The Queen's Secret (The Queen's Secret #2) - Melissa de la Cruz Page 0,40

to say another word. At that time, they wanted my destiny to remain unknown to me. They thought they were doing the right thing.

Varya settles back in her chair and closes her eyes. For a moment I’m afraid she’s about to drift off into sleep, until she starts speaking in a low, steady voice.

“The Seeing Stones will not help us with this mystery,” she says. “The stones see into the future, but we need to know the past. Who killed your priest? What killed your priest? Was this the work of man, or the work of magic?”

“The Chief Scribe believes he saw an Aphrasian monk in the tower a day or two before Father Juniper was killed. He swears to this, but nobody has found such a person. A gray monk, he says. The guards searched the entire castle, and the tower is guarded at all times. It was guarded on the day my priest was killed.”

“And there is no other way in or out, I understand from the physician,” she says, her voice soft. “Just one door.”

“What should we do?” I ask her. The warmth of the fire is so lulling, and soon it feels as though some kind of trance is overtaking me. Varya leans forward and takes my hand. Her grip is strong and her skin feels surprisingly hot.

“What do you see, there in the flames?” she asks. “What do you see in the shapes of ash, in the points of light?”

We both gaze into the fire, and I try to focus. At first I see the usual colors—red and vivid yellow, a deep blue at the heart of the flame—a brightness that’s almost white flickering like a spirit up the chimney. Then there’s something darker, a shape rather than a color.

“You see it, yes?” Varya nods in the direction of the strange shape. “I’m not surprised that it’s there, right in the heart of your private chamber, right in the center of your fire. It’s a darkness that has infiltrated the castle.”

“What is it?” I ask stupidly. We’re still holding hands, and the heat has spread to me now as well. I can feel the warm throb of her pulse.

“I’m not sure,” she says. “But I do know that it has the same shape of a man I have dreamed about for the last two nights. I wasn’t surprised when Martyn sent for me to help examine Father Juniper’s body.”

“A man? Someone you recognize?” I stare again at the dark figure in the fire, but I can’t make out any particular features.

“I’m not sure he’s a real man. What was it that your scribe said? A gray monk? I’ve been thinking of this figure in my dreams as the Obsidian Monk.”

As soon as Varya says this, I can see the shape of a hood in the fire shadow, the swoop of a gown. Among the bright colors of the fire, this darkness shines like a polished pebble.

“Does the man in your dreams wear a black mask, as the Aphrasians do?” I ask her, and she shrugs.

“The face is unclear to me. Or at least, the features look strange, not like those of a regular man. Perhaps he wears a mask.”

“Could an Aphrasian monk—or a gray monk, an Obsidian Monk—really be at large in the castle?”

“Or perhaps he is a magic creation,” she suggests. “That is why we see him, and then we do not. Why your scribe insists that he is there, but the guards find nothing.”

I’m conscious now of a different sensation, a chill creeping up my legs. There’s something about this shape in the fire that makes me fearful. I would smash it with the poker, the way I would an ember that’s jumped onto the outer hearth, but I know it would do no good. The figure there among the flames isn’t real. I suppose that is why it’s so unsettling.

“Martyn told me something interesting,” Varya says. She releases my hand and nestles back into her chair. “From the captain of the guard’s report about the death of your priest. In one corner of the chapel they found a shard of black glass.”

“Black glass? But Father Juniper wasn’t stabbed.”

Varya nods. “The captain decided that the shard came from a weapon used in the murder, but as you say, the corpse bears no stab wounds. The only thing the physician can find is the black marking around the priest’s mouth.”

“Made from black obsidian?” I ask, thinking of the monk in Varya’s dreams and the