Thread of Gold

Ch. 19: hand of the goddess

The thing about someone dying, Camille thought, was that suddenly, everyone knew them.

Overnight, Stillwater Castle was flooded with chocolates and wine, expensive cheese and rare jewels. Pink flowers lined the corridor. Court musicians performed songs, all of them dedicated to Elsie. One poet rhymed her name with "wealthy."

It was all — as Penny so delicately phrased it — utter horseshit.

At breakfast, Camille had overheard several young women loudly discussing Elsie, their embroidery spread out on their laps.

"She was always so nice," one of them sniffed. "She had the warmest heart."

Some of it was probably sincere. Most of it, Camille suspected, was not — and it only made it more difficult to watch Isaac. Isaac, who never spoke of Elsie. Isaac, who only pushed his men harder in training that morning, his face haggard.

She wondered what they had fought about before Elsie died.

Camille didn't ask, though.

She wasn't brave enough to.

There was an eeriness to the castle too, now; an almost metallic tang of fear. Panic slithered under the cracks of doorways, crouching in dark corners. Men glanced over their shoulders. None of the ladies walked alone. All of them were wondering the same question.

Who did it?

But that was the thing about Nightweavers, Camille thought. They could be your neighbour or your friend. They could be your lover.

They wore their same smiles. They shared their food. And in the night, they hunted.

But Elsie's death had sparked something in her. For so long, Camille had been a carriage stumbling behind a horse, yanked in whatever direction others sought fit to steer her. But something had changed.

Any of them could have been killed that night, and Camille didn't want to die a prisoner. She was getting her necklace off — no matter the cost.

And she knew where to begin.

Penny tracked down Tristan at breakfast.

He was sitting alone in the breakfast room, a half-finished piece of toast in his hand. A newspaper lay open in front of him. Penny knew what it would say: Tragedy Strikes at the Castle, alongside a handful of quotes from a servant that claimed to know Elsie well. Poor Ryne had spent all night trying to track down the leak.

But that wasn't Penny's concern. Not now.

"I need more," she said.

"More manners?" Tristan didn't bother looking up. "Yes, I would agree with that assessment."

"More dream somnium," Penny said, ignoring him. "The powerful stuff. Whatever you gave me outside the tavern. I need more of it."

Tristan stilled. He closed the newspaper and then set down the toast. Cucumber and cheese, cut neatly down the middle. Just as Tristan had made it when he lived at the castle as a child, Penny recalled.

"No."

She frowned. "What do you mean, no?"

"Negative. Not happening. No." Tristan sighed. "I understand that as a princess you might be unfamiliar with the term, Penny, but it means—"

"Don't condescend to me, Tristan."

"You could have died." Tristan's face was hard. "I was in an awful place when I gave that somnium to you. I won't make the same mistake again."