The prince bites back a cry as his whole body jerks with pain.
Straun flinches despite his previous eagerness. Then he sets his jaw and makes himself watch as the prince’s skin blisters.
“Ouch,” Oak says, enunciating the word slowly and deliberately in a whiny sort of voice, despite how much the hot iron against his throat burns.
Straun is startled into a snort of laughter. Valen pulls the knife back, furious.
It’s easy to make someone look foolish if you’re willing to play the fool.
“Leave,” shouts Valen, waving at Straun. “Guard from the other side of the door. Alert me if someone is coming.”
“But—” Straun begins.
“Better do as he says,” Oak tells him, breathing hard because despite his performance, the press of the iron is agony. “Don’t want to end up like Bran.”
Straun’s gaze flicks guiltily to the floor, then back to Valen. He goes out.
Oak watches him with mixed feelings. The prince has few moves, and none of them are good. He can keep at getting under Valen’s skin, but it’s likely to cost him his own. Now that Straun is out of the room, though, he could try a different tack. “Maybe I could give you something better than impressing Hyacinthe, but I’d need something in return.”
Valen smiles, letting his knife hover over Oak’s face. “Bogdana told me that you inherited your mother’s twisting tongue.”
It takes all the prince’s concentration not to look at the blade directly. He forces himself to stare up into the falcon’s eyes. “Bogdana doesn’t like me. I doubt she likes you much, either. But you want Hyacinthe’s position, and I know a great deal about him . . . his vulnerabilities, the ways he is likely to fail.”
“Tell me this,” Valen says, looming over him. “Where did you get the poison you used on Straun?”
Well, crap. That’s a very good question. Oak thinks of the jeweled snake. Imagines how he will look if he tries to explain.
“I thought I didn’t need to torture you to get you to tell me whatever I wanted to know?” Valen turns the knife so that the point hovers over Oak’s eye. He glances at it and sees the edge of one of the straps of the bridle reflected in the blade. A reminder that Wren didn’t sanction this interrogation, that she doesn’t know about it. She wouldn’t need to torture him to find out any of this. All she’d have to do, with the bridle on him, was ask. He could no more deny her than he could stop his own heart from beating.
Of course, whether she’d care if Valen hurt him was another matter. He liked to think that she would, at least for her pride. After all, ten lashes from an ice whip wouldn’t seem like much of a punishment if someone else had already gouged out one of his eyes.
He’d rather not lose the eye, though. Still, all he has going for him is his charm, and that’s a double-edged sword. “You asked me about my sister—and you’re right. I do know her. I know she’s likely to send someone to negotiate for my return. Whatever you think of me, I am valuable to Elfhame.”
“She’d pay a ransom?” Valen licks his lips. Oak can see his desire, a hunger for glory and gold and all the things that were denied him.
“Oh yes,” Oak agrees. “But it hardly matters if Wren won’t agree to give me up. Whatever my sister offers now could have always been Wren’s, along with the Citadel, as a reward for removing Lady Nore.”
Valen’s mouth twists into a harsh smile. “But you seem to have made Queen Suren angry enough to prefer your being brought low to her own rise.”
That stung, being uncomfortably true. “You could make your own bargain with the High Queen.”
The tip of the iron knife presses against Oak’s cheek. It burns like a lit match against his skin. He jerks again, a puppet on a string.
“How about you answer the question about the poison, and then we can discuss what deals I am going to make.”
Panic Roods Oak. He’s going to refuse to talk. And he’s going to be tortured until he gives in and talks anyway. Once Hyacinthe learns about the snake, he will tell Wren, and she’ll believe Oak is her enemy, no matter what he says in his defense. And whatever his sister’s plan is, it’s sure to become exponentially more lethal.
But with enough pain and enough time, anyone will say almost anything.
Perhaps, Oak thinks, perhaps he can get himself hurt so badly the questioning can’t continue. It’s a terrible plan, but no other idea presents itself. He can hardly smile at Valen as he did at Fernwaif and have that be enough to persuade him to let Oak leave the dungeon.