But his footsteps stopped right by their alcove, and Lynet’s heartbeat was so loud, she could barely hear him when he spoke. “Oh, it’s you,” he said. Lynet couldn’t see the damage she had done to his hand, but his voice was hoarse and ragged. “What are you doing here?”
Did he recognize Nadia from Whitespring? Lynet had thought he had already been away before Nadia arrived, but maybe she was mistaken.
“The queen sent me,” Nadia answered, her voice stiff.
Gregory scoffed. “She found out, didn’t she? Ah, well, it hardly matters now.” His voice lowered. “Listen, I don’t have time for questions, but come to the old church behind the university tonight. I have a new task for you.”
Nadia hesitated for only the space of a breath, and then she nodded.
Gregory continued on his way, and when he was out the door, Nadia let out a long exhale. She turned to Lynet, her face tense with dread, but she didn’t move aside. “I can explain,” she said.
Lynet hadn’t understood the full meaning behind Gregory’s words, but her skin prickled with suspicion as she took in Nadia’s guilty expression, and she felt the same as when she’d overheard Mina and her huntsman in the chapel. She recognized the bitter taste in her mouth as betrayal. “Let me out,” Lynet said, her voice low.
“He described you to people. If you run out of here now, someone will recognize you.”
Lynet was having trouble breathing in the close confines of the alcove. Her muscles were itching for movement. “Move,” she said, with a note of rising panic this time.
Nadia reached for her arm. “At least let me—”
Something about Nadia’s hand coming toward her made Lynet lash out. She tried to knock Nadia’s arm aside, but her right palm screamed with pain as soon as she made contact. For a moment, she only saw red, and she sank to her knees, the last of her strength leaving her, and cradled her hand against her chest.
She didn’t notice at first that Nadia had stepped away from the alcove, no longer blocking the way. Run, part of her urged, but she was so tired, so dizzy, and the truth of Nadia’s words was now apparent: if she tried to run, she wouldn’t get very far.
“Please listen,” Nadia whispered, crouching down at Lynet’s side. “You’re hurt, and you’re exhausted, and I can take you somewhere safe to help you with that burn. I’ll explain everything, and then … if you never want to see me again, I’ll understand. But I won’t hand you over to anyone. If I had wanted to do that, I could have done it a moment ago.”
The red haze of pain started to fade, as did the mounting panic from earlier. And now Lynet just tried to think. Gregory had said this disoriented feeling would pass in time, and time was what she really needed—time to heal, to rest, to wait until darkness could hide her features from anyone who might recognize her by Gregory’s description. But what was this understanding between Gregory and Nadia? Could she trust Nadia now? Then again, Nadia was right—if she had wanted to hand Lynet over to Gregory, she had already had the perfect opportunity to do so.
“Fine,” Lynet said. “I’ll go with you for now.”
Nadia helped Lynet rise from the ground, and if she was pleased that Lynet had agreed to her offer, Lynet couldn’t tell. Nadia’s face was as stern and impassive as when she was working. They crossed the hall carefully, Nadia peering closely around corners to make sure they were alone, and went out another side door. They entered an older stone building beside the main one, and Nadia led Lynet up a flight of stairs and down a hall lined with doors until she stopped to unlock one of them.
Lynet followed Nadia inside a small stone room, bare except for a desk, a chair, and a narrow bed along the back wall beneath a low window. And when Nadia shut the door behind her, Lynet’s heart finally started to slow.
Nadia let out a sigh, her back against the door. Her hair was coming out of its braid, and she impatiently shook it out, letting the dark waves fall loose and free around her face. “Sit, and I’ll take care of your burn,” she said, gesturing to the bed.
Lynet perched stiffly on the edge of the bed, never taking her eyes off Nadia. She watched as Nadia opened a small chest beside her desk, inside which were two neat rows of jars. She selected one, and then, for one brief moment before she turned, Lynet saw Nadia’s shoulders sinking under some invisible weight, her face shadowed by some unknown sorrow.
But when she came to Lynet with the jar, she was the perfect surgeon again, methodical and untroubled. Nadia took the chair, moving it across from the bed, and reached for Lynet’s wounded palm.
“I’m sorry about your father,” she said softly.
Lynet didn’t respond, her throat tight.
“Would you tell me what happened up north? Why do people think you’re dead?” Nadia didn’t look up as she asked, her eyes focused on the angry, blistered skin of Lynet’s palm.
Lynet might have told her—Gregory already knew, after all—but she remained cautiously silent.
Nadia didn’t react to Lynet’s silence as she started to apply the green ointment to her palm. “Would you at least tell me what happened between you and Gregory? Why he’s looking for you?”
Again, silence.
This time Nadia shook her head a little, her mouth stretched into a pained smile. “No, of course you wouldn’t,” she muttered. “I’m the one who owes you explanations.” But she was quiet as she finished with the ointment, and Lynet tried not to notice the way Nadia’s eyelashes cast long shadows against her cheeks, or the way she still had grains of sand in her hair from when they’d tumbled to the ground. She tried not to care that the ointment was such a relief from the burn that she could now begin to enjoy the sensation of Nadia’s thumb rubbing small circles against her skin.
“Explain, then,” Lynet said, her voice thick.
Nadia released Lynet’s hand and looked her in the eye with the same fierce determination as when she’d amputated the servant’s foot. But what was she going to sever this time? What invisible thread existed between them that now was in danger of being cut?
“I told you before,” Nadia began, “that it was often difficult for me to find work after my parents died. Imagine how I felt when the queen’s father came to me and offered me a position at Whitespring. He was on his way south, passing through the village I was in, and he sought me out when he heard of the work I had done. Whitespring needed a surgeon, and he … he needed a spy.”
Lynet could tell she wanted to look away, her eyes continuously darting to the floor.
Nadia took a breath and forced herself to meet Lynet’s gaze. “It was so simple. All I had to do was keep close to you, tell you how you were made, and share with him what I’d learned about you. And before the year was out, if he was satisfied, he would give me passage south and a place at the university.”
Lynet’s heart beat in her ears, a bitter taste on her tongue. Her legs felt restless, and she stood, going toward the door even though she and Nadia both knew that she had nowhere else to go. Nadia turned in her chair but didn’t rise or try to stop her, not even when Lynet reached for the door handle, gripping the metal with her good hand until it hurt. Lynet turned, her back against the door giving her the illusion of escape, of freedom.