Bea’s doubtful frown suggests she doesn’t believe me, but she nods toward the table tucked behind green velvet curtains in the back corner as she hands me a pint.
I grab it, but she tugs it back.
“I don’t like this,” Bea says, her low rasp cutting through the bar noise. “We agreed no rush jobs. We have a vetting process for a reason.”
“Don’t go soft on me now. You’re the one who summoned me here to meet a new client instead of sending me out to take out a vetted target,” I snap. “I suppose it’s for the best. I have so little time.”
Maybe it’s foolish to think that one last kill will be enough to calmthe restlessness that’s settled in my stomach since my father announced my betrothal. Killing violent men has allowed me to temper my rage for the time being, and it’s given me some semblance of control. I can’t stop Rafe from hurting my sister, but I can stop other violent men, and at least that’s something.
But that could all end tomorrow. Maybe one more abuser choking on his dying breath won’t make a big difference in the city, but it will make a big difference to one woman.
“Why don’t you have time?” Bea presses.
I yank the pint glass from her hand and take a long pull. “Well, Bea, it seems I’m being married off.” I offer her a brief rundown of the earlier events of the evening.
A muscle in Bea’s jaw clenches. “I thought once would have been enough.”
“You and me both.”
It wasn’t as if I hadn’t served as my parents’ beautiful assassin before—discreetly flirting and sneaking away with anyone they deemed knew too much about our family. Keeper of the Well getting too big for his britches? That’s a job for Harlow. An old tutor drinking until his lips loosened about my brother’s magic? Harlow will take care of it.
I hated every minute of it, but I never complained because our survival relied on unified strength. The only time I ever hesitated was when they asked me—or, rather, told me—to marry Marc Beckley.
I may be toxic to a chosen few who deserve it, but that man was a poison to the entire city. He’d managed to carve out a place for himself as a sort of antagonist to my father, and before he could gain too much political strength, my father proposed a marriage alliance. He accepted because he wanted a pretty, powerful wife who was half his age.
I’d hoped I could just kiss him and get it over with quickly. But my father didn’t just want Marc gone. He wanted the man discredited entirely.
Though the magic at my lips is ever-present—coming to life with the swift and deadly poison of the Nightsong flower any time I anticipate a kiss—I’ve learned that with a little focus, I can summon other types of plant poison instead. All I have to do is read how the plant works and take the time to touch it.
I’ve been careful not to let my family know about the nuances of myskill. As far as they are concerned, all of my poison is the same and it’s only how much I use on a victim that affects whether they die immediately or slowly.
Poisoning Marc was delicate work—a huge test of my concentration as much as my ability to wield my magic.
We courted for three months, during which time he incessantly pressured me to go to bed with him and I feigned chastity while sabotaging his political campaign. Every time I served him tea, I dipped my poison fingers in it and watched him slowly unravel to the point of madness. A week after we were married, his political career and bid for mayor imploded. Finally, I made it look like he’d poisoned himself in his shame.
The city is better without Marc, and I don’t regret what I did, except it means that I’ve had to accept condolences with some semblance of faux grief for the past six months. That is the truly exhausting part.
While much of the family’s magic is bold and dazzling, mine is invisible unless you’re looking for the purple tinge to my lips. That said, there’s no secret so closely guarded as how each Carrenwell’s magic manifests. We only ever show off as a family unit so that it’s impossible for adversaries to tell who would make easy prey. The only magic they know for sure is Vardek’s protective blessing of holy fire that my father and Able wield.
Bea’s eyes dart around the room. “So you’re to be married again? To who?”
“Apparently Fallen Hold has come in from the cold and their heir needs a wife,” I say. The words taste bitter on my tongue.
Bea’s shock is an echo of my own. “I don’t understand. They’ve rebuilt?”
I nod.
“From complete annihilation?”
I shrug.
For almost ten years, Mountain Haven has been Fallen Hold, a dark fairy tale—a threat whispered by parents to naughty children at the market—you better behave or I’ll ship you off to the haunted Fallen Hold where they’ll steal your soul and keep you as a little ghost puppet.
I was twenty when the wall fell—old enough not to believe the macabre folklore—but I can’t help but wonder what kind of grim thingsthe people of Mountain Haven had to do to survive all these years in hiding.
Bea stands a little straighter, her interest piqued. “Does that mean we could get trade back with the outside world?”
I cock my head. “I thought you loved me, and here you are willing to offer me up for a chance at importing wines from beyond the mountains.”
