Page 38 of Embrace the Serpent

“Yes,” I lied.

In return, Incarnadine dropped my mother’s ring onto my palm. It was warm, almost enough to hurt. I held tight until she disappeared into the steam, and only then did my shoulders loosen. I’d faced Incarnadine, and unlike my mother, I’d come out alive.

The hairs on my neck prickled. Camouflaged by the pattern on the tiles, the little serpent watched me.

I felt like I was floating above my body, watching myself walk up the promenade to the White Temple, the oldest and holiest place in the city. I was draped in pale pink silk embroidered all over in gold thread, wrapped and tied in place. A dress Lady Incarnadine had chosen that was not unlike the style she favored for herself. My eyes were lined in kohl, my lips reddened with carmine, which Mirandel had chosen for me, painting my face until I grabbed her wrist and said, “Enough.” She responded by asking if I had thought about my wedding night, if I knew how to please a man. She’d laughed at my expression. I supposed it was her little revenge on me.

I walked past the priestesses into the cool interior of the temple. The huntsmen were waiting.

One of them coughed, tugging open his jacket. Grimney waved at me, his little eyes worried, but I couldn’t speak to him. Not here.

I hadn’t chosen my dress. I hadn’t chosen this temple. I hadn’tchosen my groom, who waited for me at the altar. A thin circlet sat on his brow, a concession to his rank.

I met his eyes, and I thought,Thisisn’t my life.

My life, my real life, would begin once I finished the job for the Serpent King and Rane paid me in a perfect new identity. I wanted one wholly different from me. Maybe an older woman. Plain-looking, the kind that was safe from second glances. I’d lay my shop out differently, with the forge entirely separate from the showroom. Maybe I didn’t need a showroom. Maybe, once I’d established myself, I’d only make what I wanted, and people would buy it if they liked it. I’d change my name again, of course. A new name...

I didn’t listen to the droning of the priests and priestesses.

The Serpent King took my hand. His fingers were inhumanly long—and the silver scales grew smaller and smaller as they reached his fingertips, glinting like diamonds.

A fire was lit.

Seven times we circled it.

We were promised to each other.

It’s not real,I told myself.It’s not real.

Part 2

The Bite

8

They were keeping things from me. The Serpent King and his huntsmen disappeared briefly, and when they returned, he was scowling.

I told myself to go along with it as I was bundled into the Serpent King’s carriage by a gaggle of handmaidens. Mirandel came in at the last, with a small drawstring bag that she pressed into my palm. “These are for you to lead us to the kingdom.” Inside were clear stones with dark hairlike inclusions. They were clearly all chipped from a single stone, and I’d have bet the hairlike pieces were shards of a lodestone. It was my first time seeing tracker stones, and I itched to pull out my jewelsmithing glasses and take a closer look.

But Mirandel leaned in, and with a smirk of evil delight, she said, “Enjoy your wedding night. Tomorrow you’ll be a real woman.”

The carriage door shut, and we were off.

And for the next three hours, her words echoed in my head. There were more important things to worry about, like that I was no more free than I had been in the city. Because, though the city was a speck on the horizon, and we were gliding past endless desert dunes in the Serpent King’s well-appointed carriage, we were still surrounded by Imperial Guards. And behind them was a small village of people who called themselves things like handmaidensand servants but were clearly Lady Incarnadine’s spies.

The swaying of the carriage made me sick. The sweet smell of my skin—those bath oils and powders had sunk deep into my bones—made me sick. Sweat pooled in the small of my back. I pulled the drapes aside, and the breeze that came through was hot and moist and made me think of a giant breathing in my face.

I shifted in my seat. I had to pee, but I wasn’t about to go find a nice sand dune with an audience of dozens.

I missed the city, with its shady trees and easy access to privies. It seemed I’d given up everything I knew and yet Lady Incarnadine was still breathing down my neck. And now I had to worry about awedding night.

And what did she mean bya real woman? When I first got my monthly courses, Galen had brought one of his lady friends to the workshop. She had lips red as pomegranate juice and a drawn-on beauty mark under her eye, and she gave me a handful of cloths and told me what to do. She said, “Don’t cry, love. You’re a real woman now.”

Did a woman become real in fits and starts? When would I be done? Were the little stooped ladies with white hair and wrinkles the realest women around?

I stole a glance at the Serpent King, who sat across from me. He stared out the window, his foot tapping an endless beat. Was he a real man? Or did that come tonight, too?

“So,” I began.

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