The Offering (10 page)

“Brook, no,” I gasped, not sure whether I was reacting to her request or to her treatment of Eden, or both. “You can't go,” I insisted, finally breaking free from the stupor I seemed to have fallen under as I'd stood watching the two of them. “How did you know anyway? You should be in bed at this hour.”

Her mouth twisted into a wry grin. “I already told you. There are no secrets around here.”

With that, my stomach lurched. I wondered how much she
knew, and worse, if anyone else had figured out what I was up to. “Who did you tell? Does Max know?”

Brook scoffed at the notion. “Are you kidding? He thinks you're sleeping like a baby at this very moment. You have him as hoodwinked as everyone else around here. No one suspects you're sneaking around under the cover of darkness, planning to go who knows where, with . . .” She glanced at Eden, her smile growing. “Me and Eden here.”

Eden's eyes narrowed, but she remained silent. A smart move, considering her precarious position.

“Brook, I'm serious. You can't come. What you're suggesting . . . well, you'd be defecting from your position as commander of the armed forces. You can't do that.”

Brook laughed, almost a snicker, as she countered, “But you can defect as queen? To do what? To go where?”

She didn't know everything, I realized, but her words pricked my conscience. I brushed aside my own guilt as I glanced at Eden. “I'm not
defecting
as queen, Brook. Let Eden go and I'll explain.”

Eden's black eyes snapped up to mine, and I saw a flicker of something there. Something very close to triumph.

It didn't take Brooklynn but a moment to weigh my request before she shoved Eden away from her. Eden rolled her shoulder, lifting her arm as if loosening the stiff muscles. The gesture appeared casual, a natural response to the angle she'd just been pinned in. But it was a deception, and before she'd finished a single rotation of the joint, she'd spun around, her fists at the ready and her shoulders squared. She moved so fast that if I had blinked, I would have missed it.

Fortunately for me, I hadn't.

Her attack stance was thwarted, though, when Brook reacted just as rapidly, and I heard an unmistakable click. Even in the shadows, I could make out the silhouette of Brook's weapon—a handgun that was now directed at Eden.

“Nice try,” she said with a note of genuine sincerity. “I'd have expected nothing less.”

Eden looked blandly at the firearm. “And I expected a lot less.” She shrugged halfheartedly. “I suppose I'm somewhat impressed. You're better than I realized.”

Brooklynn raised a perfect dark eyebrow. “I was trained by the best.”

The reminder that they shared a bond, these two women with very little else in common except that they'd both been revolutionaries in Xander's army, eased the tension, if only somewhat, and Eden nodded.

Brook lowered her weapon as well, even though she didn't holster it. “So I'm guessing this has something to do with Xander. Am I right?” She didn't wait for either of us to answer, and it was easy enough to let her think she'd guessed correctly. “So let me repeat myself: Neither of you is leaving here without me. Have I made myself clear?”

max

“This can't be happening!” Max exclaimed, shoving his hands impatiently through his hair as he waited for Joseph di Heyse—Charlie's father—to read the letter he'd thrown down in front of him. “What was she thinking? Your daughter's a madwoman. You know that, don't you?”

When Charlie's father was finished, he set the paper down beside the ornate place setting—hand-painted china trimmed in gold leaf—and even that casual gesture set Max's teeth on edge.

How could he just sit there at a time like this? How was he not climbing out of his skin with worry?

Instead her father treated the letter as if it were yet another trivial matter in a day like any other, even though they both knew it wasn't.

He was too calm by half. Certainly calmer than Max had been when he'd discovered the note propped against Charlie's pillows that morning, on a bed that had been unrumpled. She hadn't even bothered to make it look as if
she'd slept there. He might not have even found the letter, had it not been for a night guard with a very large bump on his head and an outlandish story about being attacked by a purple-haired assassin.

No doubt who the purple-haired assailant had been.

Max had had to read the letter several times before the words had started to make sense to him, until he'd finally realized what Charlie had been trying to tell him in her abrupt handwritten scrawl—that she'd taken Eden and gone on a rescue mission to save Xander.

Xander!
Xander whose hand had been delivered to them in a box.

Charlie had also left the letter that she'd discovered in that same box, the one addressed to her from Queen Elena. Although, whether Charlie had left it as justification for her actions or to explain them, Max wasn't certain. Not that it mattered, really. There was no excuse for what she'd done. What she was risking by her actions.

And the letter was quite clear:

Charlaina,

I know your secret. I know how to cure you of it. Surrender yourself to Astonia, and I'll give you peace. I'll give you everything you want. The choice is yours.

—Elena

Her secret? Only those closest to Charlie, including Max, knew that the secret was Sabara, of course. But they'd gone
to great lengths to hide Sabara's existence from the outside world. How could Elena possibly know about Sabara's Essence being fused with Charlie?

He thought of Xander's hand, and wondered if the other queen had tortured the information out of his brother, searching for weaknesses with which to lure Charlie to Astonia. If so, she'd succeeded. She'd found the one thing Charlie would be unable to resist—the chance to purge Sabara from within her.

The offering of peace for Ludania only sweetened the deal.

But why couldn't Charlie have come to him for help? Why hadn't she confided in him?

He raked his hand through his hair again, frustrated because he already knew the answer. Because he'd have stopped her. He'd have rounded up an army and insisted they go to war instead, which was exactly what Charlie wanted to avoid, so instead she'd turned to the one person who had as much to gain as she did from sneaking off to Astonia.

The fact that she'd decided to take someone as unpredictable and revenge-minded as the former revolutionary only made her situation all the more precarious. Who knew what would happen to the two of them?

“She's loyal to a fault. I'll admit that much, at least,” Joseph said, as if that somehow excused Charlie's midnight escapade. As if that made it all okay.

“Loyal? Loyal! That's all you have to say about this? She'll get herself killed, and then what? Is Angelina prepared to take the throne?” Max saw the muscles in the older man's jaw twitch, and he knew he'd gone too far, but he couldn't
stop himself. This was Charlie they were talking about.

Joseph struck the heavy wooden table in front of him with both fists, his chair scraping across the floor. He stood facing Max now, and there was nothing calm in his demeanor. His body trembled with ill-concealed fury. “Don't you dare for a second think that I don't care, Maxmillian,” he barked. “That's my daughter you're talking about, but what do you want of me? I'm an old man. I can't very well go myself. We'll send an army after her if necessary.”

Max looked more closely at the older man, assessing the strain that made the lines that etched his face grow deeper, furrowing in places Max hadn't noticed before. The man's eyes tightened ever so slightly at the corners, and his pupils were constricted as he glowered at Max. It was there, the worry, but it was hidden, veiled just beneath the surface.

“I'll go myself,” Max stated, leaving no room for argument. “Claude's getting Brooklynn now, and as soon as we can, we're heading out to find Charlie.”

The older man nodded, settling back down once more.

“I'm sorry.” Max put his hand on Joseph's shoulder. He'd been out of line to accuse Charlie's father—overtly or not—of not caring enough for his errant daughter, not after all he'd done, all the secrets he'd kept to keep her safe her entire life.

Joseph shook his head, looking wearier than he had just moments before. “Don't be, Max. Just bring her home.”

The doors opened then, and both men's heads snapped around to see who it was.

Claude came in, alone, a scowl on his face. “The commander's gone,” he announced, not waiting to be asked. “Brooklynn,”
he amended as if they didn't know who he meant. “She's gone too.”

Max shook his head and muttered beneath his breath as he paced toward the door. Then he stopped to face Claude. “Get word to Aron. Let him know what's happening here, and gather some of Brook's soldiers. We're going after them.”

brooklynn

By the end of the first day, the only one talking was Charlie, and Brook contemplated shooting her just to shut her up.

Brook wasn't sure it would be considered treason at this point, since Charlie was no longer sitting on the throne, only on a horse they'd stolen from the palace stables. She didn't even think Eden would try to stop her. Charlie was driving the both of them crazy.

“Don't you think Aron will worry when he finds out?” Charlie asked for the millionth time.

Brook glanced over her shoulder to where Charlie was at least seven horse lengths behind both her and Eden. It was hard enough to wait for Eden, who was a decent enough rider, but waiting for Charlie to keep up was downright painful.

Hell, if Brook shot her now, no one would ever be able to catch her anyway, not even Eden. Brook was a better rider than she was a markswoman, and that was saying something.

When she'd actually realized just what a drawback Charlie's riding was, Brooklynn had doubled back and left a trail of
broken branches and hoofprints in the mud to make it look as if the three of them had taken an entirely different route, hoping to send any search parties off on a wild goose chase. She might not have stopped them from discovering their direction entirely, but she hoped she'd bought them some time.

“He's probably already been notified,” Charlie went on. “I wonder who it was who told him.” Brook watched her as she kept talking, the way her eyes never left the ground in front of her, as if somehow by watching the terrain, she was helping the horse keep its footing. Her grip on the reins was so firm that her knuckles would be stiff for days. “Do you think it was Max? Do you think he used the new communication device to send word?” Charlie looked up then, her eyes straying from the path to catch Brook's gaze, but only for a moment before returning to the ground again. Brook wondered what Charlie thought was going to happen if she looked away. That the horse was going to trip on a twig or a pebble? Or maybe a fallen tree that no one but her might notice?

Brooklynn turned and righted herself in her saddle, spurring her horse forward. She increased the distance between her and her . . .
What am I supposed to consider Charlie at this point, anyway
?
she wondered. Charlie had insisted she was no longer to be referred to as “Your Majesty,” so what was she, then? Neither Eden nor Charlie had clued Brook in to exactly what their mission was or where they were headed, so she still didn't understand what their plan was.

My queen
, Brook reminded herself.
Charlie is still my queen, as annoying as she might be
, Brook thought as she listened to
Charlie prattle on about Max and Zafir, and even her parents now.

Brook eased up to where she'd let Eden take the lead. “How much longer? I think Her Majesty needs some sleep. Or food. Or more likely a gag.” She winked at Eden, grinning deviously.

Eden, who'd said barely two words since they'd left during the night, just squinted at Brooklynn, giving her a look that reminded Brook she was a stowaway on this mission and that her input wasn't at all appreciated. “We'll be there just after nightfall. And stop calling her that. You never know who might be listening.”

“Oh, come on. We're in the middle of nowhere.”

Eden's gaze moved upward, shifting toward the evergreens that filtered out the late-winter sun. The only sounds were the horses' hooves and the branches rustling over their heads, and even the branches barely shifted.

At first Brooklynn thought Eden might be calculating the time, the way she concentrated on the cold, barren sky through the occasional openings in the thick canopy, trying to guess how much more daylight they had, but then her black eyes fell back on Brook, unflinching. “You never know who's listening.” She made a clicking sound then and flicked her wrist so that her reins slapped the horse's neck. The animal responded, increasing its pace and pulling away from Brook once more just as Eden called over her shoulder, “We're getting closer. Mind every word now. The trees have ears.”

An eerie sensation settled over Brook, prickling her skin and causing her scalp to pucker as every hair stood on end.
She looked up too, her eyes tracking over the same places Eden's had, finding the same hollows in the trees, the same forks in the branches, tracing the same twists and gnarls and bends until she realized there was nothing there. That she'd been spooked by words, and words alone.

Spirit stories, like the ones she and Charlie and Aron had told when they were younger, as each had tried to convince the others of hauntings and apparitions and ghoulish occurrences.

The same way Eden had tried to convinced Brook with her tale of eavesdropping forests.

Nonsense
, Brook told herself. But she slowed her horse anyway, deciding to keep closer to Charlie now despite her doubt.