Midday light flickered through the library. Elm sat sideways in a satin chair, his legs thrown over its cushioned arm, a sketchbook splayed in his lap. Next to him was a stack of unread tomes. He drank broth from a cup and ran the tip of his stylus over blank pages, listless and irritated.
He was drawing a horse, mid-run—and was deeply dissatisfied with it. “I don’t have to forgive you a thing,” he said to Filick Willow, ripping the paper from the binding and balling it into his fist. “I live off of my grudges.”
The paper hit the Physician square in the jaw. Filick’s gray whiskers twitched, hiding his smile. “I’ll knock louder next time.” He levied a pointed glance. “And that, in no way, should be taken as encouragement.”
Elm started a new drawing. “You disapprove, old man?”
“There are many beautiful women in the castle these days. Your father has seen to that.”
“And?”
Filick returned his gaze to his book of plants, as if he were lecturing one of them, and not the Prince of Blunder. “Why not choose a woman less…less…”
Elm kept his wrist light as he swung his stylus over the paper. “Less like Ione Hawthorn?”
“She’s betrothed to your brother.”
The smooth line of the horse’s midsection wobbled. “I’m aware.”
Filick forfeited with a grunt, sipping his tea. “I suppose, if your brother never wakes, the matter will resolve itself.”
Elm paused. “Will he wake?”
“I don’t know.” Filick’s blue eyes lifted. “Have you gone to see him?”
“You know I haven’t.”
“You should. If only for appearances.”
Appearances. Elm ripped the paper, balled it, and threw it to the ground. He stared at the next blank sheet. His drawing began with a shape, two sweeping arches. “When do you think they’ll get back?” he said quietly. “Ravyn and Jespyr and…him.”
Filick leaned back in his chair. “It’s difficult to say. I don’t think either Ravyn or your father expects a long absence. Though the Shepherd King may have different plans.” His voice softened. “I’m sure Ravyn will do everything in his power to unite the Deck and cure Emory by Solstice.”
Elm’s throat tightened at Emory’s name. “What of the Shepherd King?” He added to his sketch, drawing a large shadowed circle between the arches. “Do you think he will honor his bargain and give his blood to unite the Deck?”
“It’s not his blood to give,” Filick said, hard enough to make Elm look up. “It’s Miss Spindle’s, isn’t it?”
Elspeth. If the Shepherd King was telling the truth—and that was a big if—the blood that would unite the Deck would be Elspeth’s.
Elm signed. “Ravyn must be in hell.”
There was nothing to say after that, because saying the truth would hurt too much. Ravyn was in love with Elspeth Spindle. And by Solstice, she, if she wasn’t already, would surely be dead.
Filick pored over his book and Elm his sketchbook, the afternoon slipping away. Elm’s drawing became more detailed. The arches became an eye. Next to it he drew a contoured nose, then another eye. A face. A mouth. Shadows and highlights.
Deep within the castle, the gong sounded five times.
“It’ll be dinner soon.” Filick peered over his spectacles at Elm’s black tunic. “I believe the traditional Rowan color is gold.”
“So it is,” Elm said to his sketchbook. “But I’m not going to dinner.”
“Another drunken appointment in the cellar?”
His stylus stilled. He’d been tipsy, not drunk. Certainly not drunk enough to forget a single moment of last night. His skin—his fingers and mouth—had kept the score of it. When he’d woken that morning, hard and sore and so bloody bothered, it had taken ten minutes in a frigid bath just to make use of his own limbs. And still, he could not forget.
He’d wanted to go straight to Ione’s room and finish what they’d started, to obey her command and rip her out of her dress. But pride had stopped him. He’d laid his darkest truths before her in the cellar—practically pleaded with her to toy with him.
And now—now Elm had no idea what to do. She’d run off without a backward glance, leaving him reeling. So he’d spent the day in the library, the only place in Stone he didn’t hate. The only place he’d be free of reminders of Ione Hawthorn.
But that wasn’t exactly true. Because, when Elm looked down at his sketchbook, he realized the face he’s spent half an hour drawing was hers.
His fingers flexed along his stylus. It wasn’t a true likeness. She looked too much at ease on paper, not frozen by the Maiden like she was in real life. But her eyes, he’d gotten right. Clear and unreadable. Cold, and just a little wicked.
He ripped her portrait out of the sketchbook, balling it in his fist. “My father is a fool if he thinks dangling Blunder’s daughters under my nose will entice me to choose a wife. Taking Hauth’s place is wretched enough without adding a strange woman to my everyday existence.”
When Elm had told Filick that the King had thrust the throne upon him, the Physician had sighed in the way those who’d lived a great many years sighed at those who’d only clocked a few. “I know you well enough to keep my opinions to myself, Elm.”
“A small mercy.”
“But, if you’d humor an old man just once more,” he said, “you’d let me tell you what a fine King you’d make—what a blessing you’d be to those of us who still hope to see a better future for this cold, unfeeling place.”
Elm’s chest tugged. He looked back at his sketchbook. “You’re getting soft, Physician.”
Filick’s laugh was a low, steady rumble. “I am. And that changes nothing of what I’ve said.”
A quarter of an hour later, when Elm was alone and staring at nothing, Filick’s words stayed with him. And the irony, the bitter truth of it all, came crashing down. Ione. The Maiden Card. Hauth. The throne.
He could free himself from marrying—from becoming heir. Ione had all but handed him the means. All it would take was a Maiden Card and Hauth would be healed. The line of succession would return to normal. Elm could get his life back.
But that freedom had a cost. A terrible, violent cost. And Hauth’s wrath, should he be healed, was a darkness rivaled only by the five-hundred-year-old monster who had maimed him in the first place.
Elm couldn’t risk waking his brother. Which left only one loathsome alternative. He, Prince Renelm Rowan, would marry and become the next King of Blunder.
The sound of rustling fabric and a small cough pulled him from his thoughts. His eyes shot up. Maribeth Larch, daughter of Ode Larch, whose estate yielded most of Blunder’s wine supply, stood in front of Elm’s chair, fingers inching along a nearby shelf. “Beg your pardon, Highness,” she said. “I didn’t intend to disturb you.”
Elm snapped his sketchbook shut and fixed his mouth with an unfeeling smile. To disturb him was exactly what she’d intended. He could tell by the plant of her feet—the expectant look in her eyes—that she’d been standing there some time.