The Decoy Princess Read Free

gray.
    The woman had started to mumble incoherently, and thinking the performance was wonderful, I resolved to pay her extra. “What of my husband?” I asked slowly, frowning as my tongue seemed thicker than it ought to be.
    “Husband?” she murmured, gazing at the rock as if it meant something.
    “The man I’ll be traveling with,” I encouraged.
    She looked at me, then back down, appearing to be confused. “He’s dark like you. Brown eyes, like you. Brown hair, like you as well, though he has the decency to keep it short.”
    I stifled a surge of annoyance. I was a princess. I was supposed to have long hair.
    “Good hands,” she was mumbling. “Skillful hands. Tell him to watch what he does with them, or they will be the death of him.”
    I blinked. What kind of a fortune was that?
    “He’s closed, too,” she said. “Hard to see. Here. Take this.”
    She released my hand, and I shivered. Picking up the rock, she dropped it into my grip. My fingers curled about it, holding it gently as I felt its roughness against my skin. “Mmmm,” she said, her fingers brushing my palm as she took it back. “You won’t be able to understand his pride. But he will understand yours. Best I hope he’s patient.”
    “Pride?” I questioned. This was the oddest fortune I had ever been told.
    She grasped my hand again, and I started at her quickness. “I see—stone,” she murmured, slumping as she fell into a deeper I trance. “Marble and hay. Silk and red ribbons—”
    “Gifts!” I jerked my hand from her, alarm jolting me out of the smoke-derived fog in my head. The fox at my feet yawned I and settled itself further. “Saint’s bells and incense. I forgot,” I exclaimed. “I have to find a betrothal gift. Forgive me, madam,”
    I said hurriedly as I stood and swung my coin bag from my wrist to my hand. “I have to go.”
    The stool I had been sitting on almost fell, and I scrabbled to catch it, flustered. She sat blinking at me, clearly struggling to shake off her interrupted magic. “Please accept this as a show of my gratitude,” I said as I set a coin clattering into the empty bowl. She was quite good. “I’d ask that you come to the palace,” I said impulsively. “I need another entertainer for my betrothal festival, and the women would enjoy speaking with you.”
    The folds in the old woman’s face deepened. She took a sharp breath. Gathering her black shawl tight about her shoulders, she gave me a patronizing smile. “No.”
    I froze in surprise. No one had ever refused me outright before. I was too shocked to say anything and just stood blinking in the thicker smoke at the ceiling. I felt my breathing slow and found myself unwilling to speak or move. A tap at the door echoed in my head.
    “Princess Contessa?” Kavenlow’s voice filtered through the thick wood. “I have your water.” He opened the door, the heat and noise seeming to pool in with the light. The bird in the cage fluttered to be free. The fresh air revived me, and I took a cleansing breath. Kavenlow’s shadow eclipsed the light from the street. “I brought you a drink, Tess,” he said, the van shifting as he entered and handed it to me.
    Taking it, I gave him a bewildered smile and tried to shake the fuzziness from my thoughts. My search for the perfect gift would have to wait. Kavenlow’s brow was furrowed worse than the time I broke the guards’ practice scaffold, swinging on it. I knew without asking he wouldn’t let me stop anywhere on the way home.
    “If you want a token of love,” the old woman said, “I have it.”
    Kavenlow’s face went slack and empty. He gave the gypsy a curiously anxious look from behind his beard, then slowly— reluctantly—shut the door behind him.
    “You don’t understand,” I said, glancing into my cup of water. “It has to be something unique, something my suitor has never seen.”
    “Something from far away,” the old woman said, waving at the still-glowing stick of