“So is there a cure for me, do you think?” Mina said, trying to sound cynical, but unable to prevent that one note of hope on the last word.
The silence that followed seemed endless, and Mina wanted to say something else, to stop her from saying anything at all, when Lynet answered, “I’m not sure that you need one, but—” Her voice wavered, and she took a breath before continuing. “But I brought something for you—a letter. Your guards took it from me when they found me in the woods, but it’s for you. I wanted you to read it. And … there’s something else I thought of.” Lynet was fiddling with her dress, smiling shyly. “It’s … it’s childish, maybe, but…”
Lynet dropped the piece of fabric she was playing with and looked up at her. She walked over to Mina in the middle of the room and held one hand up in front of her, her palm facing Mina. “Hold your hand up, like this.”
Mina didn’t understand, but she held her hand up to mirror Lynet’s, palms facing each other.
Lynet brought her hand closer until her fingertips were pressing against Mina’s. “Now push,” she said.
They pressed their fingertips together, forming a web of flesh with their fingers. “What is this for?” Mina said.
“Just wait,” Lynet said. “Close your eyes.”
She waited until Lynet had closed her own eyes before doing the same. More time passed, and she was beginning to wonder if Lynet was setting some kind of trap for her.
And then she felt it.
There, in the tips of her fingers, she felt the steady beat of Lynet’s pulse. But the longer she held her fingers there, the harder she pressed back, the more it seemed like the pulse was coming from inside her own body. Or rather, it became impossible to tell whose body it came from. It was Lynet’s pulse, she knew, but it was also, miraculously, her own. It reverberated through her hand, down her arm, into her chest, and she wondered how she’d lived all these years without that gentle rhythm.
The pulse that was and yet wasn’t hers seemed to dislodge something in her, her blood flowing more freely now, and she felt everything at once—the grief of Lynet’s death combined with the shock of hearing she was alive, the shame Mina had felt in seeing her again, together with the hope she’d heard in Lynet’s voice as she insisted that she loved her as a mother.
Mina’s eyes stung—she was crying.
Startled by Mina’s tears, Lynet moved her hand away, and Mina was overwhelmed with the sudden emptiness of their broken connection. Lynet was staring at her with worry, and Mina could have embraced her then, this girl whose heart was so strong and so full that it could beat for the both of them.
Mina ran for the door, needing to get away from Lynet before she gave in to fear and her father’s voice, always whispering in her head.
“Promise me you’ll find that letter,” Lynet called after her, her own voice ragged with the start of tears.
Mina fumbled for the door, ignoring her.
“Mina, please promise me you’ll read it!”
But Mina was shutting the door behind her, muffling Lynet’s voice. She started to lock the door out of habit, but then she stopped, leaving the key in the lock. What Lynet did now was up to her.
Lynet’s last words still rang through her head as she went down the tower stairs. Promise me you’ll read it. There was a letter, something she supposed Lynet had written for her. But when Mina came down from the tower, she went straight to the chapel, some invisible line pulling her there whenever she needed refuge. She fell to her knees in front of the altar, and she put her hand over her chest, half believing that she would feel the gentle pressure of her own heartbeat, transferred from Lynet to her.
But there was nothing, of course. Nothing had truly changed. The truth still hung like a vicious blade between them: Only one of them could be queen. Only one of them could win.
32
LYNET
She’ll read it, Lynet told herself as she paced around the circular room, biting her thumb. She’ll read it, and she’ll come back to me and everything will be all right.
Lynet hadn’t wanted to tell Mina the letter’s contents or even that it was from Dorothea, unsure that Mina would believe her unless she read the letter herself. But there were still so many dangers. Did the guard who had taken the letter from her still have it? Would Mina track him down and read it? And even if she read it, would it make any difference at all?
Lynet had tried to reach out to Mina as best she could, with her words and with her heart. Ever since the night under the tree when she and Nadia had pressed their hands together, Lynet had wanted to see if she could use the same trick to give Mina the sensation of a real heartbeat, even if only temporarily. But Mina had hurried away, and now, as Lynet stood alone in the empty tower, she knew the letter was her last chance. She stopped pacing, standing in the same spot where she had first noticed that Mina was crying. She had never seen Mina cry before—surely that meant she had stirred Mina’s heart in some way.
Each time Lynet went around the room, it seemed to grow smaller and smaller, the boarded-up window making her feel like she couldn’t take a full breath. She wondered if there was anyone guarding the door, if they could bring her some water, something to make her feel like she wasn’t inhaling the same stale air. She tried knocking on the door, but instead of hearing an answering voice, she heard something clatter to the ground. Lynet frowned, listening with her ear against the door for sounds of movement. If she didn’t know better, she would have thought it was a key that had fallen from the lock.
Mina had left so quickly … was it possible she had forgotten to take the key with her? Had she forgotten to lock the door at all? Or had she chosen to leave the door unlocked? Hardly daring to believe that she would be successful, Lynet slowly turned the door handle, amazed when it gave way, the door starting to inch open. She didn’t let it open fully, though, in case there were guards waiting outside. She still wasn’t sure this wasn’t some kind of test or trap.
But now she had a choice—she could stay here, waiting and wondering what would happen next, and where the letter was, if the huntsman had found it, or if Mina would read it, without any control at all. If the unlocked door wasn’t a trap, though—if Mina had really forgotten or chosen not to lock the door—then Lynet could sneak through the castle and look for the huntsman. She could try to retrieve the letter and hand it over to Mina herself.
Lynet stared intently at the door, going back and forth in her mind several times before deciding that she couldn’t lose this chance to regain control of her plan. She didn’t think Mina would design a test for Lynet to fail, especially not after the moment they had shared. Lynet reached for the door again—
But before her fingers had touched the handle, the door creaked open to reveal Mina standing at the threshold, half in shadow. She stood calm and composed, her face smooth and impassive, her hair no longer loose but braided neatly in tight coils around her head.
“Mina!” Lynet said, startled. She hadn’t heard footsteps approaching the door at all.
Mina stepped forward, edging Lynet farther back into the room. Lynet tried to see if her eyes were red or still full of tears, but they were hidden in shadow. She saw that Mina was holding something in her hand, but it wasn’t the letter.