Page 67 of Starchaser
“What do you mean?” I ask, sticking close to Leo’s side as she leads us down the center path.
“It’s just that…” She shakes her head, smiles a little. “Where I come from, my people—” She glances at me, lowers her voice. “We’re not quite as bloodthirsty as the Nightweavers you’ve come to know.”
“I don’t think of Eliza as bloodthirsty,” I say, somewhat shocked by my own defensiveness of a Nightweaver I barely know.
“No, no, of course not,” Leo adds quickly, her round eyes innocent and pleading. “I don’t mean to insult your friend. I only mean to say that in Hellion, Nightweavers do not struggle with their… impulses. Not like they do here.”
The servants don’t seem to notice Leo as she passes, as if they don’t know who she is, and she doesn’t seem to mind. In fact, her stride lengthens, until I feel I’m jogging to keep up with her. I look at the servants then—reallylook at them—and note that their complexions are ashen and dull, their cheeks hollow. They wear black uniforms that conceal almost every inch of their skin, except for their faces and hands, their fingertips stained red from plucking.
None of them speak. Not even to one another.
“Have you been here before?” I ask.
“A few times,” she admits, her light tone now hushed as wehasten to the end of the path, to what appears to be another servants’ passage. “Hurry,” she says, opening the door to the passageway. “In here.”
I follow her into the narrow stone hall, and she shuts the door, sealing us in pitch blackness.
My heart plummets.
“What is this place?” I slip my hands into my pockets and grab hold of the hilts of my daggers. Have I been wrong about Leo? “Why did you bring me here?”
A flame ignites from Leo’s gilded lighter, illuminating her face, and I withdraw my blades an inch before she lights a torch along the wall.
Leo sags against the stones, sighing deeply. She retrieves a long silver pipe from her coat pocket, lights it. After a deep drag, she exhales, the clove-scented smoke easing the tension in my shoulders.
“Titus trusts you,” Leo says.
I open my mouth to respond, but she cuts me off.
“Don’t argue. I’ve known him all my life. It’s plain to see that he confides in you.” Her lip kicks up in a slight grin. “He used to confide in me. Before…” She exhales a cloud of smoke, holding up her ring finger, the diamond-encrusted band glittering in the torchlight. “Before this.”
My stomach twists, and suddenly the hallway feels entirely too cramped.
“I know when I’m being used, Aster,” she says, making a fist and letting it fall to her side.
Panic forms a knot in my throat, and I tighten my grip on my daggers once more.
“Every day of my life from the moment I was born has been manipulated by my parents and their advisers.” She glances at the door, as if she can still see the rose garden that lies beyond. “My kingdom depends on the Eerie forManan, weapons, and soldiers to fight at our borders. But the Eerie depends on us for the Elysian Iron needed to make those weapons and supply those soldiers. This marriage is a strong alliance between our kingdoms—only a fool couldn’t see that. And Titus is no fool. A pain in my ass, on occasion, but not a fool.”
I’m somewhat taken aback by her bluntness, and perhaps it shows on my face, because she chuckles.
“I doubt I’ve said anything that could make a pirate blush.”
“It’s not that,” I say quickly. “It’s just… I don’t understand why you’re telling me this.”
She takes another long drag off her pipe, her face pulled tight in a frown. “There is no one here I can trust. I thought perhaps you and Miss Cooper might be able to help me.”
Slowly, I withdraw my hands from my pockets. “Why us?”
“You’re outsiders here as well, aren’t you?”
My eyes narrow. “Eliza is a member of the nobility.”
Leo nods. “And yet there are rumors that she and her brothers work for the Guild of Shadows.” She cocks her head. “You didn’t know?”
I can’t admit that Lord Bludgrave accused Eliza’s brother of exactly that just last night, so I shake my head. “Don’t have much time for gossip.”
Leo grins. “I like you.” She sticks out her free hand. “Let’s be friends, shall we?”
