’m finally doing it.”
Bea swallows, and her dark eyes are full of grief. “I’m not mad. You were so stuck for so long. I’m relieved to see you healing, Low.”
I’m speechless—so moved that the person who knows my struggles best recognizes this massive shift in me. I’m not sure I even recognized it in myself until she said it. A lump forms in my throat.
Neither of us seems to know what to do with this unexpected emotional revelation.
Bea tugs at her sleeves and clears her throat again. “In that case, we have work to do. I’m assuming you’re here about the attack in North Hold and the women.”
I nod. “Who’s missing?”
“Francesca is the only one in our network missing. But several other women from the district have been taken as well, and that’s a concern. Especially because our favorite revolutionary, Rochelli, is spreading rumors that they’re not victims of an attack. He says they’re a tithe to the Drained.”
I stare at her. “I don’t understand. What do you mean? How do you know?”
Bea beckons me toward the curtain that leads to the bar. She draws it aside and nods toward a bearded man at the bar. He’s spinning his glass in a bubble of spilled ale.
“I know because that half-drunk, soon-to-be full-drunk fellow at the bar can’t stop running his mouth about it,” Bea says. “He slipped up and mentioned Rochelli, so I started filling his glass with the good stuff to keep him talking. He seems to think that it’s something your family agreed to.”
“They wouldn’t do that.” Defending them is a reflex in public settings, but less so with Bea. “There are a lot of lines my parents will cross, but our own citizens aren’t one of them.”
What I can’t tell her is that was the entire reason I was drafted into this sham marriage. My father sacrificed the fort to protect the city. It makes no sense for him to change course now, especially when he knows the fort is back up and running.
“I realize how it sounds,” I say. “There are many things they would sacrifice, but all of those sacrifices have been for the sake of protecting the people inside these city walls.”
Bea holds up her hands in surrender. “I know there are things you can’t tell me, but the great thing about being your friend is that I don’t have to buy into your family’s bullshit.”
I sigh in frustration. “It has to be Rafe. This is the perfect kind of rumor to start a frenzy. There’s no way to prove it, but also no way todisprove it, so it will just spread and spread and turn the tide of power in the city his way.”
Aidia’s face is still so fresh in my mind, and as much as I would like to tell my parents where they can shove their favors, as much as it’s their fault she’s in that situation to begin with, I only have bad options at the moment, and theirs is the only one that offers me what Aidia needs.
Bea leans back against the wall and tugs on the rolled sleeves of her button-down shirt. “Maybe it’s less that he’s effectively turning the tide toward him, and just that people are tired of your family’s manipulation. Just like you are.”
I glare at her. “You do realizeRafeis the other option, right? He was out there today like a king holding court.”
