A Throne for Sisters

Sophia was asking herself the same question, and that brought a problem with it. Sophia tried to bury that as Sebastian started to walk her back out toward the front of the palace, gliding with her among the crowds of people.

Sophia could see some of the girls there watching her with barely disguised hostility.

Who is she? What is she doing here?

Sophia could feel their anger at not being the ones on the prince’s arm, but right then, she only wanted to concentrate on Sebastian.

“When will I see you again?” Sebastian asked.

Sophia wasn’t sure what to say to that. How could she answer it, when the only reason she’d gotten in there at all was a lie? The great flaw in her plan gaped in front of her then: it gained her entrance to the palace once, but it gave her nothing beyond that. It showed her this world and then shut her off from it.

Sebastian reached up to touch her face.

“What is it?”

Sophia hadn’t thought that her worry would show so clearly. She thought as quickly as she could.

“The carriage awaiting me…” she began, trying so hard not to lie but knowing she had no choice, “…it will take me back to…”

“The ship?” he offered, concern in his face. “Back home, across the sea?”

She nodded, relieved he said it and that she didn’t have to utter the lie.

“It would,” she said, “and yet…I have no home, not really,” she said. “My home is not what it was. It is all in ruins.” That part, at least, was easy to fake, as there was some truth in it. “I sailed across the waters to escape my home. I am loath to return. Especially so soon after meeting you.”

She saw confusion cross Sebastian’s face, and then determination.

“Stay here,” Sebastian said. “This is a palace. There are more guest rooms than I can count.”

Sophia didn’t answer. She found that she didn’t want to lie to him more than she had to. That was a foolish thing, when every inch of her was a lie right then, but still, Sophia didn’t want to say the words.

“You’re offering to let me stay?” she said. “Just like that?”

Sophia could barely believe that. Sebastian filled the gap, and it turned out that he only needed two words to do it, holding out a hand to her as the last of the others filed from the hall.

“Stay?” he asked again.

Sophia reached out and took his waiting hand and, slowly, she smiled.

“There is nothing I would love more,” she said.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Kate winced as the blacksmith hammered a loop of chain closed around her wrist, anchoring her to the wrought iron fence. Kate tried to pull her hand free, but there was no give in the metal.

There didn’t seem to be much give in the man who’d forged it, either. He seemed as strong as the iron he worked with, barrel-chested and powerful. His wife was narrow featured and worried looking.

“That’s it, Thomas? You’re just going to leave her where she might get free?”

“Easy, Winifred,” the smith said. “The girl won’t get free. I know my work.”

His wife still didn’t seem convinced. She should have tried being where Kate was. Right then, it felt as though a vise was clamped around her wrist. She wanted to lash out, to fight, but the weapons she’d stolen were gone, and she couldn’t even get free.

“She’s little better than an animal,” the woman said. “We should hand her over to a magistrate, Thomas, before she murders us all.”

“She isn’t going to murder us,” the smith said, shaking his head at the drama of it all. “And if we hand her over to a magistrate, they’ll hang her. She’s barely more than a girl. Do you want to be responsible for her being hanged?”

Fear crept into Kate at that thought. She’d known the risks of stealing while she’d done it, but knowing them was a different thing from the threat that her death might actually happen. She did her best to look as innocent and harmless as possible. Kate wasn’t sure that she was any good at it. It was the kind of thing Sophia had always been better at. Sometimes, in the orphanage, she’d been able to keep from being beaten just because the masked sisters there had liked her.

Not very often, though. The House of the Unclaimed had been a harsh place, after all.

“I’m sorry,” Kate said.

“I hardly believe that,” the blacksmith’s wife snapped. “There’s a horse there that I doubt she came by honestly, and she was stealing weapons. Why would a girl like this want weapons? What was she planning to do? Become a bandit?”

What if they see the horse? What if they think we’re harboring a thief?

Kate could see the woman’s fears were more about what would happen if they didn’t hand Kate over, rather than a real hatred of her.

“I wasn’t going to be a bandit,” Kate said. “I was going to live free and hunt my food.”

“Being a poacher is better?” Winifred demanded. “This is foolishness. Do what you want, Thomas, but I’m going back into the house.”

She made good on her declaration, stalking back toward the main building. The smith watched her go, and Kate took the opportunity to try to escape again. It didn’t make any difference.

“You might as well stop trying,” the smith said. “I forge my metal well.”

“I could call out for help,” Kate said. “I could tell people that you kidnapped me, and you’re holding me here against my will.”

She saw the big man spread his hands. “I would show them the broken window, the things you tried to steal. Then you would be looking at the magistrate.”

Kate guessed that was true. The blacksmith was probably at the heart of the community in this small section of the city, while she was a girl who had appeared off the street. Then there was the horse, and the people who would know that she had stolen it.

“That’s better,” Thomas said. “Maybe we can talk now. Who are you? Do you have a name?”

“Kate,” she said. She found that she couldn’t look straight at him then. She actually felt ashamed by all this, and that was something Kate hadn’t thought she would feel.

“Well, Kate, I’m Thomas.” His voice was kinder than Kate had expected. “Now, where have you come from?”

Kate shrugged. “Does it matter?”

“It matters if you have a family looking for you. Parents.”

Kate snorted at that idea. Her parents were long gone, lost in a night that… she shook her head. It refused to come to her even now. Sophia might know, but Sophia wasn’t there.

“Which leaves several possibilities,” Thomas said. He grabbed at the leg of her stolen trousers, lifting it to reveal the tattoo that marked her as one of the Unclaimed. Kate squirmed away from his grip, but by then it was too late.

“Are you running away from your indenture?” Thomas asked. He shook his head. “No, you’re too young. From one of the orphanages then? You have hunters after you?”