Chapter 10: The Mark

I let her.

We went into Hazel's kitchen, and the elder came as witness, and Hazel sat at the table with her hands folded.

Lucan stood in the doorway with his arms crossed.

The healer set her clipboard down and told me to pull my collar aside.

I did.

Her fingertips were cold and dry on my shoulder.

She pressed her thumb into the mark, and I felt nothing.

She pressed again.

Her hand began to shake.

It was a small tremor, but I was looking right at her, and so was Hazel.

"Well?" the elder said.

"It's intact," the healer said. Her voice was perfectly calm. "A little inflamed."

"Is it Brock's?"

"It is Brock's." She snatched her hand back and wiped her fingers on her coat. "There's no tampering. The King's touch did no harm."

Lucan let out a low breath.

"Then we're done," he said.

The healer picked up her clipboard and walked out without looking at any of us.

At the door she stopped for a moment, her back to the room.

I heard her say, so quietly I almost missed it, "It shouldn't be warm."

Then the sedan door slammed.

Hazel and I looked at each other across the table.

She did not say a word.

I did not say one either.

That night, I lay in the huge bed in the hold with my door shut and the lock turned from the inside, as I had asked.

My whole body hummed.

I lay there for an hour, listening to the house, and then I stopped pretending.

At midnight, I got out of bed.

I turned the lock and opened the door.

He stood on the other side of it with one hand raised to knock.

He was in a grey shirt and old trousers, barefoot, and the hall behind him was empty.

"I told you to ask," I said.

His throat moved.

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