Jeweled by Anya Bast Page B

them. Like a tidal wave of feeling, it crashed over her head, stole her breath, squeezed her heart. All the defenses she’d built up around her for so many years were just gone.
    Gone.
    She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so much. She was reminded of why she’d undertaken the task never to do so. Feeling . There was nothing but pain in emotion.
    “Anatol,” she whispered.
    “I see.”
    But she was sure he wished he couldn’t. Just as she did. Deafness and blindness would be welcome right now. Heads were rolling on the steps of Belai, and they were heads she and Anatol both knew. Aleksander Edaeii had gone first. He’d hung low and precariously on the Edaeii family tree, but he’d been a royal.
    They were killing the royals . The idea of it was so alien to her, so unbelievable, that she kept thinking—hoping—this was a nightmare. However, the roar and jostling of the crowd assured her it was not. The happy cries of the observers grew louder as they saw the blood getting bluer.
    Her hand flew to her mouth as they brought out the next people slated for the guillotine, and she turned her face into Anatol’s chest. Annabelle Bellama, a noble, and Sorcha J’ Edaeii, a magicked woman who was only a year older than Evangeline.
    Anatol thrust her away. “Look amused or we die. They’re already suspicious of us.”
    “Look amused?” She glanced around the reveling crush around them. Indeed, a few were casting long looks their way. Anatol looked grim and resigned, and she was sure she appeared pale and shaken. “Let’s get out of here, then.”
    He gave a pointed glance around him and raised his eyebrows. “Impossible.”
    He was right. The crowd had them pinned against the gate. They had front row seats for the show and if they left now it would only make them look more suspicious. Her knees were weak, bile burned the back of her throat. Wooziness nearly overcame her for a moment and she wished it would—anything to escape this—but Anatol held her up and she remained horrifyingly conscious.
    Her gaze fixed on the next victims being led out from the palace dungeons. Oh, Blessed Joshui, no .
    Tadui walked down the stairs followed by Borco, both flanked by peasants turned executioners. Heads held high, the men stood with hands tied behind their backs and their toes just touching the large bloodstain on the pavement made from those who’d gone before them. A wagon filled with headless bodies was parked nearby, yet neither man batted an eyelash, or showed a moment of fear. Tadui stared out into the crowd, his proud, accusatory gaze settling on individuals of his choice. The Edaeii line had more courage than she’d presumed.
    One of the big farmers muscled Borco up to the slab. Borco looked impassively over the heads of the crowd as if he were about to be served tea, not have his head severed from his neck. Evangeline was too afraid to probe with her magick and taste Borco’s emotions. She was too much of a coward. There was resignation in his eyes, however, and defeat.
    The executioner forced Borco to kneel and place the side of his face down on the cold slab. Then, almost as if the executioner were bored, as if he worked in a factory and this were only his next-in-line, a simple job, he stood and pulled the mechanism that dropped the blade.
    Evangeline jerked in Anatol’s arms at the juicy thumping sound that could be heard prior to the explosion of cheers from the crowd. She turned away at the last moment to avoid seeing the cut, then turned back.
    Borco’s head rolled across the concrete at the base of the steps.
    “Oh, Blessed Joshui,” she breathed.
    Tadui had taken a step backward. Now she saw reaction in the royal’s eyes. Tadui, such a harmless, nice man. A man who had been as close to a friend as she’d ever had in Belai, save Annetka. Oh, Tadui .
    The executioner grabbed him roughly by his bound arms and forced him down on his knees. Evangeline’s body tightened, grief clogging her