The Gypsy King (50 page)

“Your Majesty!” shouted Persephone, desperately trying to make herself heard above the din. “Please, Your Majesty! I
must
speak with you.”

The king stopped spinning so abruptly that Persephone nearly fell over. It wasn't her words that had caused him to stop, however—it was the sight of the “eunuch” Azriel being kicked to his knees.

And the sight of the gleaming knife in the hand of the soldier who stood ready to scalp him.

“Mordecai,” panted the king, who still had Persephone clasped tightly in his arms as if he meant to take her for another spin any moment. “What … what is the meaning of this?”

Before the Regent could reply, a crash and a scream caused every person in the Great Hall to jump.

It was the pockmarked servant who'd dropped the roast beef platter at the king's feet a few days earlier. This time, however, instead of looking flustered or terrified, she was staring at Persephone as though she'd just seen a ghost.

Which, in a way, she had.

For what she'd seen was Persephone's whiplash scar—the one that criss-crossed the outside of her left arm almost to the elbow. The one that Cookie believed had been caused by a burn of some kind, inflicted upon Persephone when she was but a tiny infant; the one that Persephone had always believed, inexplicably, had been given to her for good reason, by someone who'd loved her very much.

What she'd also seen was that Persephone's whiplash scar exactly matched the scar that the king carried on his bare right arm. Wherever the scar ended on Persephone's flesh, it began on the king's; wherever it ended on the king's flesh, it began on Persephone's.

There was only one possible explanation for why their scars matched so perfectly.

And the clumsy, pockmarked servant knew exactly what it was.

FORTY-FOUR

M
OVING WITH SURPRISING SPEED and agility for one so clumsy, the pockmarked servant spun around and starting running from the Great Hall as though her life depended on it.

Which, indeed, it did, for she was not the only one who'd seen the matching scars. Her scream had drawn
everyone's
attention to them—the king, the woman who was not Lady Bothwell, the great lords and ladies of the land.

And, of course, the Regent.

“Stop!” he bellowed.

But the pockmarked servant paid no heed, for she knew that to stop was death.

For her part, Persephone only dimly heard the Regent's shout, so transfixed was she by the sight of the matching scars. Logic told her that she and the king must have been scarred at the very same time, in the very same way.

But I've had this scar for as long as I can remember!
she thought wildly, looking up at the king, who looked equally stunned.
That could only mean—

CRACK!

Jerking her head away from the sight of her arm pressed against the king's arm, Persephone saw that Azriel had used the distraction to jump to his feet, yank his arms free of the soldiers who held him and elbow them both in the face. Blood from their mangled noses was splattering nearby noblewomen, who were shrieking and fainting and adding to the general chaos of the situation. Even as Persephone watched, Azriel shoved the Regent so hard that he fell to the floor. Then he ran over to her, snatched up her hand and began dragging her through the crowd in pursuit of the pockmarked servant.

Mordecai slammed against the blood-flecked marble floor hard enough to knock out of him what little breath had been left in his lungs.

It is impossible!
he thought as he frantically tugged his robe down over his thin, crooked legs and awkwardly pushed himself to his hands and knees.
Impossible! I was so careful—so thorough. I was sure I'd tied up all loose ends! I used trusted men, I ordered the disposal of the queen, the midwives, the attendants, all those of consequence who might have sought to cause trouble with the truth. And then, of course, there was the matter of the child—

“Mordecai, what is the meaning of this?” demanded the king, who looked very pale and more sober than he'd
ever looked in his life. “W-why does Lady Bothwell share the scar I've borne since infancy?”

Mordecai thought quickly as he staggered to his feet, for he knew that he would lose more than the title “Regent” if the king and the court were ever to learn the truth.

He would lose everything.

“I do not know why that woman shares your scar, Majesty,” he said tersely, “but I do know that she is not a lady at all. She is an imposter!”

“An imposter!” exclaimed the king, with a harsh, wet cough. “No, I don't believe it—”

“It is true,” insisted Mordecai. Brusquely, he ordered two of his soldiers to escort the king back to his rooms and to let no one enter or exit, upon pain of death. “It is for your own safety, Majesty,” he assured King Finnius, “for I have reason to fear that the entire palace is riddled with Gypsies and that they intend to murder you this very night.”

The coughing king looked aghast. “But how do you know—”

“It is my business to know,” said Mordecai. Then, after ordering everyone in the Great Hall to stay where they were, he turned to the two bleeding soldiers, pointed in the direction that the pockmarked servant, Persephone and Azriel had fled and said, “After them.”

The pockmarked servant was fast, but in her terror she made a mistake. Instead of turning left into a passageway
that would have led her out of the palace, she turned right into a passageway that led to what appeared to be the office of a minor clerk.

It was a dead end.

Whirling around as Azriel and Persephone came bursting into the room after her, the terrified woman threw up her hands as though to ward off a blow. “Please don't kill me!” she cried.

“No one is going to kill you,” said Azriel as he swiftly barred the door. “We only want to talk to you.”

“Azriel, where is Mateo?” asked Persephone. “Atticus told me that the Regent had you both!”

“Like you, he lied,” said Azriel, giving her a look that plainly showed his hurt and anger that she'd lied and run away from him—
again
. “Mateo is safe—with Meeka.” Grabbing Persephone by the wrist, he roughly dragged her over to where the servant stood trembling with her back against the wall. “Tell us what you know about this,” he demanded, thrusting Persephone's scarred, bare arm up under her nose.

As the woman opened her mouth to reply, someone hammered hard on the other side of the barred door.

“In the name of the Regent Mordecai, I order you to open the door at once!” bellowed a voice.

“Forget that,” ordered Azriel, pushing Persephone's scarred arm up under the poor woman's nose once more. “
Tell us what you know about this!
”

The woman's eyes darted from Persephone to Azriel and back again. Then she thrust her clasped hands at Persephone. “May the gods forgive me, I did not want to
do it!” she sobbed. “I was only a frightened child and the poor queen begged so piteously!”

“OPEN THE DOOR!”

“What did the queen beg you to do?” asked Azriel, holding Persephone so that she could not back away.

“There was so little time,” panted the woman, who'd suddenly begun to speak so rapidly that she was tripping over her own words. “The Regent had gone to fetch someone to murder and dispose of the infant, but the queen had hope. Hope that her firstborn might somehow survive to someday return and claim her inheritance. But for that to happen, the infant had to be marked in some way.” The woman's eyes widened at the memory. “So the queen slipped from her neck the golden necklace that had been a gift from her own mother and she asked me to dangle it in the heat of the fire. And when she deemed it hot enough, she had me bring it to her side, where her two babies lay nestled. And … and … may the gods forgive me, while she held your tiny arms together, I looped the necklace around and held it in place until the air was filled with the smell of your newborn flesh burning. And then the soldier with the mismatched eyes came and took you away.”

THUD, THUD, THUD.…

Ignoring the sound of something ponderous being pounded against the door, Persephone wrenched her wrist out of Azriel's grasp and grabbed the pockmarked servant by the arms. “But I don't
understand!
” she exclaimed. “Why did the Regent want to get rid of one of the babies?”

The woman smiled hollowly. “The Gypsy Seer had
promised the king a son and Mordecai had been named Regent of the unborn boy child. But the clever Seer had said nothing about a girl child—and certainly nothing of a girl child born first. Regent of the second born is Regent of
nothing
.”

Her mind reeling, Persephone asked the question she knew Azriel wanted to ask but would not. “And … and did the Seer perchance mention what any of this had to do with the coming of a great Gypsy King?”

THUD, THUD, THUD.…

Out of the corner of her eye, Persephone could see the heavy bar across the door beginning to splinter, but the pockmarked servant paid no heed. Dropping to one knee, she looked up at Persephone with a reverence bordering on awe and said, “I know nothing about what the Seer may have said about any Gypsy King, Your Highness. I know only that you are the lost royal twin and rightful heir to the Erok throne.”