"Well, if he told anyone, he had good reason, Repentance Atwater. You can be sure of that. He's a good man. You ought to be ashamed, thinking so poorly of him. And him being so in love with you. What a waste and a pity that is."
Repentance felt her heart give a little tumble. "He's not in love with me."
"Most any fool would see it." Generosity gave her a stern look. "But maybe you're more fool than most."
Repentance ducked her head under the water to drown out Generosity's scolding. Sober couldn't be in love with her and betray her as he had. She had thought that maybe ... she had hoped he might …. But it was becoming apparent that he had been using her. He was either paying her back for refusing to button with him, or he was involved in some plot against the king.
After bathing, she was too wound up for sleep, and she was in no mood to face the crowd playing games in the kitchen, so she pulled on her robe and headed down the yak barn for a word with Bramble. Coming back she looked up at the starry sky and breathed deeply of the cold mountain air. She wrapped her lavacloth shawl tighter and spun around, gazing at millions of brilliant red and green and blue twinkles, lavishly sown across the sky by the hand of Providence.
And she felt a sudden anger well up.
Providence withheld so much beauty from the lowborns in Hot Springs. They were not worthy to look on the stars or the clear, blue sky, apparently.
And he seemed to delight in knocking her down. Every time she had her hopes raised, he would dash them. She dared try to escape the village and fight back against the overlords and Providence had sent her back to the swamp. She dared to hope that the king would help her save her sister and Providence had allowed the prince to make the king hate her. She dared to hope that Sober might be a true friend, and ... Sober believed in Providence. He was doing Providence's bidding, no doubt, when he told the king's enemies what Repentance had said.
A light bobbing up the lane caught her attention. A yak-drawn coach approached and finally disappeared from view as it followed the curving lane toward the front steps of the palace.
She hurried toward the palace, afraid to be out alone in the dark.
Provocation was coming out of the washroom as Repentance approached. "And where have you been?" the older woman demanded.
"I was catching a breath of fresh air."
"Fresh air, my elbow. You were sneaking around. I don't know what kind of scheme you have going, but I aim to discover it. Why is it that Madame Cawrocc won't buy you back?"
Repentance shrugged. The prince had probably paid her to refuse.
"And now you're taken off the fifth-floor suncloths and put on kitchen duty until after the Moonlight Festival. Why does Providence reward you?"
"I'd forgotten about the Moonlight Festival. When is it?"
"Little that matters to you. You'll not be going."
"Little that matters to me. I didn't even want to go."
"Then each one is happy, and the mountain stands strong," A satisfied look crossed Provocation's normally sour face. "The other servants will sit at the slave tables, but the king gave me specific instructions that you are not to attend. It seems he's afraid he'll kill you if he has to lay eyes on you." She sniffed. "I'm not able to guess what hold you have on him, that he takes such pains to protect you from himself."
Repentance held up her chapped, bleeding hands. "I think you may be confusing the word protect with the word punish."
But the next day she had to admit that she was being protected.
At breakfast Favor told her the prince had returned to the palace the previous night. So the day he got back she was assigned to kitchen duty, instead of being stuck working all alone on the fifth floor. The prince may have been off protecting her from Cawrocc, but Providence, it seemed, was protecting her from the prince.
That day she cut up vegetables and scoured pots and pans.
Cook, bustling and bossing, made it clear that no one was to touch her stove. She would only allow Merit and Repentance, and Generosity who was also on loan to the kitchen, to fill pie shells, pluck and clean birds, and engage in other such activities "what took no skill and little grace," as she liked to say.
To that end she sent Repentance to the yak barn on a mission that took no skill. "Take these left-over taters down to the boys," she said, handing a bowl to Repentance. "They never seem to get enough food, those three."
"Hello to you, Repentance," Shamed said when she entered the barn.
She stood, letting her eyes adjust to the gloom. Finally she saw him, looking over the door of the stall he'd been mucking out. He leaned on his pitchfork.
"Bringing sweets to Bramble, then?" he asked.
Repentance gave him a distracted smile. She liked this boy with his open face and quick smile. "I'm afraid I have nothing for the yaks today. But Cook sent you a bowl full of garlic potatoes."
"Here, then," he said, reaching into his pocket. "You can't very well go see your lover empty-handed. He'd be crushed."
Her heart gave a quick tumble, and she had to keep herself from looking around for Sober. He was talking about Bramble, she knew that. But that word ... lover ... it brought Sober immediately to mind.
Shamed held out a pickle.
Her cheeks flamed. It was Generosity's fault. All that nonsense about Sober loving her.
She traded her bowl
