How to Poison Your Husband [COMPLETE! Cozy Romantasy With A Dash Of Murder]

Step 11a: Lean on your friends...

Mariel was definitely judging them when they trudged into the castle dungeon in chains, surrounded by a platoon of guards. "Back so soon?" she asked snidely.

"Shut up," said Lillian.

She had been apprehended around the same time as Ivelle and Ascoria, and — judging by her narrowed eyes and the disdainful thinning of her lips — she seemed rather bitter about it.

But her bitterness was nothing compared to Ascoria's. Despite the arrow in her leg, Ivelle's mum radiated contempt. The guards seemed reluctant to approach her — which was understandable, as she had exploded several of them on the pier — and it was only when the Captain of the Guard snarled at the nearest men to cease dawdling that a few brave souls edged forward to snap some magic-dampening manacles around her wrists.

The guards escorted Ascoria into a cell and secured her door with a massive padlock. They then set about trying to find separate cells for Ivelle and Lillian. This proved more challenging than expected. Ascoria's rescue attempts had not been kind to the castle prison, and few cells remained that didn't have structural damage. After two doors disintegrated on contact and a third proved impossible to open, the guards gave up and shoved Lillian and Ivelle into the same cell as Ascoria.

"You think you're so clever, but mark my words!" The Captain of the Guard glowered down at them, wisps of spittle frothing from the corners of his mouth. "The next time I have to drag your miserable bodies back to this dungeon, it'll be in pieces! Do you hear me? I will put these keys in the care of Queen Ysette, if I must!"

"Are you all right, mum?" Ivelle exclaimed, the moment he was gone. "Your leg—"

She knelt over her mum's wounded calf, sucking in air and trying to stop her hands from shaking. Her heart had been pounding since the arrow had struck her mum's flesh.

She knew it was irrational. A small injury like a leg wound had never stopped Ascoria before. But the sight of the arrow protruding from her mother's leg had dredged up a bevy of other, less savory memories.

An arrow thudding into Ascoria's chest, meters away from Lord Saffron's treasury. Lord Saffron's laughter, cruel and cold. Her mum's mouth opening in shock — her body tumbling backward — her eyes shifting from glassy to cloudy to dead...

It had been the worst day of her life.

Even if it had all been a lie.

A hand came to rest on her shoulder. Dimly, Ivelle realized she was swaying, her eyes fixed on the arrow in Ascoria's leg. She tore her gaze away — to find Ascoria watching her shrewdly.

"I'm just fine, Ivelle. Don't lose your head."

"I'm—" Ivelle ran a shaking hand through her hair, gulping air. "It's my fault — if not for me, you wouldn't be—"

"Deep breaths," Lillian guided her into a sitting position. "Put your head between your knees. If it's any reassurance, we're all going to die eventually. Someday all life on Earth will be annihilated when our world gets subsumed by the sun. Next to that, what is a leg wound, really?"

From the next cell over, Mariel gave a loud snort. "That has got to be the worst attempt at reassurance I've ever heard."

"When I want your opinion," Lilian said sweetly, "I'll give it to you."

Ivelle shook her head. "Mariel's right. Don't ever become a therapist."

But she took Lillian's advice. She sat in the corner of the cell until her breathing slowed and her heart rate returned to normal levels. Perhaps she was still a little anemic from her shoulder wound. The potion had patched her up nicely, but a brew that tasted like weeks-old vomit could only do so much.