The other girls slow their movements, listening. “I’m serving Ina Gold this morning,” I say, though the words don’t seem to come from me at all. Bea brings her hands together in a small, joyful movement, but I don’t think I imagine the way the others’ eyes widen, how they suddenly busy themselves with making beds that have already been made.

As soon as I reach the kitchen to tell Lora—before I can even speak—she takes me by the elbow and ushers me into the corner. She looks harried, her face flushed and hair frizzing out from beneath her kerchief.

“Jules,” she says. Her voice is tense. “You have to come with me, dear.”

“But, Lora—” My voice comes out childish. I wince. “Lord Roan has invited me to serve him and the Queen’s ward breakfast.” Lora steps back and takes me in, my elbow still in her hand. “Lord Roan—”

“Well, Lord Liam has a different job for you this morning. You’ll need to take it up with him.”

I bite the inside of my cheek, hard. I would never. He’s the eldest and he’s—well—

Terrible.

Warily, I follow her to the entrance to the food cellars.

I stop at the doorway, stiffening at the wet, heady scent of dirt, vegetables, and iron. The last time I went down here was the day I discovered Papa’s crumpled form amid sacks of turnips and potatoes. Was it six days ago? Seven? Lora takes my arm and gently but firmly tugs me along with her down the stairs.

“You’re on mava duty today,” she says, avoiding my eyes. “The dye stores are running low.”

“What?” For a second, my instinctive horror at the cellar is swallowed up in a rush of anger. The Everless’s stores of mava are kept down here, far away from the kitchen, so that the fruit’s sickly sweet odor—like honey and copper, or wine gone off—won’t distract us in the kitchen. To make the dye, someone has to pick through the leathery skin and extract the noxious, abrasive insides with their hands, leaving stains and scars. I’ve seen the unfortunate victims stumble up from the cellar on occasion, swaying from the dizzying scent.

But that’s not why everyone fears it. The pods have been known to harbor tiny, poisonous scorpions, travelers from the southern deserts where mava is grown. Though the stowaways are rare, I remember attending, as a child, the funeral of a cook who died after a single sting.

Shelling mava is a punishment, just short of getting your time bled.

And on top of everything, piling onto me like rocks, I now know how the beautiful color is used—as a mark of death upon people who dare to access the vault. People like Papa.

“W-what have I done?” I sputter indignantly.

But of course, I know. I crossed Liam Gerling.

Lora sighs. “It’s not my orders, Jules. This comes directly from Lord Liam.”

“Liam.” The word escapes my mouth like venom, at the same time as fear stabs through me—he remembers my name, my face. He must, to have picked me specifically for this task. A wild thought flies through me: Could he have known about Papa’s coming to Everless? Papa’s hands were stained trying to access the vault. The vault in Liam’s care.

Lora nods, interrupting my thoughts. “I don’t know how you attracted his notice, but just be thankful he didn’t take a day. Though there’s not much difference—you’ll be down there quite a long time.”

So this is my punishment for my curiosity. I clench my fists, my nails digging into my palms, as I try to push down the rage and fear. I thought I had nothing left to be afraid of, now that Papa is dead. But if Liam knows me—if he goes out of his way to torment me—how can I ever be safe at Everless?

And how will I ever get closer to the Queen?

As we walk down into darkness, another thought: Roan knows I’m at Everless, too. The memory of our meeting in the hall, his closeness, is a talisman. I cling to it. More than you know.

These thoughts dissolve as Lora leads me into the cellar. When she opens the narrow door at the end of the hall, I nearly faint at the pile of mava in the dark room—thousands of purple-black pods the size of chicken hearts are heaped against the wall, reaching to the ceiling, some splitting to spill their gleaming pulp down the pile. The smell is a physical thing, a wall of sickly sweet air with a tang of something bitter beneath, like wine and vinegar.

The motion of the door opening causes a few of the ugly, leathery fruits to roll down the pile. One comes to a stop at our feet. I resist the urge to grind it with my boot. Lora coughs beside me, obviously affected.

“Come up if you start to feel dizzy,” she says, after a moment of regarding the pile. “I’m sorry, my dear.” But she closes the door behind her, leaving me with just a single flickering torch.

Once stripped of its protective shell, mava has to be kept in the cold, so the cellar is freezing—my teeth are chattering, my feet numb through my boots from the cold stone floor. Each fruit has a skin as tough as leather, which I have to tear apart without doing too much damage to the pulp within. After five, my fingertips are bleeding.

At first, I think I’m getting used to the smell; but as the buckets Lora has provided me with slowly fill up with fruit, it overpowers me again. My nails snag and tear on the skins. Juice stains my hands the color of wine. Liam couldn’t have devised a more perfect torture for me. Every time I look down, I’m reminded of my loss and my guilt. It occurs to me that I could go back to the vault—try it while my hands are already stained—but if what Liam said was true, it could take any amount of my time. Drink up fifty years in a moment and leave me fainting on the floor. Or dead.

Weighing the risk, I return to the kitchen to take up the buckets of shelled mava and for a meal. Lora doesn’t allow me to linger in the warmth, instead sending me back downstairs with a hard roll and pad of butter, her mouth set in a harsh line. I know she’s holding in her mind the stories of Tam, of Hinton’s father, everyone who crosses the Gerlings. My mood blackens.

At some point there’s a knock on the door. I look up to see Lora, wringing her hands. The look of worry on her face strikes fear into me.

“Lord Gerling is coming down to speak with you. Make yourself presentable, quickly.” She disappears.

Fear is replaced by hope in quick succession. The events of my encounter with Roan in the servants’ hallway—the nearness of him, the heat of him—return to me. Maybe he’s heard what happened and has come to fix it.

I wipe my forehead with my sleeve, careful not to smear my face in wine-dark stains, and am cleaning my hands on my apron as best I can when another knock sounds.

The door opens, and my stomach drops. It isn’t Roan who stands in the doorway—not with the pulled-back hair, the stiff, awkward posture. It’s Liam.

His eyes narrow as they take in the towering pile of fruit, me with my stained apron and hands. Anger and disappointment rush through me like a tide, and a dozen curses spring to the tip of my tongue. I glare at him as if the force of my hatred alone might send him away.

He steps inside, leaving the door open behind him. He’s wearing a long coat against the chill of the cellar, his hands jammed awkwardly into its pockets.

“Lord Gerling,” I say between gritted teeth. He’s only two strides from me.