I want Rachel because the thought of a life without her is more than I can bear.

The grief recedes. It won’t help me plan. I haven’t lost Rachel. Not yet. I lean my head against the wall, careful not to rub my burned skin against the damp stone, and consider my options. Movement catches my eye, and I turn to see Melkin’s wife, Eloise, staring at me.

I don’t greet her. I don’t need to announce to anyone that I’m capable of that. But I hold her gaze, trying to assess what I see there.

Best Case Scenario: She’s an innocent caught up in all of this and means me no harm.

Worst Case Scenario 1: She means me no harm but will unwittingly gather information she’ll later deliver to the Commander under duress.

Worst Case Scenario 2: She’s cunning enough to realize she might leverage her way out of here by providing the Commander with secrets about me.

Worst Case Scenario 3: She’s his spy dressed up to look helpless and pregnant. Hoping I’ll pity her. Hoping to play on the sense of honor the Commander swears I don’t have.

The answer to every scenario is the same. Give nothing away and set in motion my plan for escape before anyone realizes I’m well enough to do so.

She’s still looking at me, but I close my eyes and turn away. It’s easy to look exhausted and sick. I don’t even have to feign it. Let her report my weakness. The fact that I can’t even stand. Let her tell them the Commander has me beaten.

By the time he realizes the truth, I’ll be gone.

“Stop him,” someone whispers, a mere breath of sound I barely catch.

I open my eyes a fraction, and she’s still watching me, her eyes pleading. Stop whom? The Commander? Melkin?

This is exactly the kind of conversation I need to avoid. I close my eyes again, and keep my silence.

“Please.”

Another breathy whisper. I tamp down on the surge of irritation that wants to snap my eyes open so I can glare her into silence. Does she think I’m so easily led that I’ll fall for this?

Does she really think I have the power at the moment to stop anyone?

“He isn’t a killer. He isn’t …” Her whisper chokes off into stillness as the dungeon door opens with a clang.

If “he” isn’t a killer, she can only be discussing Melkin. But how she thinks I’ll ever be able to reach him in time while I’m lying indisposed in a dungeon of stone is a mystery.

Not that I don’t have a plan for it, of course. But she has no way of knowing that, and her misplaced faith in me rings false.

Another sign I need to be careful what I allow her to see.

The footsteps traveling the aisle are light. They stop at the first occupied cell and a door slides open with a high-pitched squeal. A girl’s voice, light and calm, murmurs through the air, and my stomach tightens.

This must be my secret savior. The one who gave me hope that someone on the outside is interested in helping me. I need more information, but I have to hide the transaction from Eloise.

I slide down to the floor and curl into a ball with my back facing the cell door. The girl is talking to every prisoner she encounters. Seeing her talk to me will raise no alarms, while seeing me question her will give more away than I can afford.

She moves to the cell with the young man in chains, and her voice is clearer now. I listen to her offer him food and water and then quietly suggest he put the paste she’s placed in his tin of food on his abraded wrists rather than in his mouth.

She could be arrested for that alone.

I marvel at her courage, even while I tense for the appearance of a guard. No one comes, though, and she moves on to Melkin’s wife. I strain to hear their conversation and catch snippets of admonitions to eat everything in front of her and drink her water slowly. Then there’s the sound of fabric hitting the floor.

“You can’t give me your cloak,” Melkin’s wife whispers. Because apparently she is incapable of realizing the best way to punish a good deed is to announce it to everyone else. Or because she thinks turning in the girl will somehow grant her favor with the Commander.

Her mistake could simply be one of youth and ignorance, but I have precious little sympathy for either at the moment. Rachel is young too, and she’d be far too smart to make such a stupid mistake.

The door to my cell creaks open, and I’m swamped with the delicate scent of lavender a second before she drops to the floor beside me, clutching a tin water pail and a cup.

The concern on her face doesn’t falter, even as she takes in my steady, fever-free gaze. She’s tall, thin in a lithe, graceful way, and the torchlight flickers beautifully against her dusky skin. The cloud of dark hair hanging down her back throws off the lavender scent every time she moves.

She seems familiar, and I try to recall where I’ve seen her before. One of the stalls in Lower Market? A merchant’s place in North Hub? Neither of those locations fit.

She scoops a cup of water out of the pail and leans toward me.

“Day?” I mouth silently before accepting a few swallows. The water is tepid and tastes of tin. It’s the most refreshing drink I’ve ever had.

She frowns as if I’ve spilled the water out my mouth and fishes around in her skirt pocket for a scrap of cloth. Bending down, she pretends to mop my face with the cloth and keeps her face level with mine, her hair obscuring her features from anyone outside my cell.

“Tuesday.” She says, and presses a small, paper-wrapped packet into my hand. “For the pain.”

Tuesday. The Claiming ceremony was Saturday. I’ve lost three days.