Chapter 3

Helen met Nora on the bridge outside her rooms, breathless from running.

"Go. Now. Your grandfather and your uncles are discussing sending you to Blackwell House tonight."

Nora dismissed the servants. When they were alone, she steadied Helen by the shoulders.

"I can't escape. If I run, they'll threaten you."

"I've lived long enough. If you live, I don't care what happens to me."

Something unfamiliar ached beneath Nora's ribs. In her first life she had been raised as a weapon, without this attachment. Was this what having a mother felt like? It was making escape impossible.

Helen caught her hand. "I'll tell them you're a daughter. Then you won't have to go."

"Then they will kill us both. The family won't take responsibility for deceiving the Crown."

"What can we do?"

Nora touched the tears on her mother's face. "Do you trust me?"

In the main hall she bowed to Edmund and her three surviving uncles. Daniel's chair, of course, was empty.

"I don't know what will happen to me. I'm concerned about my mother."

"She stays here," Edmund said, barely looking up from his book. "Nobody will mistreat her."

For the moment, perhaps. Nora was useful to them now. Later they would forget.

"With you all here, I know she would be cared for. But she worries so much. Suppose she runs to Blackwell House and annoys His Highness?"

Her eldest uncles exchanged frightened looks.

"Wouldn't it be better to send her to her father's family? My aunt and cousin could keep her company. Providence is far enough away that she couldn't cause trouble here."

Edmund shut his book. "Very well."

"Thank you, Grandfather."

Nora left without letting them see her relief. If her disguise failed, distance might keep Helen from being the first person punished. An assassin planning to save somebody. Life was full of surprises.

Blackwell House loomed above her that night. She tightened the strap of her bag and straightened her pale pink coat, chosen from her supposed gentleman's wardrobe.

Someone slapped her shoulder.

"Noah!"

Miles beamed at her.

For a dreadful instant she thought their shared-husband joke had come true.

"No," he said when she asked. "My beauty didn't pass the test. I'm here to see you off."

Even wastrels had real friends. Nora clasped his shoulder.

"Thank you."

"We're brothers, aren't we?" He handed her a book wrapped in brown paper. "This is about all I can do."

He left before she opened it.

A Hundred Ways a Royal Favorite Can Die.

A hundred? Was she supposed to make this a lifelong profession?

She packed it away and entered.

Adrian reclined in a candlelit room. A woman in green knelt beside him. Nora recognized her as Alice Wells, an official's adult daughter rumored to be intended for the second prince.

"Noah Ward, at your service."

Adrian's hand moved. A blast of trained force threw Alice across the floor. Magic and martial power were real here, Nora reminded herself; the regent did not need a weapon to be dangerous.

"Afraid because someone came in?" he asked Alice. "Did I tell you to stop?"

"Your Highness..."

"Your family will do anything for advancement. Since you've come, show me what you can do."

Nora braced herself for something sordid. Instead, another movement of Adrian's sleeve sent Alice sliding farther away, blood at her lips.

"You may think this respectable. I find it filthy. Get out. Tell your father I don't appreciate men who trade their daughters for promotion."

Cole dragged Alice away. Adrian discarded another handkerchief.

"Come here," he told Nora.

She approached in tiny steps.

"What can you do?"

"Eat. Sleep. Cheat at cards."

Surely a man of his discernment would return useless merchandise.

"Did the Wards send me a pig?" He was suddenly standing over her. "I hate useless people. Shall I send you to your father?"

She swallowed.

"Daniel died without meeting you. We could correct that disappointment."