Chapter 6

The prison gates closed behind me, and three locks slid into place one after another.

Edmund arranged everything in front of me with Warden Samuel Briggs: a private cell, clean bedding, daily bandage changes, nothing to be skipped. Helena sent two large crates containing food, blankets, medicine, and the navy blue wedding gown. Adrian handed the brooch he had given me on his sixteenth birthday to the guard and said I should wear it on the wedding day.

Helena gripped the iron bars and would not let go. "Just two nights. You survived the workhouse as a child. This can't be worse than that. Once you reach Northsea, I'll visit often."

She did not know that the workhouse was not some misfortune that fell from the sky. Edmund had chosen that path himself. And she did not know that years later, they had put me in another cage.

But my first meal inside was a bowl of cold water and half a piece of moldy black bread.

Nell Carter, one of the guards, told me Edmund had washed his hands of me, that Helena had never visited once, and that the Duke of Northsea had canceled the betrothal after learning I was an arsonist. She dragged me from the private cell and shoved me into a crowded communal cell.

The first night, someone stole my bread and poured cold water over me. The next morning, they ripped my dress open and beat me, targeting the old wounds on my shoulder and forehead. Nell stood outside the door and watched. She only intervened when I fought back, logging it as "prisoner initiated an assault," and had me transferred to the underground punishment cell.

One of them pulled my hair and said, "Your sister told us that if you can't wear the wedding gown, each of us gets another silver coin."

They stomped on my hem, pried open my scabbed-over fingers, and tried to force me to confess that I had set the fire out of jealousy. When I refused, they pushed my face into cold water. Every time they pulled me up, I could see Nell clutching the money Lydia had sent.

I found out later that Lydia had not just paid them off. She had given them a full report: where I was hurt, what I feared most.

The punishment cell had no windows. The floor was always damp. The sound of the lock falling echoed back and forth in the dark. I lay on the floor like a dead fish, struggling just to breathe.

At dusk the door opened. It was not a guard who walked in. It was Lydia.

She was wearing my navy blue coat, Adrian's brooch pinned to the collar, and carrying the food basket Helena had prepared. She crouched outside the iron bars, rested her chin in her hand, and smiled. "Evelyn, you look pathetic in there."

The basket held hot meat broth, white bread, medicine, and pastries Helena had baked herself. My stomach twisted at the smell.

Lydia scooped up a spoonful of broth and blew on it slowly. "Want some?"

I did not answer. She held the spoon out to me. The moment I reached for it, she poured the broth into the dirty water on the floor.

"They really do send things every day." She held up the blanket, the wedding gown, and the medicine, one by one. "But you won't get any of it. I've had the guards log you as refusing food and refusing treatment. When you die, everyone will think you gave up on your own."

"The wedding and Adrian are both yours. Why are you so determined to kill me?"

"Because you're still alive." She tilted her head. "As long as you're breathing, the Duke of Northsea might still insist on marrying you. Adrian might start thinking about you again. And every time Mother looks at you, she'll remember she has another daughter. That's too inconvenient."

"Do our parents know what you've done with the guards?"

"They don't. But they'll cover for me." She smiled. "Have you forgotten? Our whole lives, whenever I caused trouble, weren't you always the first to give way? The boiler room, the frozen river, Adrian, even this fire. Someone already wrote the confession for me. They handed you over to me themselves."

She stood, unclipped the brooch, and dangled it in front of me. "On the wedding day, the guards will force a dose of medicine down your throat. You'll die, and they'll put it down to jail fever. Mother will think she arrived one step too late. No one will suspect me."

The door closed again. I had no strength left for anger. Time crawled by. I lay there with nothing I could do, just waiting for people who would never come to save me.