On This Unworthy Scaffold by Heidi Heilig (best pdf reader for ebooks TXT) 📕

AKRA: What if he isn’t?

CHEEKY: Well. If all else fails, I don’t have a problem poisoning him. Ellisia—can you help us get into the palace? I’m sure Raik would pay extra for the girl he couldn’t have.

ELLISIA considers as she turns to CAMREON.

ELLISIA: And you plan to lift the deportation decree?

CAMREON: I do. In fact, I plan to send Akra to stop the Prix de Guerre from leaving the harbor.

ELLISIA: It’s a deal. I wasn’t made to be an innkeeper.

AKRA spreads his bloody hands in a disbelieving gesture.

AKRA: Am I supposed to stop the ship by myself?

CAMREON: You’re the best suited for it. After all, Le Trépas can’t steal your soul. And I’ll order the dragon to obey you. Can you do it?

AKRA narrows his eyes, then turns back to CHEEKY.

AKRA: Depends on who’s asking.

CHEEKY: Please, Akra.

She leans into him, her head against his chest.

Leo is on that ship.

AKRA wraps his arms around her tightly—fiercely.

AKRA: If you swear you’re coming back to me as soon as you can.

CHEEKY: Of course I’m coming back.

She pulls back, giving him a pointed look.

Cam’s not the only one who owes me.

AKRA: What do I owe you?

CHEEKY: This.

She rises up on her tiptoes to kiss him, and he holds her for a long time before he lets go.

Chapter Fourteen

The madhouse.

I feel it in my throat—a rising heat, like fire, like bile—a scream, building with my rage. Looking into the king’s guileless eyes, I would bet my life that he knows Theodora doesn’t belong there.

Was this a punishment, like Ayla said? The king had been displeased by his dear niece’s attempt at public humiliation, and he is in full control of the audience as we cross the plaza to the carriage. The courtiers are following, watching, whispering. Not to mention the guards at the door, and the footman approaching to help me up the step. Le Roi Fou has staged all of this with impeccable timing. Moreover, he knows I’m the one who really needed the elixir. If I protest too much, too loudly, it would be only too easy for him to whisk me away to the sanatorium as well.

Swallowing my anger, I take a breath, searching for the right lines on this impromptu stage. “This is shocking news,” I say slowly as the footman offers me his hand. I take it reluctantly—in the carriage, I lose the audience. “Theodora Legarde is the sanest person I know.”

“She’s been under incredible strain,” the king replies. “The loss of her father . . . the embarrassment of her brother. But time heals many wounds.”

“Surely a visitor would help,” I say over my shoulder as I step into the carriage. “I’m one of her closest friends.”

“Perhaps once the worst is over,” the king replies smoothly as I settle into the velvet seat. “Unfortunately, her delusions center around Chakran superstitions. I’m not sure she’d be well served by seeing someone who shares them.”

His voice rings over the square—only when he is finished does he follow me into the carriage, leaving the whispering courtiers behind. I grit my teeth as the carriage starts across the cobbled square.

Nécromancy is far from superstition. I want to prove it—to raise a fantouche here and now. To tuck the soul of a butterfly into his silk handkerchief, or the spirit of a frog into one of his shoes. But looking at Le Roi Fou’s hawklike face, I remember when I had tried to impress his half-brother with my power. Maman had explained it all away with lies: hidden strings, a trick of the light. If I am to prove myself to the king, I need something unmistakable—inexplicable except by the truth.

Then again, do I want him to know the extent of my powers? My hand goes again to the little scar in the crook of my elbow, where the armée stole my blood and then used it against me—against my country. I have to be very careful when facing the king. And I have to do it without Theodora’s help.

My mind is spinning faster than the carriage wheels, the way it always does under strain. Can the king tell? Does his own malheur do the same?

“In happier news, the court is very much looking forward to your performance,” he says. “The theater is ready as soon as you are, and I have a very capable orchestra to place at your disposal.”

“An orchestra,” I say, and I no longer want to scream, but laugh. Half a year ago, I was ready to leave Chakrana for this chance. But now the same price seems much too high. And yet . . . an idea begins to form. Know your role, Akra had told me. If I need to convince the king of anything, where better to do so than on a stage? “And fantouches, you said?”

“In the salon,” the king says, gesturing out the window. “Here we are.”

The carriage rolls to a stop, and when the footman opens the door, I see we haven’t gone far. Stepping down from the carriage, the great cathedral of Lephare looms over me, the soullight brighter than the morning sun.

Up close, the building itself is even more impressive: taller than the kapok trees that rise above the rest of the jungle, and carved as richly as our own temples are—or at least, as they were. Grotesque creatures and lovely faces peer from the corners and the lintels, though I don’t recognize the stories they must represent. Even stranger: the arched doors of the church are flung open, and people drift in and out as freely as the souls. Is this how our temples had been—how they could be again?

But when the king descends from the carriage, he starts along the side of the building, away from the main doors. “Where are we going, Your Majesty?”

“The Salon des Merveilles is beneath the cathedral,” he says again, lifting a hand. The footman races to his side, holding out an embroidered kerchief. The king puts the perfumed fabric to his nose, and even