Sold to the Alpha novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: Three Hours

The envoy left at ten bells with a bow, a full belly and a smile I wanted to scrape off with a lye brush.

I was in the cold pantry by eleven.

It was a narrow stone room under the kitchens, lined with shelves of cheese wheels and hanging hams, and no lamp ever burned there.

I stood in the dark with my arms crossed, shivering, and counted my own pulse against someone else's.

It was racing.

The door opened.

I did not turn around.

"You shouldn't be here," said Ketil.

"You shouldn't have followed me."

"I didn't follow you.

"I came to find out why you ran from the hall."

"I didn't run.

"I walked briskly."

A pause.

"Your hands are shaking."

"They're cold."

"They've been shaking since the stew."

He shut the door behind him.

The dark closed up thick between us, and I could hear every breath he drew.

"Three people," I said. "Only three people knew about the Fallow Ford."

"You know that."

"The envoy told me.

"The envoy told the whole table, and you went white as a plate."

"You see too much," he said.

"I serve soup.

"It's a good seat."

I turned.

I couldn't see him, only the shape of him against the pale line under the door, and the glint of his eyes.

"You've had a leak for months.

"You never caught it, because you never tried a different trap.

"Whoever it is learns the real hour every time, so the real hour is the thing that leaks."

"Go on."

"Give each of the three a different hour for the next wagon.

"Tomorrow's grain train.

"Tell the steward second bell, tell his secretary third bell, tell the Beta fourth, and send the real wagon some other way.

"Whichever hour the south strikes, that's the man who talked."

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