“What do you have to tell me?” Daemon asked.
Daemonar wondered if anyone else could feel the cold anger beginning to rise from the depth of the Black. He figured Brenda, wearing the Green, would notice, but she gave no indication of it.
“I was tidying the social room in the Queen’s square—the square of rooms across the corridor from yours,” Neala explained. “I was standing in plain sight, but it was a shadowy part of the room at that time of the morning, so I doubt Lady Cara noticed me when she slipped into the room. Her bedroom isn’t in this square of rooms, and no one else was about, so she had no business being there. Except it seems she did, because she hurried over to the basket that held the envelopes with the assignments, took one out, carefully lifted the wax seal, and then added another piece of heavy paper. I think she used a bit of Craft to warm the wax enough to seal the envelope again.” Neala hesitated. “Lady Cara was laughing when she left the room.” Another hesitation. “She’s an aristo Lady, so I wasn’t sure it was my place to be telling tales about her making mischief, but after what happened this morning, with Liath biting that boy after the boy slapped one of the girls in the face . . .”
“The boy did what?” Daemon’s voice was quiet and viciously polite.
“Slapped her,” Brenda said. “Obeying the Queen’s orders.”
“Whose orders?” Still quiet. Still viciously polite. But getting colder. Getting closer to the Sadist.
“Not yours,” Daemonar said. “Not Lady Brenda’s or Prince Raine’s or any of the other instructors. Not Beale or Holt.”
Daemon’s glazed gold eyes focused on him. Just him.
Daemonar swallowed hard and chose to dance on the knife’s edge. “If the Queens were doing whatever this is by their own choice, you’d toss them out of the Hall before they had time to squeak. Maybe that’s the intention. Maybe someone is trying to push you into expelling these Queens and the others who are here for court training and protection.”
“There’s sense to what Prince Yaslana is saying,” Brenda said. “You’ve already expelled a couple of girls for crossing some lines.”
“I have,” Daemon agreed.
Daemonar held his breath, hoping that Brenda wouldn’t point out that Cara had been one of Dinah’s friends. Although he wasn’t sure what difference it would make. Sadi would figure out if Cara had acted alone or if she had received those extra instructions from someone else—and he would call in the debt.
“A slap on the hand, a slap in the face,” Daemon said. “Was any other kind of punishment ordered?”
“Not that Raeth mentioned,” Daemonar replied. “I can see why no one growled about the hand slaps. I’ve had my hand slapped plenty of times, so being ordered to do that wouldn’t seem important enough to report to you.”
Daemon stared at him. “Having your mother slap your hand because you were trying to grab half a cake and stuff it in your mouth is significantly different from having a Queen give that order for no reason. One slap is done out of love; the other is done because a Queen wants to inflict pain and doesn’t expect to pay a price.”
“It wasn’t half a cake,” Daemonar muttered. “And I was little when I did that.”
Warmth replaced cold in Daemon’s psychic scent. “But it did make an impression.”
The slap itself hadn’t made as much of an impression as finding his mother crying because she’d had to inflict that slap to stop him from grabbing the cake. No need to mention the crying to Uncle Daemon. Lucivar had said plenty about that at the time.
Daemon turned his attention back to the Scelt maid. “Thank you for reporting this, Neala. You did the right thing. If you notice anything else, please inform Lady Brenda. Or you can report to Beale, Helene, or Holt. I’ll make them aware of this . . . trouble.”
Daemonar pushed out of his chair. “I left Raeth watching Jaalan. I’d better rescue him.”
“Which one would you be rescuing, then?” Brenda asked.
“I guess I’ll find out.”
Brenda and Neala left the study. Daemonar stayed a moment longer. “Is this how it begins? With something that seems so insignificant that no one challenges it?”
“Last week started with a slap on the hand,” Daemon replied. “This week has added a slap in the face. How many steps between that slap and someone being ordered to use a riding crop or belt or whip on someone’s back? Not that many. And once you’ve split someone’s skin, it’s easier justifying taking that next step if the choice is to inflict pain or feel the whip yourself.”
“What are you going to do?”
“As long as it doesn’t escalate, I’ll give the youngsters a couple more days to report this to me or resolve it on their own. Either way, I will find the source of this trouble.”
“Sir.”
“Prince.”
Daemonar hurried to return to the room where he’d left Raeth. Yes, Sadi would find the source. And may the Darkness have mercy on that person.
Daemon waited for Beale, Helene, and Holt to report to his study.
He’d been aware of emotional undercurrents. Hell’s fire, there were thirty-six aristo adolescents living in the Hall—not to mention the servants who were around the same age—so how could there not be emotional undercurrents? But this deliberate . . . corruption . . . of honor. He understood why the other girls hadn’t come to him when that first command had been given, but he felt a sharp disappointment that neither Titian nor Zoey had marched into his study to ask him about it. They should have known he wouldn’t allow even that much physical harm, that he wouldn’t allow any mental or emotional harm to be inflicted on anyone under his protection. Instead, they had submitted to receiving and inflicting physical harm.
Well, once they got this sorted out, he knew what lessons these youngsters needed to learn for their own sakes as well as for the safety of the Realm.
Titian hurried to open the door of Zoey’s bedroom just enough for Jhett to slip inside. It had been an awful day, with the instructions getting garbled as they’d been passed from Province Queen to District Queens, who gave the orders to their people. The result of those garbled instructions was that two of the girls had been slapped in the face hard enough to leave a bruise. Arlene and the other apprentice Healers had done what they could to reduce the pain and swelling—and the skin discoloration—instead of hauling the girls to Lady Nadene and having the resident Healer deal with the injuries. But Nadene would have reported to Uncle Daemon, and Zoey wanted a little more time before Uncle Daemon learned about the extra instructions—just enough time for the Queens to find some answers on their own.
“It’s possible,” Jhett said without preamble. “Paper doesn’t usually hold intense emotions like a room where someone was attacked, but a skilled Black Widow could draw out some emotion or recognize a psychic scent.”
“Could you . . . ?” Zoey began.
Jhett shook her head. “I don’t have the skills yet to do that.” She hesitated. “Prince Sadi has that skill. It’s kind of an open secret now among the Hourglass and isn’t supposed to be talked about with anyone who isn’t a Black Widow, but he is a natural Black Widow—the only natural male Black Widow in the history of the Blood, and the only other male Black Widow ever was his father. And Witch was one of Prince Sadi’s teachers in the Hourglass’s Craft.”
Zoey caught her lower lip between her teeth. She trusted Prince Sadi. She did. But she was certain someone was watching the Queens to make sure they followed the secret instructions, and she couldn’t risk harm coming to her people by her breaking the rules and telling him about this.