Chapter 29

29

Ella

We rode through the gates twenty minutes later, under the scrutiny of the watchful castle sentries. Whatever peaceful feeling I had slipped away. If the guards gossiped—which I was sure they would—the castle would be rife with rumors by the next evening: the prince came riding back with a silver-haired serving girl in his lap.

Fates. The sisters might actually kill me.

The prince lingered as I put away the horses, watching me like a hawk.

"Are you afraid I'm going to run off?" I asked, my voice slightly sharper than intended.

His jaw ticked, and he gave me a look that suggested I just might. "You're not to leave the castle again. Not without my express permission."

So I was a prisoner then.

Annoyance prickled as I put away the tack. "I have to go into town and get Bianca's clothes from a washerwoman, or she'll have my hide."

"I'll send someone else. You're to go straight to the women's residence, do you understand?"

I kept my eyes on my work, and my back to him. "Yes, Your Highness. "

"Good."

There was a long pause, but I didn't look back. Finally, his footsteps departed, and I let out a long, unsteady breath. Thank goodness he was gone. The brute was suffocating. That's why my breath always felt short around him.

I finished my work and headed back to the women's residence, trying to shove the damned prince from my mind, along with his accursed name and his eyes that shone like the winter sky at twilight. I had bigger problems.

By the time I dropped into my bunk, my head was bursting with thoughts like a sack of oats that had gotten wet in the cellar. Monsters were real. Magic was real, and I was a whisperer.

If that wasn't enough to wrap my mind around, someone had placed a curse on the Bloodvale that repressed magic beyond the walls. Now that I knew what to look for, I could sense the change. While the forest and town had been stifling, inside the castle, I felt a low thrum of energy flowing through me.

But who had created the curse?

If Siggy was right and immortals didn't have magic, then that almost guaranteed that there were human mages in the castle. Someone had to cast the spells that heated the water and levitated the chandeliers.

And if Belle was right, they were prisoners held in a secret part of the royal wing.

I rubbed my forehead and stared up at the ceiling. This was information that might be able to transform the resistance, but I couldn't tell my stepmother yet. I barely believed what I'd heard and seen myself.

That meant I needed to find proof that the imprisoned mages existed—and I needed to do it without getting killed.

Belle's voice echoed in my mind. The immortals have spies everywhere. Do not trust anyone. Anyone.

I could trust Cara, I was certain, but I didn't dare implicate her in my activities. I would have to go it alone.

I woke the next evening just before my shift.

With the masquerade ball only ten days away, the castle had exploded in a flurry of activity. The sisters were almost too busy to harass me— almost . Cara was occupied with decorations, while Katherine and I and the other maids prepared every guest room in the castle, cleaning it to Lorayna's impossible standards.

The general hubbub and distracted supervision created the perfect cover to begin asking questions, though I never asked about the imprisoned mages overtly. I asked about rumors instead, or about a dungeon and its prisoners, or about places in the castle no one went—particularly in the royal wing. I tried to keep it casual. Just curiosity or pretending to repeat rumors.

A slow trickle of information began winding my way. At first, it was myths. Ghosts. Treasure. Monsters living in cesspools or dungeons. But then it became interesting.

One of the guards who had taken a fancy to me told me about the prisoners kept in the dungeon. Unfortunately, as far as I could gather, they were all highwaymen and cutpurses. Murderers were executed immediately, of course, as killing townsfolk directly impacted the immortals' food reserves.

An older maid told me that a few of the day staff performed work that no one talked about in the royal wing, and that they had been sworn to an oath of silence. That got my attention, but I made no progress on finding out who they were or what they did. While my schedule meant I didn't cross paths with the day shift, the kitchen staff did, and after much pestering, a plucky redhead told me that she'd heard a rumor that some servants took food to another part of the castle during the day. She didn't know where, though, only that it was at the northern end of the castle, within the royal wing.

While I didn't report on the magic, anything else I learned that would be useful to the resistance, I sent to my stepmother. Requests for additional information began arriving by crow courier every day or two. Names of guards. Timing of work shifts. I investigated as discreetly as I could and sent replies. She wanted plans of the castle, but I couldn't figure out how to attach them. It became overwhelming. There was nothing my stepmother didn't want to know—except, of course, how Belle or I were doing.

It didn't surprise me. Words were valuable, and our relationship…well, our relationship hadn't been like that to begin with.

Cassius went riding just once over the next few days. I only saw him in passing, and he never spoke to me. I knew I shouldn't expect anything from the prince of the realm, but his indifference was smothering. I was nothing. I was beneath him.

I reminded myself he didn't care. He'd come for me in the woods because he liked control and didn't want any of his pawns or playthings out of place.

I threw myself into my work to push him from my mind, yet as hard as I labored, I couldn't pry him from my thoughts. Every task was a reminder that the ball was a week away, and dancing at the center of it all was a man with eyes that could take my breath away.

How was I supposed to forget that?