Fairy Queens: Books 5-7 Read online

  An evil smile cracked Zura’s face. “Are you?” She pulled a skeleton key from a long chain around her neck, inserted it into the one of the locks on the cabinet, and pulled open the door. In the cabinet, hundreds of jewels in elaborate settings glittered as if hungry for the light.

  Zura gestured to a medium-sized trunk on the bottom shelf. “Magian, take this to the table.” The girl hauled it from one of the shelves and set it down while Zura locked the cabinet. The key disappeared in the folds of her robe. She strode to the table and opened a chest. “Look inside.”

  Heart pounding with dread, Cinder took five hesitant steps to the table. Inside the chest were items of clothing made from rich linen, soft silks, and gauzy chiffons. She recognized them instantly.

  Zura hauled out what had once been a teal overdress, clenching it in her fist. “After all I have done, you have repaid me by stealing?”

  “I didn’t steal it,” Cinder began, “It was stained. My mother never wore—”

  “Silence!” Zura threw the garment on the table. And grabbed another item. And another. And another. Seven pieces of clothing in all. All given to Cinder by companions who had cast them off. She had cut out the worn, stained fabric and pieced together what was left into something new. Something no one had ever seen—a fitted bodice and a skirt that flared out in the back, the front open to reveal the contrasting trousers beneath. It was feminine and practical.

  “Sneaking, lock-picking, thieving, impudent child.” Zura folded her arms across her chest and narrowed her gaze. “The value of those items is at least eighty attalics.”

  “Not even when the clothes were new!”

  Zura slapped Cinder again. “Make a note in the ledger, Magian. Another eighty attalics. Which puts our dear Cinder at two hundred and twenty.” Magian’s quill scrapped across the vellum, forming ten elegant letters and numbers that damned Cinder.

  Fighting a sick wave of fear, Cinder stood with her fists clenched, anger boiling inside her. She hadn’t stolen, and the ruined clothing had had little to no value. But she was of clannish descent, which meant the courts would side with Zura.

  Cinder closed her eyes, trying to count her breaths or the beat of her heart, but the numbers had abandoned her, turned against her. All she could see was the dark damp, the cold walls of the mines pressing in on her. It would be so much worse than the holding room in the cellar where Zura had sent her to be punished as a child. The cellar where she would sit in complete darkness, nothing to do but imagine the terrors crouching in the shadows. It was there Cinder learned the comfort of losing herself in the numbers.

  “But then you may very well end up dead, and I would never see my money again.” Zura let the last item of clothing slip from her fingers into a puddle of silk on the table. She meandered over to her cushions and lay back on them, then used a finger to trace patterns in the velvet. “I am merciful. Though you stole these garments, I can see the skill with which you reconstructed them.”

  Cinder felt a glimmer of hope. She had reworked the clothing at night, counting every stitch as her eyes strained in the dim light thrown by the oil lamps. She had taken the dresses to the city’s tailors to show them her skill, but they had turned her away. Every single one.

  Zura smoothed out the velvet and began drawing again. “So I will give you this chance you so desperately seek. Succeed, and you will become the seamstress for the House of Night. I will pay you one daric every three months, in addition to your room and board.”

  Cinder’s mouth came open. A daric was a large gold coin, and what Zura offered was about double what the other tailors made. The numbers flooded Cinder’s head. Her thumbs tapped against her fingertips, her mind spinning with calculations. She would be able to pay off her own debt in less than one year. Her mother and grandmother’s debts in six. Seven more years—2,556 days—and they could all be free.

  Zura smiled, showing perfectly straight teeth that gleamed, white and sharp. “We will place your creations on the new companion I plan to purchase. If she earns two hundred attalics in bids, you will begin the next day.”

  Cinder tipped her chin up. “What assurance do I have that you will keep your word?”

  Zura waved her hand at her daughter. “Magian has already drawn up the contract.”

  Magian handed another scroll to Cinder, but aside from the numbers, the characters made little sense to her. Sweat broke out on her brow. Magian scooted next to her and began reading out loud, her voice as smooth and sure with the words as Cinder’s fingers were with a needle.

  Cinder held out her hand. “How do I know those are really the words Magian is reading?”

  Annoyance flashed across Magian’s face.

  “Very well,” Zura said with a sigh. “First thing tomorrow morning, you and I shall make a trip to the moneylender of your choosing. He or she can read the document and you can see for yourself.”

  Cinder considered the offer. Zura was a snake, but the woman wouldn’t have anything to do with deciding Cinder’s fate—that would now be decided by the patrons. And deep inside, Cinder knew the clothing she was making would be well received. “And if I fail?”

  “Debtors’ mine.”

  Cinder hesitated, knowing she couldn’t trust Zura, yet also knowing she didn’t have a choice.

  “Make your decision, Cinder, for my mercy grows ever thinner.”

  Cinder pressed her lips together to keep her acid words from leaking out. Zura thought she would fail. But Cinder would show her. Clanwomen were strong as stone. More supple than a sapling. “I accept your bargain,” Cinder said.

  Zura watched her with emotionless eyes. “Tomorrow, after we visit the moneylenders, I will take you into the market and you will purchase whatever fabric you need. Be ready to leave first thing in the morning. If you can prove yourself worthy, the job will be yours.”

  Cinder felt the blood drain from her face. “You want me to purchase the material?”

  Zura poured herself some more tea. “Of course, I will have to add it to your debt. If the companion proves worthy of my house, I will repay the cost of the material.”

  Cinder’s gaze turned to the ledger, imagining the new numbers that would appear beneath her name. “You can’t expect—”

  “Are your dresses good enough, or aren’t they?” Zura sipped her tea.

  Cinder figured the numbers. The finest fabric and the best ornamentation would cost around forty attalics. Her total debt would still be well below the four hundred Zura needed to claim her as a slave. “My dresses are good enough.”

  Magian circled around the back of her table and placed the ledger in its cube. Sick to her stomach, Cinder turned toward the door. How was she ever going to tell her mother and grandmother what she’d just done?

  “And Cinder,” Zura called. Cinder paused, one hand stretched toward the door. “The outer gate is locked for a reason,” the older woman finished. She called for Farush, who opened the door, cane in hand.

  Cinder clenched her fists, her breaths coming hard and fast. But there was nothing to be done. She marched back into the room and lowered her robes. Standing naked from the waist up, she braced herself against the desk as the cane whipped through the air behind her.

  Cinder was surrounded by colors. Hundreds of them, deep and rich, bright and airy, soft and subtle, bold and striking. The textures were nearly as varied. For once, she had no desire to count them. Instead, she could have spent hours sinking her hands into the plush fabrics, skimming her fingers across the slippery ones. But there wasn’t time. Forcing herself to focus, she wandered through the aisles, searching for something that matched the vision in her head. Something that would look like lust-come-to-life under the lights.

  And then she saw it. Wine-red, rich as blood. She touched the fabric, which shone like satin but was sturdier somehow, so it would hold her stitches without puckering. Cinder didn’t know the name for the fabric—no one had ever taught her. But a name didn’t matter, not when her hands knew by the feel and te
xture. She glanced at the price on the end of the bolt. Fingers tapping, she quickly calculated in her head. Six attalics. “I’ll need a bolt of this one and another bolt of white,” she said.

  “Any other fabrics?” the girl asked.

  Not yet, Cinder thought. But soon.

  Where is this all being sent?” the apprentice cloth-maker asked sourly. This shop was the first place Cinder had come for a job months ago. Apparently, they wanted her shopping here only slightly more than they wanted her working here.

  “The House of Night.” Cinder started to move away to look over the threads when she saw three girls about her own age, all of them leaning close to listen. With the gold bedecking their bodies, and the three slaves trailing behind them carrying bolts of fabric, the girls were upper class.

  “You’re one of her companions, aren’t you?” the lead girl said in disgust. Her eyes and forehead were wide, her chin narrow.

  Growing up in a brothel, Cinder should have been used to this by now. Yet it never ceased to infuriate her. Right now she was a servant. But soon her gowns would be so well renowned that these girls would be begging for one.

  She stared them down. “I am my own.”

  “Sadira.” One of the other girls tugged on her arm. “Let’s go.”

  “Why?” Sadira looked at her friend. “Afraid you’ll catch something? You’d have to bed her for that.” She snickered again.

  Cinder deliberately turned her back on the girls and said to the apprentice, “I’ll need matching thread as well.” Only one-quarter of an attalic.

  “Buttons or clasps?” the girl responded.

  “Clasps—six of those antique gold ones you showed me earlier.” Twelve attalics, but they would be worth it.

  The girl nodded and started gathering up the order—eighteen attalics in as many minutes. It was enough to make Cinder sick. She watched to make sure the girl didn’t cheat her.

  “You can always tell a clanswoman,” Sadira whispered loudly enough to be heard by the entire shop, “because they’ve had all the color washed out of them.”

  The welts on Cinder’s back burned anew. She would not ruin her chance at freedom over this girl. She took a deep breath and counted doubles: two, four, eight, sixteen, thirty-two, sixty-four . . .

  The apprentice looked nervously between Cinder and the other girls. “I can have everything delivered tonight.”

  “If you send one of your men, she can pay you from her bedroom,” Sadira said. Her two friends burst into laughter.

  Losing count, Cinder rounded on her and said, “Jealous that you can’t even get a man to look at your goat face for free?” The moment the words left her lips, she wanted to snatch them back from the air. Not because she regretted them, but because she knew they would get her in trouble. Too late to worry about that now.

  One of Sadira’s friends snickered, and Sadira shot her a murderous glare.

  Cinder turned on her heel and marched away without a backward glance. Sixteen steps later, she was outside the shop. The heat hit her. It was the hottest time of the year—the end of the dry season when the humidity had picked up but the rains hadn’t cooled things off yet. She sagged against the stone wall and braced herself against her bent knees. She had to remember that while she might not be a slave, neither would she ever be those women’s equal. They could mock her and bully her all they wanted. Fighting back would only make it worse.

  She heard the girls coming her way, all indignation over her insult. Cinder hurried down the street. Maybe, just maybe, she would never see them again. Maybe Zura wouldn’t hear of her insubordination. Counting her steps, Cinder broke into a run. She still had one stop to make before meeting up with Zura at her friend’s house, and she was already behind schedule.

  Holding her veil over her face to protect her pale skin from the relentless midmorning sun—and to hide her clannish features—Cinder crossed the dusty street and wove through the market of lesser goods. She kept her head down to hide her eyes, not wanting to elicit jeers or nasty glares, and picked up counting where she’d left off: 128, 256, 512 . . .

  When she reached the glassmakers’ district, she stepped into the billowing heat of one of the finer shops. Forcing herself not to count the panes of glass waiting to be picked up, she made her inquiries. The master glassmaker wasn’t too receptive at first. But once Cinder had convinced him she worked for the House of Night and had proven she could pay for half of her order up front, he reluctantly promised to try to make what she asked. One more stop at the cobblers, and then she was practically running back the way she’d come. She was supposed to meet the mistress at Tya’s house long before now.

  Cinder checked back over her numbers and started up where she’d left off: 1,024, 2,048, 4,098 . . . or was that 4,096? She was concentrating so deeply she didn’t notice the girls from the cloth-maker’s shop. Didn’t see them as a pair of hands were planted firmly in her side, sending her sprawling into the path of an oncoming chariot. Cinder landed face first, her nose smacking the flagstones in a burst of pain. She looked up into the deep red of the horse’s flared nostrils, its hooves poised to pound down on her. With no time to scramble out of the way, she curled into a ball and braced for impact, but the horse gathered itself on its hind legs and leapt over her. Two wheels churned as the chariot passed over her, the base of the axel scraping across the welts on her rounded shoulders.

  Her back on fire, Cinder let out a breath. She felt warmth and wetness running down her chin, tasted blood, and realized her nose was bleeding under her veil. After unhooking it, she leaned forward so her blood would drip onto the dusty street instead of all over the front of her brown servant robes.

  The driver hauled back on the reins and called out to the frightened horse, while another man leapt from the chariot, rushed to kneel beside Cinder, and pressed a bit of cloth to her face. “Are you all right?”

  She tried to count the drops mixing with the dust beneath her, but quickly lost track in the mess. She gave a tight nod.

  Rising to his feet, the man called out, “Sadira!”

  The group of retreating girls froze. Sadira reluctantly turned her head, while the other girls stepped back from her as if she had some sort of disease. “Darsam, I didn’t see you, my lord,” she said.

  Cinder’s eyes widened. The House of Night was a hotbed of gossip, and the wild son of the city lord featured in many of those stories. It was purported that Darsam ran his own gang of tribesmen thieves, and because of the connection with his father, the city watch was powerless to do anything to stop him.

  Darsam’s fists were clenched, his jaw tight. Slowly, as if by force of will, the tension drained out of him, and he affected a careless stance—eight fingers tucked under his folded arms. "Haven’t you heard? Murder is punishable by instant beheading in Idara.”

  The girl’s gaze slid to the side, searching the shadows between buildings as if for help. No help came. Sadira straightened. “You can’t murder a slave. Only put them down like a dirty animal.”

  The man’s gaze shifted down to Cinder. She shot to her feet, blood running down her face, and yanked off her headscarf to reveal the cobalt tattoos on her scalp above her ear. “I am no slave.”

  Sadira’s face paled. “Well—she’s still clannish. And a whore.”

  “I am not a whore! And unfortunately, I’m not clannish either.” The last bit she said under her breath.

  Sadira faltered for a moment and then visibly braced herself. “You come from the House of Night, do you not?”

  Cinder couldn't deny it. “I’m a servant there.”

  Sadira narrowed her gaze, hate spitting from her eyes. “Liar.”

  Cinder spit blood into the dirt. “You’re just mad I called you goat-face. But really, it’s your parents you should be angry with. I had nothing to do with it.”

  The girl’s eyes narrowed, hatred rolling off her. Beside her, Darsam snorted. Then he was laughing. Sadira’s hateful gaze transferred to him.

  Still grinnin
g, he swept his gaze over Cinder, lingering a beat on the blond hair settled around her shoulders. He was perhaps a handful of years older than her seventeen, and his dark chest was bare to the unforgiving sun. But instead of a shaved head and long beard, his face was clean shaven, and black curls framed his face. Cinder made the mistake of looking into his eyes—black like the strongest orray and lined with kohl. She could have sworn she saw admiration in their depths.

  He was beautiful, she realized. Beautiful and powerful—two things that made him very dangerous for her. She tore her gaze away, tapping her thumb to her fingers to distract her from the disconcerting warmth spreading through her.

  “I’ve done nothing wrong,” Sadira insisted.

  The man’s admiration shuttered off, leaving behind a dark rage he fastened on Sadira. “And what about my chariot? Or my horses? My team is the best in the province. One of them could have broken a leg.”

  Sadira shifted her weight uncertainly. “They didn’t.”

  “Even whores have rights,” Darsam said.

  “I’m sure you know all about whores and their rights,” Sadira snapped. “Why don’t you pay her a visit later? Check for injuries yourself.” She sent a scathing glance back into the shadows, whirled around, and stormed down the street. Her friends didn’t follow.

  Cinder spit blood onto a flagstone and did her best to wipe her face clean with her sleeve. “I’m not a whore.” She wasn’t sure if she was shaking from indignation or shock or both.

  Darsam’s gaze was steady. “I haven’t anything against whores.”

  She whipped around, glaring at him for the insult she was sure he’d just given her. But movement behind him drew her attention. A figure in black, wearing a veil. His gaze locked with Cinder’s, and her mouth came open in a silent gasp. She recognized those close-set eyes—the man carting the piss pots. The one who’d spied on her for Zura, and who was probably spying on her now.