Rowan’s expression collapsed, but she didn’t look shocked. She must have had the same suspicion.
But if that were true . . .
“Benjy, did you find out anything more about the sun apples Faye kept talking about?”
He nodded, looking grim. “I tried to get into the crop house at the end of the field this morning. Claimed I’d seen a bad batch of grain and wanted to check some of the supplies. There was a mountain of sun apple crates—far more than I would have thought the orchards could produce in just over a month.”
“That’s odd,” Ayla said slowly.
“Not as odd as what I found inside them.”
“What do you mean?” Rowan asked, her voice hoarse and low.
“The crates weren’t full of apples at all—at least not the ones I managed to pry open. I didn’t have much time before that tall guard, Tiren, was going to find me out, so I wasn’t that thorough, but I did open two of the crates, and, and . . . they were full of . . . I don’t really know. This . . . this dust. Black dust.”
“Black dust? Like some sort of powder?” Rowan asked.
“Could it be a weapon?” Ayla chimed in.
Benjy shook his head. “I honestly don’t know.”
Ayla looked at Rowan. “If Faye was helping Kinok make shipments of this dust . . .”
“She was definitely in way over her head,” Benjy finished.
Ayla’s breath shook in her chest as she tried to speak. “Well, whatever the purpose of the dust, we know one thing—Kinok is controlling Faye. Using her. Maybe she tried to defect. Maybe that’s why . . .”
She didn’t have to finish her sentence. All three of them were thinking the same thing. Maybe that was why Kinok had ordered Luna’s death.
Ayla swallowed hard. “So what do we do?” She and Benjy both looked at Rowan.
Rowan’s voice was cold. “We take the Scyre down.”
“Wait,” Ayla said suddenly. “I know something. I learned something just last night.” She avoided Benjy’s eyes. He still didn’t know the truth of what had happened last night. That she’d slipped out not to iron a dress but to confront her brother. And that it had ended with her curled up in Crier’s bed. It was only a matter of time before that secret got out. “The Scyre has something in his possession that might help us. Will help us. It’s a compass. Apparently, it’s very important to Kinok, and I think that’s because it’s not just any compass—it’s special. Instead of pointing north, it points to the Iron Heart.”
Benjy’s eyes widened. “Are you serious?” he asked, at the same time Rowan said, “Are you sure?”
“Crier said it was special, she said even the Red Hands seemed jealous of it,” Ayla told them, and then immediately regretted it when Benjy’s gaze turned suspicious. She continued before he could say anything. Imply anything. “Why else would I be spending so many late nights with her? She’s so naive, she’ll spill any secret if you get her talking for long enough.” It didn’t feel true, the way she was framing it, but it did feel necessary. “A compass that could lead us to the Heart. Think about the power of that. And it’s in Kinok’s study.”
Quickly she explained about the failed interrogation in Kinok’s study—neatly sidestepping the reason she’d been interrogated; she told them it was just Kinok being paranoid about his future wife’s closest servant—and her own discovery of the hidden safe. “I think if there’s anywhere he could be hiding the compass, it would be there. Even if it’s not the compass, it has to be something else just as valuable.”
Rowan nodded. The light was back in her eyes, the spark of excitement over a new mission. “We have to get into that safe. Then, once we have what we need, we destroy the Scyre and rescue Faye.” She smiled, ruffling Ayla’s hair the way she’d been doing since Ayla was small and starving. “You did well, my girl.”
Ayla bit back a proud, silly grin.
“It’s been nearly an hour,” said Benjy. “The guards will be checking the servants’ quarters soon. We should get back.”
“Yes,” said Rowan. “I can get away again next week—same time, same place. We’ll come up with a plan for getting into the safe as soon as possible. We’ll need a distraction. There’s something in the air, something on the horizon. I can sense it. There’s no time to spare.”