Page 44 of Embrace the Serpent

It was market day in Cobalt Town. The main square was filled with a mix of oxcarts and street peddlers, farmers selling rice and dried lentils along with buffalo milk, palm fruits, and mildly wilted vegetables. Some simple toys. It wasn’t a grand market for nobles; it was aimed at those who worked in the cobalt mines, the soldiers of the barracks, the farmers to trade with each other.

I weighed the drawstring bag of tracker stones. I hated feeling like Incarnadine knew where I was, and though I couldn’t do anything about our escort, I could get rid of these.

But as I went through the market, the hairs on the back of my neck stood upright. I glanced at a stallkeeper, and he quickly averted his gaze. He wore clothing in the Imperial style favored by city dwellers, and I let a few stones fall from my palm into the corner of his cart.

I avoided the folks who seemed to come from nearby—the local farmers, the kind selling palm fruit and desert shrubs—and focused on the merchants who seemed to have come from the Imperial City, as well as those who wore garments in foreign styles. These were traveling merchants, and they would take the tracker stones far.

But the deeper I went into the market, the more I had the sensation that if eyes could shoot needles, I’d be a pincushion. Everyone was looking at me, but no one met my eye.

I caught a sweets seller whispering behind her hand to her neighbor; both dropped their gazes when I clocked them.

They were looking at me, but seeing another Saphira, one who was the beloved bride of the Serpent King, one who had become areal womanlast night. There was the truth, and there was the story.

Like a breath of fresh air, a thought came to me suddenly: no one sees reality. There’s only the story we tell ourselves, and that becomes the lens through which we see the world. But if we don’t know we’re looking through a lens, we mistake the story for the real thing.

They didn’t see me, but they thought they did. And now that they believed the lie, what they felt when they looked at me was real fear.

A hand gripped my shoulder. A huntsman. “My lady. Your husband has been looking for his beloved wife.”

The young daughter of a shopkeeper overheard and squeaked, running away like she’d heard some great bit of gossip.

“Fantastic,” I said, pocketing the rest of the stones.

“I’m afraid that’s just the effect your husband has on people.”

I winced at the wordhusband.“I’m not him.”

“That makes you more frightening. You’re the fearsome woman who brought the Serpent King low. In fact, just this morning I heard you charmed him with nothing but a flute.”

There was something too amused in his tone. I squinted at the huntsman. “Rane?”

He tugged off his helm. “At your service.”

I hesitated, but it came out of me. “Does he like that people fear him?”

Rane understood who I meant, because he said quietly, “He has to be what they expect him to be.”

“Because...” I said, slowly, worried it was too forward, “it keeps him safe.”

His dark eyes were opaque, revealing nothing. He inclined his head, conceding. “What was that you were doing earlier?”

A change of subject. “I was getting rid of a wedding present.” I showed him the bag. “Tracker stones.”

Rane’s brows pinched together. “Oh, I was wondering what that was.”

“You didn’t know? But I thought—there was a snake—”

“Yes, but snakes don’t have ears. It’s all vibration. If you’d been in danger, I’d have seen and jumped in. But it’s not an especially good form for espionage.”

I digested this. So he didn’t know what kind of offer Incarnadine made me. And still he trusted me?

“Do you mind if I take these?” he asked. “For the—well, I never told you what I came to tell you, which is—” He broke off and craned his neck. “Oh, what a lovely market. Shall we?” Abruptly, Rane pivoted toward the stalls. I trailed after him, glancing over my shoulder and meeting the gaze of an Imperial Guard.

Rane bought things at random, trading them again at other market stalls, and somehow, he ended up holding nothing. He paused before a tiny girl with a toothy grin. She squatted before a small table, on which were three copper cups, upside down. “Try yer luck, sar?”

“Certainly,” Rane said, flipping her a coin. The girl placed his coin under the middle cup, and then shuffled them so fast her hands seemed to blur.

He glanced over his shoulder at the guards, who were inspecting every stall we had entered. He leaned toward me. “I think we’ve got a moment to ourselves.”

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