Page 32 of The Rat King
“Everything to do with you will be blocked from her memory aside from the day you retrieved her from the witch from my plane,” she explained. “Or any other memories that can’t be explained without your presence.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“It can block or overshadow memories. The magic can’t replace them, and she needs to understand how she arrived here, so she’ll likely remember you from that. In-between, it depends on how essential the memories are to her experience. The less confusion the better, so you’ll have to come up with a clever ruse to take her from Ravsted and get her to Lieden Palace.”
“And what will she see?” I asked, a little nervous for the answer because I knew what I wanted my mother’s answer to be. Me. No, that didn’t matter. All that mattered was getting the pill so I could break the curse. It was foolish to hope for anything more.
“I don’t know exactly. The magic isn’t that specific. Darling, can you not trust that—” My mother’s words were cut short as a courier darted through the door.
“What is it, Luk?” she asked the letter carrying teen, who was also the stable boy I’d left Eclipse with. Luk bowed awkwardly as his gaze tracked up my muddy boots to my annoyed face, his eyes near bulging out of his head as he realized who he stood before.
My mother snapped and he jumped, handing her a folded paper, saying, “Message, matron.” My apprehension rose as she quickly scanned the contents, her face draining of color.
The young man bounced on his toes anxiously as if he already knew what the note said.
“Is it true?” she said, assessing him. He nodded, pulling off his cap to wring it in his hands.
“She killed him,” she said, slumping against the wall. Luk rushed forward and wrapped an arm around her before guiding her to the sitting room. As they moved out of the foyer, the paper floated to the ground, forgotten. I snatched it up.
It was a note from what appeared to be one of her informants.The King Xavier Helicanus is dead by the hand of his new queen, Avery Plath. A public execution is scheduled for this coming reprieve.
My heart started thundering so loud I could hear it in my ears. I stomped into the sitting room to find Luk fanning a pale Samara. “Get up,” I demanded. “You have to take me to her.”
“I can’t,” she said.
I leaned over, wrapped my hand around a frail arm and attempted to pull her out of the chair she’d sunk into. “Yes, you can. Just do this one last thing for me, mother.”
When she didn’t stand on her own after my tugging, and slumped back into the cushion, she said, “I really can’t, son. I’m depleted. And she killed your brother. Why do you want her still?”
It was a good question. Family was supposed to be everything. But when I thought of what I’d read, all I cared about was getting to Avery. Now I had the perfect ruse. She’d be sitting in the dungeons, subjected to Goddess knew what. I studied my mother. She did seem more limp than normal. Shit.
There wasn’t time to think. I had two weeks to make it back to Ravsted before whoever had taken charge now, likely Leviticus, executed our last chance. I grabbed Luk by the elbow and dragged him toward the door. “To the stables. Ready my mount.” When he stared at me blinking, I shouted, “Go, now!”
He skipped forward to do my bidding and when I turned to my mother, intrigue glinted in her tired eyes. Her son had left this world and as the shock wore off, no tears were shed. I guessed we had one thing in common. I patted the pocket which held the pill.
“Thank you,” I said, hesitating. She’d just lost her son. Surely, she wasn’t that devoid of emotion. “I trust you’ll be fine?” I asked her.
“I’ll be fine. You’d better hurry.” What was unsaid speaking volumes. If Avery died, my mother could do no more, even if she wanted to. Our fates would be sealed.
I nodded, before turning to begin my race for the castle.
Chapter 22
Avery
Mycovenwitchesweregoing to come. They had to. They were my only hope. That had been my chant for the last month. The thing keeping me from having a complete breakdown. My mantra, my prayer. I just couldn’t see my story ending like this.
If my aunt, Cara, and the others didn’t come for me by the time the moon reached its apex in the starless night sky, these rat-people were going to Marie Antoinette style lop off my head. A shiver worked its way down my spine. How did I end up here?
Keys rattled outside my cell. I had twenty-nine days for the fear to build. I knew my fate the moment I’d been captured. The sound of metal grinding in the lock set my heart skittering, in quick shallow beats.Don’t panic. They will come.The hollow words were the only thing keeping my knees from buckling.
The heavy metal grate door groaned as it swung open, and a rather large rat-man stood on the other side, glaring with his beady rat-eyes. Even though I knew the curse wasn’t their fault, I hated these monsters with a depth of feeling that was rooted in my soul.
A makeshift stage was set up at the base of the stairs of Ravsted where I’d first arrived. Worn, stained wooden planks lay across scaffolding at least five feet off the stone courtyard. In the center sat a large ominous wood block with a curve carved out of the top about the size of a watermelon. There were several grooves in the wood which made bile rise in my throat as I took the stair that brought me eye level with it.
About two-hundred onlookers were standing around it, watching with interest as they lined the six of us prisoners up at the back, against a railing which looked ready to give at any moment. Of the six, I was last in the line and when my guard prodded me up the last stair, and I came into view, whispers erupted across the crowd. I ignored them. My aunt would come. Now that I was out of prison and under the moonlight, they would come for me. Still, my hands shook, which was more than I could say about a few of the other sentenced.
The bell gonged once, and my eyes tracked to the prisoners to see their features soften into their human faces except for Anabelle, the only other person in the female section of the prison, who had a dirty brown canvas bag over her head for some reason I wasn’t privy to. I wanted to reach out to her, to say something, but what would I say?
