“Does Commander Duncan know about this?”
“I think he prefers not to know—about anything that has happened down here in the past or what may continue to happen. He suspects some of my black-market dealings, of course, but he and the majority of the garrison benefit from it. They don’t care how I get them ice wine from the Cartesian Valley—only that it’s still cheaper than importing it from Maltec or Andolesia. But there are other things that move under the Wall that they might be less pleased with.”
Wren looked at the infirmary-style beds again and at the bags of apples, packets of salt fish, and sacks of grain. “People, you mean?”
Odile inclined her head. “People, objects… information. It’s important that we don’t entirely lose touch with what’s happening east of the Wall, so I make sure to keep on top of rumors and gossip.”
“Like what?” Wren asked eagerly.
“Not all of it bears repeating, but with undead roaming freely across their lands, I’m sure you can imagine the sort of thing. Some of it is nonsense, and some of it is intriguing—but some of it is dangerous, too. Until I know fact from fiction, I prefer to keep most of it to myself.”
“That makes you, what, some kind of gatekeeper?”
“I guess you could say that. Information is harder to control, but as for everything else… I have the only key and am the only person who can manage the lock. Well, myself, and now you.”
Wren returned her attention to the woman. “Why are you showing me this?”
Odile shrugged, a determinedly nonchalant gesture, but there was tension in her shoulders. “If anything should ever happen to me, it’s important somebody knows their way around. And now you know more than one way out of the fort. Just in case.”
Wren frowned, but nodded, getting the distinct impression she was missing something but afraid to pry lest Odile shut down again.
“I’m supposed to be staying out of trouble,” she said instead, trying to lighten the mood.
Odile’s serious expression didn’t change. “Sometimes trouble finds us, whether we’re looking for it or not.”
* * *
Finally, after weeks of anticipation, His Highness arrived.
Excitement thrummed in Wren’s veins as she returned from patrol, the sunset casting dark shadows over them as they passed under the gate.
She had never met a prince before, thanks to her years of intensive valkyr training and the fact that the Valorians rarely deigned to make the trip north to Marrow Hall. The last time they had done so was to honor her uncle Locke after the Uprising, when Wren had been a baby. Typically, her father and grandmother journeyed to their seat in Port Valor instead. The odds of her proving anything to a puffed-up, spoiled royal were long indeed, but it was the most interesting thing to happen since she’d arrived.
“You’re late,” snapped the steward. They had barely dismounted before he was on them. “Make yourselves presentable. We head for the dining hall at once.”
The guards tugged and straightened their uniforms as best they could. Wren hadn’t gotten dirty, exactly, but she was still armed and armored, with black smeared around her eyes and on her lips. She was a bonesmith, after all; she might as well look the part. If only she had a reapyr’s robes, then she’d be everyone’s worst idea of the House of Bone.
The steward hustled them toward the servants’ entrance to the dining hall, intending for the latecomers to sneak in unnoticed, but when Wren moved to follow them, he halted her progress.
“You’ll be sitting at the high table,” he informed her, waving a letter in her face. She thought she spotted Odile’s spiky signature near the bottom. “The commander requires a representative from each branch of the fort’s defenses to demonstrate our full capabilities to the prince, and Odile has fallen ill. As you are the only other bonesmith in residence, you shall take her place.”
Fallen ill? She’d looked perfectly fine that morning when she’d informed Wren that the prince should be arriving sometime that day.
Was this her way of giving Wren some face time with the prince? A chance to prove herself?
“Uh… right,” Wren said, straightening her shoulders slightly. Yes, she could do it—bow and nod and answer questions about the fort’s ghostly defenses.
“Ready?” the steward pressed, gesturing for the main double doors to be opened for her.
Before she could answer, he clamped his hand around her arm and guided her, firmly, down the main aisle toward the dais at the back of the room.
The tables had been scrubbed, the flagstones mopped, the walls wiped, and the tapestries knocked free of dust.
And there, seated beneath them, was the prince.
He looked every bit the royal, dressed in rich black velvet, with shiny leather boots and a delicate woven circlet atop his head.
But he looked every bit the goldsmith, too.
The thread in his jacket, the rings on his fingers… Even his eyes were as golden as a cat’s, glinting with amusement as Wren approached.
The steward bowed to the prince before bending to whisper in Commander Duncan’s ear.
His face, which was lit with a false, jovial smile, flashed with alarm. He evidently hadn’t heard about Odile’s absence until now. Seated on either side of him were representatives from the prince’s retinue and senior members of the commander’s staff, people with at least ten years of experience serving at the fort, including the silversmith who ran the infirmary, the stonesmith who oversaw maintenance, and the captain of the guard.
Then there was Wren, barely a month into her service—and all he had.
Commander Duncan waved the steward away, then sighed, before visibly pulling himself together. “Your Highness, the last of our, uh, representatives, has returned,” he announced. “Prince-Smith Leopold Valorian, of the House of Gold, may I present Lady-Smith Wren Graven, of the House of Bone.”
Wren knew how to bow—her father had made sure of it, lest she have one more flaw for her grandmother to hate her for—but as she straightened, she saw the prince’s eyes lingering on her.
He was good-looking, as the reports had claimed, with a halo of caramel-colored curls, full lips, and smooth light-brown skin. He was pristine to the point where she’d fear to touch him in case she wrinkled his clothes or mussed up his hair. Or maybe that would be the fun of it…
No. Wren was playing by the rules. Following orders, and proving… something…
“This is Galen Valorian, who has been overseeing the prince’s tour,” Commander Duncan added, indicating a young man on the prince’s other side. He had some of the prince’s coloring but none of his charisma, his shoulders rounded and his curls flat.
Wren bowed briefly. Then the commander gestured for her to take a seat in the empty chair reserved for Odile at the end of the high table. Before she could move, however, the prince held up an elegant hand, halting her in her tracks.
“Wren…，” he said, his idle gaze roving her from head to toe. “That’s an unusual name for a bonesmith.”
“It is, Your Highness,” Wren admitted, surprised that this shining apparition of a prince knew anything about her house’s customs. For a bonesmith, being named after an animal was considered silly and trite. “I was named by my mother before she died.”