Read The Hidden Queen for Free Online Page A

information he wanted. He could not let her die before he got it out of her. Deira stumbled against the bed, making no effort to wipe her tears; Rima’s eyes opened again. Deira gasped at the sight, her hands, one still holding the document, flying to her mouth.
    “Ask!” said Sif violently. “The original! The princess!”
    Rima whispered something, very low. Deira’s breath hissed out again as Sif tightened his fingers on her arm; she bent over her to listen, and then, sobbing, murmured the questions Sif had put. Rima was silent then, for so long that Sif already tasted defeat, but then her lips, almost bloodless now, opened again. Sif almost pushed Deira into Rima’s face. The queen’s voice rustled faintly, like the sound of wind in dying leaves, and then she was simply…gone. Fodrun could see the instant of her going, her breath stopping, her head lolling sideways, lifeless. Her eyes had stayed open, though, and if Fodrun had been called upon to interpret the expression that remained on her face he would have had to call it triumph. The thought gave him an odd shiver of apprehension. What was it she thought she’d won?
    “She said,” Deira said slowly, without being prompted, although Sif’s fingers were possibly prompt enough, “the original is with Princess Anghara.”
    “And where,” said Sif, who couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of his voice, “is the princess?”
    Deira looked up, her eyes clear and very candid. “She does not know, and she is speaking the truth. There is no memory of Princess Anghara in her mind, after the crowning.”
    Fodrun felt the temperature in the room drop. Sif took his fingers from the woman’s arm as though she were unclean. “Crowning?” he echoed, and his voice was glacial.
    “The council crowned her, and swore allegiance,” said Deira, recounting the memory she had just read. Fodrun watched Sif’s face change. Even if he had wanted to spare Anghara it was now too late. There was no room for two crowned sovereigns in Roisinan, and Sif had already staked everything on the gamble he had taken to win the crown for himself. Rima’s plan had doomed her daughter; if Sif’s searchers found the child-queen, she was dead.
    “Who knew of this?” Sif asked, his voice flat.
    “The council lords, who were there. And the queen’s guard,” said Deira.
    “None else?”
    “I did not know until this moment,” said Deira, suddenly gathering the tattered rags of dignity befitting a lady of the royal chamber, “and I was Princess Anghara’s own attendant.”
    “Go,” Sif said abruptly. “Leave us. Guard!”
    “Lord?”
    “Get the woman out of here.”
    Deira went with alacrity, stealing a tender look at the woman whose last memories she had stolen for Miranei’s new lord.
    One of Sif’s captains returned at this point to report no trace of Anghara Kir Hama could be found in the keep, living or dead.
    “Could she have spirited her away under my very nose? Where would she have sent her?” Sif said, speaking only partly to Fodrun, demanding answers from himself.
    “I could make enquiries, lord. Even in the chaos…someone might have noticed something,” Fodrun volunteered. Sif gave him a swift glance from beneath lowered eyelids.
    “Yes. Do so. But if…when…we run her to ground, it will be for me alone to know. As far as anyone else is concerned, she is dead, Fodrun. Anghara Kir Hama is dead, and will be buried with her mother. They cannot crown a dead queen; this way, even the damned document…where is that parchment, Fodrun?”
    Fodrun’s eyes widened. “The woman…the woman had it…you gave it into her hand…”
    Sif was already at the door. “Domar!” he called, and the man who had reported not finding the princess stood to attention. “The woman who was just here. She has in her possession a document. I want it back. Find her.”
    “Yes, lord!”
    Leaning against the doorway of Rima’s room, Sif laughed joylessly, his head bent, seeming to study