Chapter 15: Mother's Recipe

Nerys's POV

Madoc told me about the dagger while I laced my boots.

He said it plainly, standing over me with his arms crossed, and he did not look away once.

"Aconite," I said.

"On a plain blade, in a plain sheath."

"And he'll call it an accident."

"Wystan thinks so."

I pulled the last knot tight.

My neck felt strange without the weight of the king's mark.

I kept putting my hand up to it.

"I'm coming with you to the tree line," I said.

"I'd rather you stayed."

"She's my sister."

"That is exactly why."

"Madoc."

He breathed out through his nose.

"Hild will be right behind you," he said.

"I will be watching from the trees. If she so much as drops a cup, I want to know."

"Yes, Alpha."

The look he gave me went straight down my spine.

The last time I had said it, it was into his shoulder in the dark.

Cecily was waiting at the edge of the trees in her pale blue cloak.

She had a stoppered flask in one hand and a small covered basket on her arm.

Her face lit up when she saw me.

"Nerys."

"Cecily."

"You came."

She stepped forward and then stepped back, too fast, as she always did.

"I wasn't sure you would."

The cloak smelled of cedar and cold iron.

It was the king's smell, and Rue bared her teeth inside my chest.

"You look well," Cecily said. "Different."

"I slept."

"I brought tea. The way Mother makes it, with honey and the mountain thyme."

She held up the flask with her right hand.

Her left stayed closed against her belly.

"I thought we could sit. Just us, like we used to."

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