Free Elevation of the Marked (The Marked Series Book 2) by March McCarron Page A

When the water came to a boil, she carried the unfortunate fowl—once again by its leg, its wings lolling like doll arms—to the hearth. Even headless and defeathered, it evinced a certain ruffled indignation at being thusly handled.  
    Arlow hopped from his stool. “Wait.” She turned to him with a raised brow. “You aren’t boiling that chicken whole?”
    She shrugged. “Sure am. Why?”
    Arlow swallowed down a laugh. “Great Spirits, woman! Don’t you know how to cook? Give it here.”  
    She permitted Arlow to assume the culinary reins. As he chopped potatoes, he sensed her approach close behind and, unexpectedly, tensed in anticipation. Unfounded anticipation, clearly, as she merely tied the apron around his waist—a pink, frilly thing. “There,” she said with a laugh, then hopped up onto the counter beside him.  
    She clenched the wine bottle between her thighs as she wrested the cork out with a delightful pop . Arlow cleared his throat. Must really be missing the company of women if that was alluring .  
    “Watch where you’re chopping,” she said, as Arlow nearly divested himself of a pinky finger. “This Quade fellah might not look kindly on us returnin’ his emissary short a digit.”  
    Arlow focused again on the food, taking familiar pleasure in the task—in the feelings and smells.
    Mae handed him a serving of wine in a chipped mug. “So, how’d a rich boy like you learn cooking?”  
    “Don’t spread the rumor. I might die of shame if it were known I had a real skill.” He slid the roasting pan into the coals. “I had a fondness for our cook as a boy. I used to spend half the day in the kitchens if I could.”
    “Pretty, was she?”  
    Arlow smiled. “Stunning, really. She had huge, ” he held up his hands to indicate the size of her bosom, “brown eyes.”  
    Mae snorted and gulped her wine. The smell of the chicken and vegetables roasting in the hearth began to fill the lodge; Arlow’s mouth salivated.  
    “So, is your brother traveling with the Pauper’s King? I presume he’s meeting me here.”
    She shook her head at him as if he were slow-witted. “My brother is the Pauper’s King.”  
    “Oh?”  
    This information traveled sluggishly through his mind. She seemed too young, at the oldest a year or two his senior—there must be a wide age gap between the siblings. Though, studying her, he detected a resemblance in her features to the face on the ubiquitous wanted posters. They had the same strong jawline. It looked better on a man.
    “Does that make you the Pauper’s Princess, then?”
    “You best not be mocking my brother.”
    “Certainly not, I only—”
    “Cause he’s the reason a lot of folks have food on their table. He takes in all sorts. What do you think would’ve come of me, a girl raised on the streets of Accord, without my brother?” She crossed her arms and glared at him.
    He thought she’d likely have become a prostitute, but it seemed an indecorous thing to say. “My apologies, I meant no offense. I have a high opinion of what your brother does for the country. In fact, it’s been a goal of mine for a long time to see how we could better integrate his practices within the law—without stealing.”  
    Her cheeks grew pink. “It ain’t stealing to take something from a person who don’t need it.”
    “In point of fact,” Arlow said, “that is stealing. Who ever heard such a backwards definition? What, belongings are determined by need? Ludicrous!”  
    She sprung down from the counter. “So a poor child should go hungry so some richie can keep his baubles? That’s not backwards? We don’t take nothing nobody’ll really miss anyhow.”
    “That is demonstrably untrue,” Arlow said, his eyes flashing. “ I was waylaid by your brother’s men as a boy. Those brutes took everything—including my grandfather’s watch, the only heirloom I had from a man who meant a great deal to me. Or do you assume that the rich are without