out the second-story windows overlooking the courtyard. Their throats and wrists and ears were heavy with gold. They were arriving on horseback, in gilded caravans, in horse-drawn carriages. And then she saw it: a black uniform among all the red-uniformed servants. The colors of a Scyre.
Her skin prickled. She didn’t like being locked up in this cold palace with so many leeches.
That evening, Ayla was ordered to fetch Crier’s ball gown from the seamstress. Feet aching from walking on flagstones all day instead of softer dirt, she dragged herself down to the underground level where the housemaids, laundry maids, and seamstresses did most of their work. All she wanted to do was sleep. For years. Curl up right here on the cold flagstones, hide herself in the shadows, sleep for a decade. It was the kind of tired that left her head all foggy and tipsy and slow. She’d imagined that housework would be easier than field work, but she’d underestimated not just the quantity of work but the sheer exhaustion of being constantly watched and monitored, of controlling her expression and stifling any suggestion of that fatigue—a single yawn could get her kicked out of the palace for good.
That was why, when she stepped into the washing room, she stopped dead in the doorway. She genuinely thought she was dreaming, just for a moment.
Because there was Faye bent over one of the massive tubs of steaming, soapy water. Luna’s sister. The one everyone in the market had gossiped about. The one who hadn’t been seen since Luna’s transgression—whatever it was—and subsequent murder by the leeches.
Faye was gripping a long wooden paddle, stirring the linens and the discarded clothes, her face pink and sweaty from the heat.
The last time she’d seen Faye, it was noon and the sun was beating down on their heads and Faye was on the ground, covered in dust, screaming in the raw and wordless way of tortured animals. Automa soldiers kicked her in the belly and she didn’t stop screaming. Sometimes, her lips formed the word Luna. But it was so drawn out, so wrecked with terror and anguish, that it didn’t sound like her sister’s name at all.
A white dress, fluttering in the breeze.
And somehow, she was still alive. She was here, in the palace, stirring a tub full of linens. She didn’t look injured. No missing limbs, no scars on the side of her face that Ayla could see. The only difference was that the Faye of one month ago had kept her hair long, always twisted into a knot at the back of her head. This Faye’s hair was cropped short, cut so messily in places that bits of pale scalp showed through.
But she was alive.
Faye was alive.
“Faye,” Ayla said helplessly. The second she made noise, Faye startled and dropped the wooden paddle; she whirled around to face Ayla, her eyes huge. The door closed behind Ayla. They were alone together. “Faye, where have you been? I thought you were—”
“Do not say my name,” said Faye.
“—What?”
“Do not. Say my name.” Faye cocked her head to one side, her eyes fixed on Ayla. She hadn’t yet blinked. She had an oddly precise way of speaking, her words sharp even though her voice was quiet. “That is not. My name. Anymore. Don’t say it. Do not say it. Who are you?”
“What do you mean?” said Ayla. “I’m—I’m Ayla. You know me. Remember? I’m a friend of Rowan’s. I didn’t know you were alive. I swear, I would’ve found you. Rowan didn’t know either. We thought they’d taken you away.”
Faye laughed.
Or shrieked.
“Taken me away,” she repeated. “Taken me away. No. No, not quite. Should have, though. Deserved it. Wasn’t her. Wasn’t her, wasn’t her.”
Her eyes were the kind of wild Ayla had seen before. Usually, you saw those eyes in graveyards, or at executions, or at the burnings. Ayla felt the first real prickle of unease along her spine. She’d heard of Hesod taking human servants into the palace to pay off debts, even going so far as cutting them off from their families, but hadn’t Luna’s death been punishment enough?
“What wasn’t her?” she asked. “Are you talking about Luna?”
“Don’t say her name,” Faye hissed. Her teeth were bared.
“What did she do?” Ayla demanded. Something felt so wrong. “What wasn’t Luna? What did she do?”
“The apples,” Faye mumbled, clutching at her own hair. “The apples, the apples—”
And she screamed at the top of her lungs, the sound bouncing and echoing around the tiny washing room,