Red Ruse

Chapter Five

Mare

My shoulder screams when I wake. The feeble dressing I managed to scrape on it has decayed to dust, seeping onto the sheets below.

You made this wound yourself.

A toss of sheets and a clatter of metal brings me to my bedside, to a tin filled with green paste and the stench of medicine. Elara said no healer. I suppose he technically obeyed.

"Are you there?" The words are feeble, and I swallow. "I hope not. You murdered for that crown. I would hate to see it go to waste."

For a moment, nothing happens. But sure enough, footsteps approach my bedside, followed by the boy attached to them. "I didn't trust a servant to bring it."

I eye the hand he lays across my bed, but it moves no closer. "Convenient."

"Do you need help?" He gestures to the tin. "I'm sure it's difficult to move."

"I can do it myself," I hiss.

"You sure?"

"Drop the act." My mouth sours. "Fetch me a washcloth, will you?"

He chuckles. "You're smarter than you look."

"Washcloth. Now."

Maven obeys, fetching a bowl of water as well. He frowns. "You don't want the ointment?"

I flick water onto his coat. "Have you never cleaned a wound before?"

Something flickers, a weakness so brief I might've imagined it. Maven clears his throat. "Did you sleep well?"

"No." I pull the washcloth from the bowl, wincing. "Your mother's warming up to me, alright. Nearly lit me on fire."

For once he doesn't laugh. He stares into the distance, hands cold, barely breathing as his gaze returns to my shoulder. "You can't keep doing this."

"Doing what?"

"You know what I mean," he snaps, nearly tipping the bowl over. "This isn't sustainable."

Shrug. "That's the point."

His fists curl. "Don't you want to live?"

"This isn't about me." I force myself upright, pain be damned. "It's about the truth."

A hollow laugh. "What about the newbloods, huh? Is the truth more important than them?"

I falter. "She'll hunt them anyway." My mouth curdles, on the verge of nausea as I look him in the eye. "I never should've believed you."

The bowl clatters to the ground.

Maven catches his breath, eyes flickering from me to the water seeping beneath us. "I'll get a towel."

Blood seeps down my arm. "Don't leave."

"Never." The washcloth stings as he presses it to my shoulder, closing the distance between us to whispers of scandal. "I won't let you burn."

"Even if I asked to?"

He withdraws, reaching beneath my bed to pull out a box. "There's something else I need to give you."

"You didn't answer the question." Fabric tumbles onto my lap, a silken pool of black peppered with scarlet. I frown. "What's this?"

Maven grins. "Proof you were right to believe in me."

My eyes grow wide as he elaborates, hands shaking as he explains my new role in his game. Elara's game. Cal's game. A game too vast to be controlled by any one person.

"Mare."

Look into his eyes. Let him brush the hair out of yours. And, in a breathless whisper: "How much of it was real?"

Two can play at this game.

He cups my cheek with a lie a stupider girl might believe. "More than you think."

Our breaths grow ragged, bleeding together in naked desperation. His lips press to mine. My hands find his hair. Together, we stumble against the wall and trip back onto the bed, upon which he laughs and it's not real, none of this is real, and yet . . .

I slam a fist into the pillow.

Feathers float through the air like particles of ash, an active volcano of silk and fury. The casing tears with a violent rip, bone white fluff coating my hands. I can't stop.

"Mare--"

"Damn you," I choke, throwing the remains at his face. "You're such a liar."

Maven picks feathers from his hair in silence. "I don't know how to be anything else."

My fists curl. "Have you ever tried?"

The last feather rests in his hand, one flutter from joining the others on the ground. "I did." A whisper. "But I wasn't very good at it."

I grit my teeth. "Try harder."

"I've cleaned wounds before. When I was at the front." The feather falls off his palm. "Wasn't good at that either."

My shoulder burns as I reach for the ointment. "You can learn."

Maven looks away. "Get dressed. We'll be making an announcement at breakfast."