She dropped to the floor, mouth to the crack under the door. Harmless. Only Kirstin, she sighed to herself, as she rolled onto her back and stared up at the ceiling, could go from heartbreaking mess to making enemies so quickly. None of the others had spoken to the guards. None of the others had insulted their weaponry. She didn’t even want to think about why, among her limited vocabulary, Kirstin knew the Imperial word for sloppy.
While she waited for Kirstin to return, Danika used the comb to tug her hair into some kind of order, although she had a feeling she’d left it too long and it was now sticking up in an irredeemable spiky mess. Both Kirstin with her thick, dark waves, and Jesine with her auburn curls, had hair more suited to the short style of the Mage-pack. After a moment’s reflection, she took a deep breath, hooked a few teeth under the net, and pulled.
She was still dry heaving into the commode when her door opened. She straightened and wiped her mouth on a corner of the robe as a new guard came into the room. He beckoned, the gesture already familiar. By the time she reached the hall, Danika’d decided to call him Mouth-breather and his partner, Hairy-knuckles. It seemed Mole-under-ear and Bruised-thumb had been assigned exclusively to water room duty.
They took her back into the vestibule and through the door in the opposite wall.
It led to a large, high-ceilinged room. Danika’s gaze skipped over the table set with five places, over the guards standing along two walls, and locked on the other four women of her Mage-pack. They stood a little apart from each other. Not talking. Not touching. Waiting.
Danika spread her arms.
The next few minutes were a frenzy of touch and tears. Everyone’s cheeks were wet, and Annalyse was still crying when they finally pulled a little apart. Kirstin wasn’t the only one with new bruises, but none of them were badly hurt and, more importantly, they were together.
Although too conscious of the guards to say much.
Kirstin swept a disdainful gaze along the walls. “I’ve never really liked those households that keep too many footmen,” she sighed. “It’s pretentious.”
Jesine shot Danika a look that clearly stated, “She’s back.”
Danika smiled and, when no one objected to Kirstin’s declaration, added, “They’re well trained, though. Seen but not heard.”
“Only the best,” Jesine agreed, and directed her smile at the line of uniformed men. Jesine was beautiful. Unless they were guarded only by men who solely enjoyed men, that had to have caused a reaction—even in the plain, deep yellow dress that she’d somehow managed to make look better than the identical piece of clothing worn by all of the others.
Danika and Kirstin were in blue, Annalyse in green, Stina in brown, Jesine in yellow. They’d been color coded to match their mage marks, a style that went in and out of fashion in Aydori, usually among the young and the not terribly powerful.
“Who came up with the theory that simple and comfortable has to be unattractive?” Stina pulled a bit of heavy brown cotton away from her body and sighed with exaggerated frustration. “A little embroidery would have killed them?”
Annalyse stared at her for a long moment, then sputtered with laughter.
“That’s my chick.” She put her arm around the younger woman’s shoulders and pulled her in for a hug. “Don’t give them the gift of your grieving.”
As Stina clearly had Annalyse in hand, Danika turned her attention back to Jesine and Kirstin, hoping Kirstin hadn’t made it all the way back to her old self. Fighting among themselves would help only Leopald.
“I’m better,” Kirstin was saying. “The pain from trying to remove the net has faded, I promise.” The white lines still marked her fingers, but she pulled them from Jesine’s grip a little impatiently. “They don’t hurt. I just couldn’t cope for a while, so I went away. I’m sorry if I frightened you.”
She sounded sincere, but Danika couldn’t shake the feeling that when it came to Kirstin, nothing was that simple. Unfortunately, her stomach chose that moment to growl.
Annalyse giggled and covered her mouth when it started to get out of control. “What do we do about the food, Lady…I mean, Danika?”
They all had to be hungry.
“We eat.”
“Is it safe?”
She didn’t blame Kirstin for being suspicious. “Yes, it’s safe. We’ve had the stick. This is the carrot.”
The porridge had grown cold, but that didn’t matter. There was honey to put on it and butter and cream. There were large, fluffy biscuits warm in a napkin cocoon, with more honey and butter and jam to put on them. There was no tea, but there was water that didn’t taste of rust.
Danika caught Annalyse’s gaze and nodded, ever so slightly, toward the pitcher.
The younger woman reached for it and frowned over at Stina who’d kicked her under the table. Her green-flecked eyes widened as she realized what was expected of her. She lifted the pitcher with shaking hands and took a deep breath, braced for pain as she poured the first glass. “Oh. It doesn’t…look like there’s anything but water,” she amended hurriedly, cheeks flushed. “I’d very much love a cup of tea.”
“So would I.” Reaching across the table, Danika squeezed her hand. Annalyse clearly hadn’t used any low-level mage-craft since being netted but had still been willing to try and purify the water. How could Leopald hold them with such women as these?
“This is a banana.” Jesine waved a long yellow fruit. “Sirin and I…”
Sirin Hagen was Ryder’s third cousin, silver-furred like Jaspyr and at forty, eighteen years older than Jesine. Danika had seen them together, and it was clear Sirin’s nose had known what it was about. Ryder had sent Sirin and Kirstin’s husband Neils to the front with the 2nd. Annalyse’s husband Geoffrey was Hunt Pack and Torvin Menkyzck, Stina’s husband was a senior officer. Tomas had said the Hunt Pack was dead. Annalyse was a widow at twenty. Stina at thirty-seven, her three children left in Aydori without a father.
But they couldn’t all be dead. Looking around the table, Danika saw every woman there thinking, He can’t be dead.
“Sirin and I,” Jesine repeated defiantly, “had them on that trade trip Ryder sent him on to Abyek last spring. You eat them like this.” She peeled the thick skin down, pushed her chair away from the table, and slid the end of the fruit into the perfect circle of plush lips.
Not one of the guards made a sound, but over half of them shifted in place.
Annalyse turned her giggle into a cough and hid it in a napkin.
“It’s an interesting sort of prison.” Stina pushed back from the table, one hand gently stroking circles over her stomach. “Someone has put a lot of thought into it. We’ve seen the worst, we’ve seen the best, and they can control us by sliding us up and down the scale depending on how we behave.”
“Shut up,” Kirstin snapped.
“The voice this morning, it spoke Aydori.” Annalyse twisted the napkin with both hands. “Are they listening to us?”
“Count on it.”
“Then I imagine,” Stina said calmly, “that they’ll be pleased we understand what’s going on. It’ll save them a lot of time.”
“And we will be model prisoners.” Danika cut off Kirstin’s response. “We have more than ourselves to think about.” She dropped her hand to mirror Stina’s and glared at Kirstin, exhaling. Lull to false security!
Escape!
Absolutely.