Three Dark Crowns (Three Dark Crowns #1) - Kendare Blake Page 0,95

Arsinoe asks. “Or did you turn it into an arrow and stab Natalia Arron through the heart?”

Mirabella retrieves the pitcher from where the storm cast it onto the floor. Most of it spilled, but there is still a cupful, sloshing against the sides. “There is not much,” she says. “I was not focused. I only wanted to keep them away. It was like that day at the Black Cottage.”

“I don’t remember that day,” Arsinoe says. She upends the pitcher and swallows greedily. She may throw it up as soon as she stands.

“Try, then. Try to remember.”

“I don’t want to.” Arsinoe sets down the pitcher. It takes a moment, but eventually, she is able to rise.

“Your shoulder,” Mirabella says. “Be careful.”

“I’ll get Jules to put it back in. I should go.”

“But,” Mirabella says, “the council and Luca . . . They will be waiting.”

“Oh,” Arsinoe says. She takes a step and holds her breath and then takes another. “I don’t think they will. I think you made your point.”

“But if you let me . . .”

“Let you what? Listen, I know you think you did something really grand just now. But I’m here. I’m caught. We all are.”

“You hate me, then?” Mirabella asks. “You want to kill me?”

“Yes, I hate you,” Arsinoe says. “I always have. I didn’t try to escape so that I could spare you. It was not about you.”

Mirabella watches her sister limp toward the tent flap.

“I suppose I have been very stupid,” Mirabella says. “I suppose . . .”

“Stop sounding so sad. And stop looking at me that way. This is what we are. It doesn’t matter that we didn’t ask for it.”

Arsinoe grabs on to the flap of the tent. She hesitates as though she might say more. As though she might be sorry.

“I hate you a little less now,” she says quietly, and then she is gone.

THE MILONE ENCAMPMENT

Jules is waiting for Arsinoe just beyond the half-collapsed tent. Arsinoe will not take a shoulder to lean on, but she accepts Jules’s arm, and tugs the collar of her shirt over her face. It at least provides a small shield from the spit and fruit peelings as they navigate the crowds.

“Everyone stay back!” Jules shouts. “No one say a word!”

They do stay back, thanks to Camden. But they say and throw plenty.

“Just like being at home, eh?” Arsinoe says grimly.

Inside her tent at the Milone encampment, safe from prying eyes, Cait and Ellis tend to her. Luke and Joseph are there as well. Even Madrigal. When Ellis sets Arsinoe’s shoulder, Luke weeps.

“Queen Mirabella is one for the rules,” Ellis says. “She will not even let priestesses harm a queen before her time.”

“Is that why she stopped them?” Jules asks. “Or does she just want to do it herself?”

“Whatever the reason, I think that the temple will find her harder to control than they thought,” says Ellis.

“Is Billy all right?” Arsinoe asks. “Has anyone heard?”

“He was safe when they escorted him toward Sand Harbor,” Joseph says. “I’m sure he’s there now, preparing for the Disembarking.”

“The Disembarking,” Madrigal says. “We do not have long until sundown.”

“Be silent, Madrigal,” Jules says. “She does not have to worry about that.”

“No,” Arsinoe says. “I do. I’m here, and I won’t have you getting into any more trouble on my account.”

“But—” Jules says.

“I would rather walk up those cliffs than be dragged by priestesses.”

Cait and Ellis look at each other solemnly.

“We had best finish preparing for the feast, then,” Cait says. “And dig our blacks out of mothballs.”

“I can help,” Luke says. He looks very handsome, and very smart, in his festival clothes. But Luke is always better dressed than the rest of Wolf Spring. “If I’m staying and eating, I ought to pull my weight.” He takes Arsinoe’s hand and squeezes. “I am glad to see you back,” he says, and follows Cait and Ellis out of the tent.

Arsinoe sits down on the makeshift bed of pillows and blankets. She could sleep for days, even in a tent that smells like mold, with no furniture besides a wooden trunk and a table with water in a cream-colored pitcher.

“I should wring your neck,” says Jules.

“Be nice to me. My neck was almost severed, not one hour ago.”

Jules pours Arsinoe a cup of water before sitting on the trunk.

“I need to tell you something,” Arsinoe says. “I need to tell you all.”

They gather close. Jules and Joseph. Madrigal. They listen as she tells them what Billy told her. About the Sacrificial Year, and