The Consolation Prize (Brides of Karadok #3) - Alice Coldbreath Page 0,38

She had lived her whole life on a knife’s edge and had often woken to the sound of a soldier’s footfall approaching to urge her to dress and flee or even to the sound of clashing swords nearby.

She had been schooled from a young age to never accept wine except from a trusted source and her father had always employed tasters to sample their every meal. In her old voluminous gowns, it had been easy to tip the contents of a goblet down her wide sleeves. These precautions had to fall by the wayside when she spent three years under Lord Mycroft’s household, but in any case, they had been an honorable family, even if they bore no love for her. She could not imagine stiff, autocratic Lord Mycroft lacing her meat with poison, though his wife perhaps might have been sorely tempted.

At the Southern palace, her dear Estrilda had insisted on drinking and eating a mouthful of any dish sent to her rooms, and at the public feasts she had eaten but sparingly. Her gowns had grown a good deal looser, and it was hard to remember that in her youth she had been round and plump. Perhaps, she thought folding her hands across her stomach, in old age she could relax enough to grow a little stout. That would be nice.

She was not sure why tonight she had eschewed the wine, although in truth, her husband had pulled such a face at the sip he had taken that it was not to be wondered at. The food too had been unappetizing, greasy and tough, so that could account for why she had pushed her plate away, largely untouched.

If she were truthful though, it could not entirely account for it. In part, her abstinence had been due to her own finely-tuned instincts, tingling away and warning her to be on her guard. But why was that, she pondered, turning it over in her mind?

Armand himself had been put out by the fact their hosts were not who he expected. Was that what had triggered her unease? She went over their reception by the smiling landlord who had explained he had taken over the business some twelve months earlier. Could he be an agent of the collapsed North? His accent had not been Northern, but that did not rule out such a thing.

She knew only too well that certain factions would like to gain control of her as a figurehead for their planned uprisings and rebellion. Even under house arrest, she had received smuggled messages, which she had been forced to burn, and twice the house had been breached by rebels wanting to free her and incredulous of her disinclination to go with them.

If this did turn out to be some attempt to grab her and spirit her away to some fortress full of loyalists to the Blechmarsh cause, she would resist it with her last breath, she thought with determination. She could imagine nothing worse than returning to that life of hiding and running away, a mere pawn in someone else’s game. Especially, when freedom had been almost within her grasp.

Was she just being paranoid, though? It would not be surprising she acknowledged, after the life she had led. Quickly she ran over the household in her mind’s eye. The groom had been a surly looking fellow, a hulking great brute who had led their horses to the stables with barely a word.

The maidservant’s manner had been decidedly odd. Where the landlord oozed geniality, her gaze had been hostile, and she had tried to mask her malevolence by keeping her gaze low and refusing to meet anyone’s eye. It was hard though, to imagine her a sympathizer to the Northern cause. For surely if that had been the case, she would have been more amenable when serving her?

Her ruminations were interrupted by an unexpected squeak from the wood paneling at the foot of the bed. Una looked toward that spot and was alarmed to see movement there. She had been lying with her eyes open, so her vision was already adjusted to the dark. Lifting her head off the pillow, she craned her eyes and fancied it was a portion of the paneling swinging open into their room. She slid her arm along the mattress to grip Armand’s upper arm, digging her nails into him cruelly. She felt his breathing hitch and his head rustled on the pillow, as to her horror, Una realized someone was swarming across the