Treacherous Witch

—a figure floating in the tempest. Gold is her sceptre and gold is her crown. The queen raises her staff to the heavens.

The sky crackles with lightning. A bolt strikes a man on horseback—a Drakonian soldier. Valerie clings to her mother, awestruck and terrified.

The figure descends. “Where is the man with Maska’s sword?”

*

She didn’t expect Rufus to be her escort.

“Well, you can’t go on your own,” he said.

Drakonian ladies weren’t permitted to travel anywhere in the capital without a man accompanying them. Valerie found the whole thing ludicrous, even more so given that servants could travel alone. But she had instructed Priska to tackle that problem for her, and now she had no option but to accept the solution on offer.

Rufus led the way, striding over to the waiting carriage. A few drops of rain pattered down, and Valerie dashed the last few feet to join him in the courtyard while the guards opened the gate. She’d borrowed Priska’s rough worn travelling cloak, the hood pulled over her head, but she wore her own silver buckled boots. The disguise was flimsy at best.

Still, the fading light might work to her advantage. Clouds darkened the sky, her breath misting in the damp air. Rufus held out his hand, and she climbed in after him, hoping the guards wouldn’t recognise her in the gloom.

She knew this plan wasn’t foolproof. Priska would claim to anyone who missed her that she was laid up in her sickbed, but someone could easily have spotted her leaving. Nor could they avoid Rufus’s valet, since he was driving the carriage. And she hadn’t even thought about what to do when she returned…

Despite this, Rufus remained obnoxiously cheerful. He adjusted his waistcoat as the carriage set off and whistled a tuneless ditty.

Valerie craned her head to watch the guards through the narrow rear window and didn’t relax until the gate and the villa had faded into the twilight. Trees swallowed up the road, bent and swaying under the weight of the steadily increasing rain. They descended towards the bridge that led into the city.

“You all right?”

She let out a breath, turning back to Rufus sitting opposite her. He had a shrewd look about him, forehead wrinkled in concern.

“Yeah. You?”

“Never better.” He patted the scarlet and gold-trimmed handkerchief arranged artfully in his breast pocket. “Put on my Drakonian best for dinner with the Duke of Arden. What do you think?”

She thought he looked like a parody of a Drakonian gentleman. Even more so than their first meeting, he had imitated their foppish style to an elaborate degree, with a laced up shirt and frilly sleeves. A top hat and tails completed the look. But her eyes were drawn to the handkerchief.

“I like the colours,” she said.

He grinned. “It’ll be quite the party, so I hear. They like their foreign guests to put on a show. Lord Avon wants me with him to talk up Maskamere. Never stops, does he? But don’t worry, I’ll drop you off first.”

She stared at him. Avon was attending some party without her? Not only that, he’d recruited Rufus to help him? A flash of jealousy prickled through her, and she swallowed an angry response. Of course he wouldn’t wait for her to recover. Whoever the Duke of Arden was, Avon probably needed his vote at the Senate.

“Good,” she said, deciding to treat this as a stroke of luck. “You know where I’m going, right?”

“Aye. Priska told me.”

“Did she tell you why?”

“No. I have a feeling it’s best I don’t know.”

She twisted her mouth. “This won’t end well if you get caught.”

“Then let’s not get caught.”

Valerie frowned. How could he say that with so little care? He didn’t seem worried at all. And why had he agreed to help in the first place?

“You’re putting your marriage at risk,” she pointed out. “What’s in it for you?”

He spread his hands. “I’m doing you a favour, Valerie. One Maskamery to another.”

Outside, the rain lashed down. Judging by the gas lamps and the tightly packed buildings, they’d crossed the bridge and entered the city, but it was impossible to see any detail. The rain drummed on the roof of the carriage in time with the clip-clopping of the horses’ hooves, so that she felt as if they were enclosed in a strange watertight cocoon.

And she didn’t understand this man cocooned with her. She’d never asked for his help. Quite the opposite: she’d been openly hostile.

“Why?” she asked. “So that I’ll owe you?”

He raised his eyebrows. “I wouldn’t dare to impose a debt on a priestess. My time is offered freely. You can thank me if you like.”

Not likely. He irritated her like the slowly healing scars on her back; she shifted in her seat to displace the itch. Rufus watched her.

After a moment, he said, “I am trying to help. Promise.”

So did Priska, and she’s why the Emperor had me flogged.

Her annoyance at Priska hadn’t gone away either. The maid had put her into this position. Forced her to rely on a man whose loyalties she couldn’t be certain of, when for all she knew he could be a double agent.

“I think you should focus on helping Lord Avon,” she said. “You’ll find that safer.”

“Right.” He leaned back, crossing his legs. “What do you think about this election?”

Valerie blinked. “Avon’s election?”

“Our election. Your beau Lord Avon up against our boy Titus. Who would you vote for?”

He was fishing again. Avon did this too, but he was careful, precise. Rufus questioned her with all the subtlety of a brick to the face.

“I don’t get a vote,” she said, “so it doesn’t really matter, does it?”

“Any reason your beau isn’t escorting you to dinner?”

“You’re his companion at the party. You tell me.”

“You don’t want him to know,” Rufus observed. “Why’s that?”

“Why are you so nosy?”

“Why are you so prickly?”

She bit back a sharp retort. He didn’t even look mad, only curious, and admitting that he was the source of her irritation would do her no favours.

“Look,” she said, “it’s been a long week, and I can’t say or do anything here that won’t get me into trouble. I didn’t want to involve you in this. And you shouldn’t try to help me. It won’t do you any good.”

In the pause that followed, the rain beating down outside seemed to amplify. The carriage wheels rattled beneath them.

“You know,” said Rufus, “I can’t work you out.”

He let the silence hang in the air, but Valerie didn’t fill it. She wouldn’t be drawn into explaining herself. He observed her still, and she smoothed her features into her blandest possible expression, the one she used to deflect Avon’s interrogations.

Finally, Rufus shook his head with a wry smile. “I see. You like to play hard to get. Lord Avon’s a braver man than me.”

“Are you going to tell him where I’m going tonight?”

“No,” he said. “No, I’ll be a good dog and keep my big mouth shut. Figure that’ll be safer.”

Relief washed over her. “I think it will.”

But she couldn’t entirely relax. If she was in his position, she’d squirrel away this information for another rainy day and have it ready to use against her. She had the unsettling feeling that Rufus knew that—that he saw straight through her—which didn’t help.

Maybe he wasn’t a schemer like the rest of them. Maybe he was a good person at heart. She never liked to assume that.

Her doubts vanished as the carriage came to a halt, and a fresh wave of anxiety swooped through her stomach. They’d arrived.

The valet opened the carriage door, and the rain’s volume instantly doubled. It was pouring in sheets. Valerie peered out at the dark street and shivered.

The valet unfurled an umbrella and she stepped out, ducking her head. She could barely make out her surroundings: a tall building, an elegant cast-iron gate fashioned in a pattern of intertwining roses, a short path flanked by sodden flower beds, and then a porch…

Footsteps hurried behind her; Rufus had followed. He hunched over, half under the umbrella, half getting soaked by the rain.

She wrapped her cloak more tightly around herself. “Don’t you have a party to get to?”

“You shouldn’t go in alone,” he said seriously. “At least let me show my face.”

“He’s Maskamery. I’ll be fine.”

Rufus shook his head. “I don’t know when we’ll be back to collect you. These Drakonians do like to drone on.”

“I’ll be fine,” she insisted. “Go.”

Rufus didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t press the matter any further. He bowed, then returned to the carriage, the valet doing his best to hold the umbrella aloft. Valerie watched him go with a pang. She would feel so much better doing this with someone she trusted, but Rufus didn’t make that cut.

Nor could she tell him the real reason he wasn’t invited. The conversation she was about to have would only implicate her in the eyes of the Drakonian court, and Avon wouldn’t be happy if he found out either. It would be unfair to drag Rufus into it.

Well, too late for second thoughts. She was stuck out here on her own. The porch sheltered her from the rain, but the cold seeped through her cloak. Best not wait any longer.

When she knocked at the door, the man who answered was tall, curly-haired and whip-thin. He gazed at her with sea-green eyes.

“Valerie Crescent,” he said. “Come in.”