Total pages in book: 222
Estimated words: 210715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1054(@200wpm)___ 843(@250wpm)___ 702(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 210715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1054(@200wpm)___ 843(@250wpm)___ 702(@300wpm)
He tilted his head, looking me over. “We meet again, my lady. You’re moving up in the world. From a barefoot beggar to someone who can afford embroidery. Quite a leap.”
He’d seen me in my corpse cloak. He’d probably watched me come into the Garden and then deliberately waited for me to emerge from the baths, so he could talk to me. Why?
“You haven’t changed a bit,” I told him.
“Oh?”
“You were a lord in disguise then and you are a lord in disguise now.”
He chuckled softly. That voice was off the charts. I didn’t even know what to compare it to. Melted chocolate, warm velvet, amused wolf . . . All of the above?
A sound of a commotion made me look over my shoulder. At the grum stall, two men crowded Clover. The older one waved his arms around, irate. Reynald glanced at me. Our eyes met, and he moved into the space between Clover and the two men.
“Your nursemaid is otherwise occupied,” the man from the Garden said.
“Is that your doing?”
“Yes. I cherish privacy, and we have many interesting topics to cover. Why don’t we take a stroll, my lady? You didn’t answer any of my questions in the Garden. I’m still so curious. Come with me.”
Yeah, no. “Does that usually work for you? Do you just slide up to a woman and tell her ‘Come with me,’ and she allows herself to be meekly led away from her bodyguards?”
“Sometimes.”
“I’m going to stay right here. If you would like to say something to me, now is your chance.”
“You’re getting more interesting by the moment,” he muttered. “Why are you here?”
“Why are any of us here?” He wasn’t giving me much to work with. Maybe if I frustrated him enough, he’d slip up. “To pursue happiness and discover the meaning of our lives.”
He laughed softly.
“Or are you asking why I am at the market? To buy supplies and look at interesting things. Why are you at the market?”
Tell me something.
He moved to the side so fast, he almost glided.
Reynald bore down on him from behind the jewelry stall. He’d circled from the other side. Somehow the man from the Garden had sensed him and moved out of the way.
The two men stared at each other, both with their faces covered and their hands not too far from their swords. I had landed in the middle of a medieval spy thriller.
The man from the Garden narrowed his eyes. “Do I know you?”
Reynald’s voice was casual and even. “Draw your sword and let’s find out.”
“Tempting, but I have places to be. Another time, perhaps.” He leaned to the side, meeting my eyes. “Have no fear. I’ll find you again.”
“Not if you value your life,” Reynald said.
“If you want to see something interesting, my lady, you should head north, to the pavilions. Trust me, it will be worth a look.”
The man backed away and took off, vanishing into the market.
Reynald and I turned left at the same time and started north.
Clover caught up with us. “I bought six grums . . .” She saw my face and fell silent.
We headed deeper into the market along the Center Row.
“Who is he?” Reynald asked quietly.
“No idea. We met in the Garden.”
Reynald’s eyebrows came together.
“Not that kind of meeting,” I told him. “I was watching Hreban make an entrance, and he stopped by and said a few words.”
“What did you talk about?”
“He called Hreban a gilded toad. The attendants treated him with deference. He is a lord of some sort.”
“I know him from somewhere,” Reynald said. “I know the eyes and the voice. I just can’t place them.”
A faint yell came from ahead. It sounded like a woman who’d choked off a scream.
The crowd was growing thicker.
A woman about my age hurried past us, going in the opposite direction, wide-eyed, her face pale. Terrified.
Yep, that’s exactly the kind of “interesting” I was expecting him to point out.
Another woman, an older one this time, in a good quality dress, with a maid and two bodyguards, barreled up the street. Reynald not so subtly put himself between us and them. The small group rushed past us.
Ahead, the Center Row widened, flowing around three large pavilions, set in a column. A crowd had gathered in front of the first one, squeezing into a knot of tightly packed bodies.
I had to see what it was.
Three guards in chainmail with teal and black surcoats marched up from behind us, toward the crowd. The leading guard bellowed, “Part!” and the crowd opened in front of them. They strode into the gap, and I ducked in after them. Clover and Reynald barely had time to squeeze in behind me. I turned sideways and pushed my way to the front.
The press of bodies eased, the crowd ended, and I halted on the edge of it. In front of me, across twenty yards of clear ground, stood a simple open-air pavilion with a clay tile roof resting on ancient wooden beams. A row of timber columns held up the roof. Every column had two bracers, one on each side, that stretched from it at an angle to support the rafters.