She would.
Want had nothing to do with the situation she found herself in.
Mole-under-ear gestured with his free hand, indicating she should move forward into the hall. He moved with her, backing up as she advanced. Bruised-thumb stayed where he was. As she passed him, she murmured a polite, “Excuse me.”
Manners, her mother had taught her, could be a shield in troubled times. And she remembered the confusion of the guard she’d thanked. Given the insults from the soldiers who’d taken them, the guards had very probably been taught the mages of Aydori lay with beasts and were therefore less than beasts themselves. Confusing the guards was a place to start.
Once in the hall, the guards…
No, as portentous as using the descriptions might be, she needed to always think of the guards as individuals.
Once in the hall, Mole-under-ear and Bruised-thumb fell in on either side of her. Mole-under-ear on her left, was left-handed. Bruised-thumb on her right, was right-handed. As they stood beside her, their weapons were in their outside hands, making it all but impossible for her to grab one—had she decided to do something so incredibly stupid. Either the more over-the-top stories about the Pack had not only been believed but applied erroneously to the Mage-pack, or Leopald really didn’t trust the net.
Or, she reluctantly admitted, it was coincidence.
The lamps were on over the other doors, but the doors remained closed. Wherever they were taking her, she was going there alone.
She could feel the weight of their attention. She didn’t dare try and send a message.
The door at the end of the hall opened into the vestibule…
…and she froze.
Not back to the darkness. To the stone and the damp and the smells and the hunger. She couldn’t. She wouldn’t…
They dragged her out of the hall. Closed and locked the door behind them.
Danika knew herself a heartbeat away from begging when they turned her toward the open door on the right—the door to the water room.
She found her feet, shook off their hands, and walked in.
No woman waited inside this time, but, this time, she knew what to do. After days in the same clothes, in the woods, in the mail coaches, in the hole, hot water was the next best thing to freedom.
Back in her room—no, her cell. No matter how comfortable it seemed in comparison, it was still a cell. Back in her cell, the commode had been emptied and cleaned, the bed made, and the robe hung from a hook that hadn’t been there previously. A wide-toothed comb had been left on the small table, and a high-waisted, long-sleeved dress of blue cotton had been laid out on the end of the bed.
Danika turned as the bolts slammed into place behind her and dropped to the floor, listening to discover if the other women were to be treated the same way. She heard the bolts pulled back on the door next to hers. Heard the door opened. Heard Annalyse’s voice, young and frightened, heard her bare feet against the slate floor in the hall, not moving freely but shoved along. Heard the door open at the end of the hall.
As Annalyse entered the water room—Danika couldn’t hear either Annalyse or water, but she had to believe that was where the younger mage had been taken—much lighter footsteps—leather shoes not boots—hurried down the hall and turned into Annalyse’s empty room. The sounds from the room were the familiar sounds of a maid at work.
Danika dressed while she waited for Annalyse to return. The fabric was coarser than any she’d ever worn, but the style was Aydori. The front panels of the dress crossed over themselves, support built into the bodice, a double panel of fabric down the center front. Undoing the two buttons in the band tucked up under her breasts would allow her to step out of it. Lady Berin had been wearing a nearly identical style in the carriage, although Lady Berin’s dress had been of significantly better quality. She wondered if Leopald realized the Mage-pack was not actually Pack and couldn’t change.
When Annalyse was returned to her cell, she thanked the guards in stiff Imperial before they closed and bolted her door. Danika smiled. The shield of manners.
Kirstin, next to Annalyse, refused to leave her cell. To Danika’s surprise, the guards left her and moved on.
Jesine and Stina went with the guards in turn. Stina was unusually quiet, but neither of them sounded as though they had to be forced. The maid attended to their housekeeping while their cells were empty.
When Stina returned, the boots marched down the hall to Danika’s door, and she scrambled up onto her feet as the bolts were thrown. Bruised-thumb beckoned her out into the hall. Mole-under-ear stood with his pistol aimed into Kirstin’s cell. Without waiting for instruction, Danika hurried down the hall.
Still in the robe, Kirstin had curled into a nest of bedding in the far corner of the room between the bed and the wall. The room smelled like vomit. No, not quite vomit. Like bile that remained when there was nothing left to throw up. Wishing she had Jesine with her, Danika stepped farther into the room and softly called Kirstin’s name.
Kirstin looked up, her eyes widened, and any fear Danika had that she’d been injured fled as she suddenly found herself with an armful of her ex-rival. Danika sank to her knees, holding on as Kirstin crumpled with her, sobbing over and over against her shoulder. “I thought I was alone.” There were bruises wrapped purple and green around pale wrists and another that looked like a handprint just visible where the robe pulled away from her shoulder.
I am Alpha, Danika reminded herself, and somehow kept her voice from wobbling. She would lend Kirstin her certainty because that was all she had right now to offer. “No, dearling, no. We’re all here. You’re not alone.” When one of the guards made an impatient noise behind her, she freed an arm and gently lifted Kirstin’s head so that blue-flecked dark eyes met hers. There was more of Kirstin in them now than there had been at any time since they’d been taken. “The guards are here to escort you to the water room. And that’s all they want. When you return, your cell will have been cleaned and there’ll be clean clothes left for you. Granted, not clothes even approaching fashionable, but…”
“Where we lead, fashion follows.” Kirstin found the strength for a half smile and Danika mirrored it.
“Exactly, and fashion will follow.” It was as close as she could get to declaring they’d find a way to escape. It was unlikely the guards spoke Aydori, but they already had evidence that it was spoken here, so they had to assume every word would be overheard. Except…
Heard you in the coach. Kirstin exhaled the words. Sniffed, pulled back a little, and added, Only one dead. Sad. She frowned when she felt Danika tense, but there was no way Danika could explain how that one death had made her feel with the guards in the room.
Shielded by Danika’s body, Kirstin took a moment to slide on an approximation of her best society face, then she stepped away and said in broken but passable Imperial, “My apologies for the delay. I found myself indisposed timely.” Hopefully, only Danika heard how brittle her voice was. How easy it would be to break her again.
Bruised-thumb raised a hand and held Kirstin in place, while Mole-under-ear beckoned Danika out into the hall and escorted her back to her room. Cell, she corrected herself again. Not a house, not a dorm, not a hoteclass="underline" a prison.
As her door began to close, she heard Kirstin say, “That is a Deni pistol, yes? The brass work is very distinct. Sloppy action on old style. Single shot, yes? Too bad.”
Kirstin’s uncle was a Metals-mage who developed weapons for the army. Officers among the volunteers carried a double shot pistol, and Danika remembered either Ryder or Jaspyr saying he was working on a rotating something or other that would shoot up to six rounds.