“So, how do you know what kind of Mark it is?”
“Because it wraps your torso from your heart to your hip—it’s the only Mark of its kind. And the question is, Ara—” He propped one foot on the seat of the chair, resting his arm over his knee. “What have you done?”
“I don’t know.” I leaned my butt on the tabletop. “I was hoping maybe if I could figure out what kinds of things would give me this Mark, then maybe I could—”
“Ara, what ever it is you’ve done, to be Marked with that symbol, it has to have been something pretty spectacular.” He dropped his foot to the floor, standing tall again. “That’s one of the Four Detriments.”
“The what now?”
“There are four things a queen can do that ultimately betray her crown, her people or herself. You don’t need to figure out so much what it is you did, but perhaps whom you did it to. And there should be a symbol somewhere in that mess of a rash all over you that reveals it.”
“Well, which one.” I lifted my top and poked at the black line.
“I don’t know.” He put my top down for me. “And stop doing that. If anyone walks past, they’ll think we’re being inappropriate.”
“Oh. Sorry, Falcon. That wasn’t my intention.”
“I know. Just. . .” His eyes drifted away from me. “Just be more careful.”
“Sorry.”
“Stop saying sorry.” He pulled the chair out and sat down, offering me my seat again. “How long have you had the Mark, Ara?”
“It started as a red rash after I fell off the lighthouse, and it’s just been changing since then.”
“The lighthouse?”
“Yes.”
“Did you jump?” he asked, and silence befell the room.
“I—” My mouth opened, but I was so shocked by the question I struggled to form an answer. “No way. I’d never do something like that.”
“Are you sure? Maybe you were so depressed about David being away that you—”
“No! Falcon, that’s ludicrous.” I jumped up and walked over to the sink. “It would take a lot more than that to make me want to die.”
“Bingo.” He appeared beside me. “Then, what did you do before you ended up on the lighthouse that night?”
My immediate reaction was to protest. But I stopped. What if something really bad had happened, and I did actually jump? I mean, David was there that night. What if he and I had an argument—what if he told me the truth about going to his death, and that’s why I jumped, knowing I didn’t want to live without him? It would make sense. It would explain why he was so hell-bent on keeping the truth from me. Or maybe it wasn’t that at all. Maybe, just like my gut had been trying to tell me, it had something to do with Jason. “I can’t think of anything that would be bad enough to make me want to die, can you?”
“Damned if I know, Ara.” He shrugged, stepping away. “Unfortunately, there are no books I can study that get inside your head.”
“But someone can.” A suggestive grin teased my lips. “Someone can get in my head and go back to that night—see what happened.”
He settled back on his heels. “Jason.”
“Yes. Maybe I could ask him to, I dunno, hypnotise me and take me back on a past-month regression?”
“Bad idea, Ara.”
“Why?”
“Because, A: he’s not allowed near you, especially when the king is absent. And, B: until we know exactly what happened and whether or not you did, in fact, jump, every person in this manor is guilty until proven innocent. Including David,” he added.
“Why David? He’d never hurt me.”
“I don’t know that. And neither do you, really. He’s pretty vial, Ara, especially when it comes to the law. For all we know, he pushed you off the lighthouse.”
“Why would he push me?”
“Who knows? All I know is that he was out there that night, and it’s a pretty convenient story that he just happened to return here to “talk” with you.”
“Yeah, but—”
“But nothing. It’s my job to protect you, Your Majesty, even if that means from the king.”
“That’s exactly why I should go to Jason, and—”
“And how do you know it wasn’t him?” He let that hang for a second. “He was the last one to see you that night, Ara. Not to mention, your memory is gone. How do we know he didn’t erase it?”
I rubbed my head. “So we tell no one?”
“Look, let me take a good look at the book of Marks, and another good look at your body—in private.” He looked around as if someone might have heard him say that. “And if we can’t come up with an answer, then we’ll discuss further investigation, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Right. And just until we’ve figured this out, I want guards on you at night.”
I took a deep breath and let it out. “Okay. If that eases your mind.”
“It will.” He nodded once.
“And, thank you, Falcon—for helping me out with this.” I motioned to my Mark.
“It’s always my pleasure, Majesty, and I know I don’t need to say it, but . . . you can trust this information will go no further than me.”
“Not to Mike?”
He held back a small laugh. “Especially not to Mike.”
Chapter Eight
“You wanted to see me?” I said, popping my head around Jason’s door.
“Yeah, come in.” His arm rose in a wave from his huddle over the spread of papers in front of him.
I stopped a second to look back at Falcon. “Coming, Fal?”
“It’s okay.” He gave a small nod of approval. “I can hear everything from out here.”
I flashed him a grin and closed Jason’s door behind me, shutting us into his room, alone. “What’s up, Jase?”
“I know why the stone melted. But that wasn’t why I asked you here.” He leaned his butt against the table and folded his arms. “You were thinking about something at breakfast.”
“I’m always thinking about something.”
“Yes, but this thought involved me.”
“Okay.” I wondered over and sat on the blanket box at the foot of his bed. “What thought was it?”
“You have something you want me to translate into English.”