The Queen's Assassin (Queen's Secret #1) - Melissa de la Cruz Page 0,55
his shirt in which he’d carefully collected food scraps for his escape. “Or we can catch something if need be.”
“Those moldy old biscuits you’ve been dragging around with you? Very kind of you to offer, but no thank you.” She sits up straight and shouts toward the back room: “A loaf of your freshest bread alongside that salted meat, good sir?”
“Beats stealing,” Cal hisses back at her. “You want more people chasing us? Because I’m not a beggar. Or a thief.”
“Ouch!” Shadow puts her hand to her heart. “Of course I can pay for the food,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Why would you assume I’m going to steal it?”
He frowns. It’s because he never has any coin of his own. Since she hired him from the Guild, Queen Lilianna rarely sends him off with any—too easily robbed and would attract too much attention. She sets up places for him to stay and the like instead. Of course, now that he thinks of it, he has neither Her Majesty’s coin nor largesse at hand. “You truly have coin?”
She shrugs.
“Let me see it, then,” Cal says to Shadow. He isn’t about to be fooled into eating a meal that won’t be paid for.
She reaches into the side of her trousers and pulls out a small leather pouch from a hidden pocket. She loosens the top and shows Cal a handful of shiny gold coins inside. Just one of them is more than enough to pay for this meal, and the next three after that. He raises his eyebrows and calls out toward the back room: “Make that two loaves of bread for the weary travelers, please.”
Eager as he is for his first real meal in over a month, it is still infuriating to think that the queen lavished so much coin on this green apprentice. The queen was never so generous with him—certainly not before an assignment was fulfilled, either. But at least they will be able to eat.
* * *
BELLIES FULL OF MUTTON and fresh bread slathered in creamy butter, they step back onto the wood-slatted sidewalk. Cal is practically delirious with happiness; he can’t remember the last time he ate so well, the memory of Deersia porridge is too strong. “Maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to spend the night here. Rest up some,” he says. “Then head into Montrice early tomorrow.” The luxurious meal has altered his outlook considerably. If she has coin, why should they suffer? The thought of a real bed, even an old lumpy one in a tavern lodge—not to mention the possibility of a bath—is so enticing that he forgets he’s the one who didn’t want to stay in Alvilla to begin with. “We can make arrangements for our introduction to Montrice.”
“Wonder if that inn down the road back there has any vacancies?” Shadow says. They’d passed a two-story wattle-and-daub building on the way into town.
“Not sure that’s a place for a lady,” Cal says. “If you know what I mean.”
She scoffs at that. “I’m not some delicate flower . . .”
“Clearly,” he says, then puts his hand up to quiet her. “Hold on.” He sees a man tacking a sign to a fence post. When he’s finished, he walks back inside his shop—a print shop. The two of them approach the fence to read the sign up close:
**NOTICE**
ESCAPED PRISONER
ARMED AND DANGEROUS
MAY BE TRAVELING WITH HOSTAGE
**DO NOT APPROACH**
ALERT DEERSIA AUTHORITIES IMMEDIATELY
There are two crude charcoal sketches on the poster. One shows a man with an exaggerated upturned nose and bulging eyes over a wild mane of uneven hair and a patchy beard. Underneath the drawing it says, CALEDON HOLT, ARMED AND DANGEROUS. “Terrible likeness,” Cal says, frowning. “Ears are all wrong.” The other drawing shows a handsome young boy with chiseled features and wavy, tousled brown hair, one eyebrow cocked, smiling mischievously: IDENTITY UNKNOWN.
Cal looks at Shadow and then at the picture and back at her again. “Surely they can’t be serious. Did you give them this description yourself? Because—”