Page 18 of Reaper’s Curse

But this…

We both turned our attention to the practically comatose afflicted gentleman seated across the room. His attire suggested that before his fall into the undead, he’d been employed in some capacity at the palace.

Now he did little more than stare and drool.

“But he’s…” I waved a hand in the man’s direction.

Valen nodded, a cat-got-the-canary grin on his lips. “Exactly. No better place to practice your supposed talent than on one who clearly can’t get much worse. Honestly, I think death would be a mercy.” He turned his cold, challenging gaze to me. “If you could manage a death, given the circumstances.”

He raised his hands toward the ceiling as if the curse had somehow amassed there.

Shifting to my side, Valen laid his hand against the small of my back and gave me a soft nudge, shoving me closer to the afflicted.

I trudged forward, away from Valen’s touch, and tossed him a sidelong glance. Something about the line of his nose caught my attention.

I recalled his nose appearing straighter when I’d met him in the carriage, but last night when he’d pressed my bloodied fingers to the contract, it had appeared somewhat crooked. Had something happened between those two meetings? Or had my perception simply been distorted through the skewed lens of exhaustion?

“Heal him.” Valen pointed to the afflicted. “I shall observe so that I may record a baseline from which to work forward and then report to Her Majesty of your fine accomplishment.”

“And after that?” I stared at my splayed hands, curling and stretching my fingers several times.

“You do it again and again until you can prove your success within an acceptable margin of error.”

“And what exactly do you and the queen consider an acceptable margin of error?”

Valen didn’t verbally answer, but his eyes gleamed, and his lips curved upward with a touch of harsh cruelty. His gaze filled with challenge and incredulity. He clearly didn’t believe I had ever healed an afflicted, and he questioned my saving the crown prince.

I would prove him wrong… I hoped.

Turning my gaze from Valen, I studied the afflicted. This man was a test. One of several I’d be forced to heal…or attempt to heal. And why start here, with the afflicted, when any information on the curse, information the queen had suggested she could provide, might help me better understand the altered rules governing death…or the lack thereof…within the citadel?

“There’s someone in particular you wish for me to heal, isn’t there?” I asked. “Someone your queen considers very important.”

The widening of his grin answered my question. An expression I took for a seriously fat yes.

Did the queen even care for her citizens? Or was her true motive behind our agreement actually concern for a particular someone?

“Power up, Ms. Gunn,” Valen said with a bark, then he shoved me straight into the afflicted’s embrace.

6

Acentury in his grandmother’s service and Valen still refused to show Winter proper respect.

Well, he had once, when he’d first arrived at the citadel, but only once, and not since then.

In better days, the emotion ravaging Winter’s system would have brought icicles to his fingertips. Now his skin was merely whiter than usual, an almost undetectable mist lingering around his body.

And yet he sensed something swirling in his core. Something that he had brought back with him from his magic-encased cocoon. Something he’d soon be investigating, exploring.

Soon, but later.

He had planned to spend the day with Raven. Standing vigil at her side while she reconnected with the old man, Mr. Aldine. The three of them, together, could have then crafted a plan to locate the other member of her team—that hothead irritant, Chace.

Ace.

Winter had once heard Aoes call Raven’s associate Ace. The hothead didn’t appear to favor the name, a simple fact that brought a hint of a smile to Winter’s lips. He wasn’t sure why Chace’s discomfort gave him a tiny thrill, but it did.

His plans with Raven were now tossed to the wayside, all thanks to Valen and his grandmother, the queen. Their agenda remained unclear to him, but he would get to the bottom of it, whatever it was. A scheduled teatime and solid discussion with his grandmother should provide the desired results.