There were far more dangerous things I’d done in my eighteen years of life, times where I would’ve been more likely to die in the process. Utter heaps of examples where even I had been a bit surprised that I’d walked away with my limbs and life intact. But here I was, one wrong step away from plummeting to my death, clutching the supposed diary of one Miss Willa Colyns, the book that Loren and Dafina had been talking about. Obviously, the book would most definitely be the type of reading material Priestess Analia would expressly forbid. And if I were caught with it in my possession, it would be yet another reason for her to believe that I wasn’t respectful of my duty as the Maiden.
So, of course, I had to read it. I’d been so very bored all day.
I’d already read every book Tawny had snuck me at least three times, and I couldn’t bring myself to read another too-familiar page even one more time. She had yet again been commandeered by the Duchess and the Mistresses, and I knew I might not even see her the following morning. So, I had another day of staring—uninterrupted except for my training with Vikter—at four stone walls. And the longer I stayed in my room with nothing to occupy my mind, the more I thought about what Hawke had said about all the rights that had been stripped away from me.
It wasn’t like I didn’t already know that, but it wasn’t something that others appeared to even acknowledge. Maybe it was because they were with me constantly, so everything had become the norm. But to Hawke, who was new, none of this was normal.
And that was what led me to travel unaccompanied through Wisher’s Grove to the Atheneum while Hawke stood outside my chamber door, thinking I was inside. Vikter was…well, I had no idea where he was. I had a feeling based on how tired and sad his eyes had looked this morning, that he’d been called upon the night before to take care of one of the cursed and hadn’t invited me.
I also had a feeling that he wasn’t going to involve me going forward, which irritated me. Of course, I planned to discuss that with him the first chance I got. I wouldn’t be cut out when I could help people. And he would just have to deal with it.
But right now, I needed to focus on not dying, or worse yet, getting caught.
Cold night air whipped around me as I stood plastered against the stone wall, praying to any god that the foot-wide ledge I stood on wouldn’t cave under my weight. I doubted when it was built that they had taken into consideration that, at some point, an entirely stupid Maiden would find herself standing on it.
How had this gone so terribly wrong?
Sneaking into the Atheneum hadn’t been hard. With my shapeless black cloak, my trusty mask in place, and my face hidden under the hood, I doubted anyone on the streets of Masadonia had been able to tell if I was male or female, let alone the Maiden as I hurried down the alley toward the back entrance of the library. Moving along the grid of narrow halls and staircases without being seen was easy, too.
I knew how to be like a ghost when needed, quiet and still.
The problem started when I found the leather-bound journal of Miss Colyns. Instead of leaving and going back to the castle like I knew I should, I’d ducked inside an empty room.
I just…I had been going stir-crazy in that room and had dreaded going back. And the thickly cushioned settees called to me. The stocked liquor cabinet, something I found odd to discover in a library, confused me, however. But I’d sat by the large windows overlooking the city below and cracked open the worn book. My cheeks had been scalded by the end of the first page, having discovered what occurs when someone kisses one not on the mouth or on the breast like…like Hawke had done before he knew who I was, but some place far more intimate.
I couldn’t stop reading, practically devouring the cream-hued pages.
Miss Willa Colyns lived a very…interesting life with many, many other…fascinating people. I had gotten to the part where she spoke of her brief fling with the King, which I could not even begin to picture, nor did I want to, when I heard voices outside the room—one in particular I’d never thought to hear in the Atheneum.
The Duke’s.
Hearing his voice meant that I’d been so caught up in the diary, I hadn’t even realized the sun had set.
I hadn’t been summoned to meet with him the night before or today. With the preparations for the Rite, I’d been given a temporary reprieve, and I assumed Hawke had as well since he was still my guard. But that reprieve would come to a swift end if the Duke discovered me.
Which was why I was now perched on a ledge outside what turned out to be the Duke’s personal room in the Atheneum. The only grace I’d been given was that the window I’d climbed out of wasn’t the one facing the street but rather the one blocked by Wisher’s Grove.