“What makes you think I don’t?” Rebecca said, her voice rising. “I was in Southbridge Guardhouse, remember? I saw how you’d been beaten. I saw what happened to your friends. But you can’t think the queen had any—”

Han plowed right over her words. “The queen has had everything to do with every bad thing that’s happened to me in the past year.”

Raisa sat frozen, her green eyes fixed on his face, speechless for once.

Why are you telling her this, Alister? Han thought. Just shut it. Not the way to follow up on flowers. But he opened his mouth and the story came pouring out.

“Me and my mam and little sister lived over a stable in Ragmarket,” he said. “My mam did washing for the queen until she was dismissed for ruining one of her dresses. I’d given up thieving, so we had no money at all. That was the start of it.”

Rebecca leaned forward, lacing her fingers together. “I never realized that your mother worked for the queen,” she said. “Perhaps…perhaps there’s a way to get her reinstated. I…know some people and…”

Han shook his head. “Don’t try and fix this. It’s not fixable. Just listen. The queen’s responsible for public works, right? For the water supply and like that. Well, the wells went bad in Ragmarket, and my sister, Mari, caught the fever. While I was out trying to get the money to buy some medicine for her, the bluejackets came looking for me, thinking I was the one hushed the Southies that died. When they didn’t find me, they set fire to the stable with Mam and Mari inside.”

“What?” Rebecca whispered, her face now gone ashen.

“They burnt to death, Rebecca,” Han said, his voice low and fierce. “And the bluejackets did it, on the queen’s orders. Mari was seven years old.”

She stared at him, shaking her head. “Oh, no,” she whispered. “No. That can’t be true.” Her mouth formed the word no even when no sound came out.

“You said the queen’s in charge.” Han knew he should stop, but he’d had this stuffed up in his heart so long that it was like the floodgates had opened. “After that, somebody came back and murdered the Raggers and the Southies. Some of them were lytlings, too. The ones you saved from Southbridge Guardhouse—they’re all dead.”

Tears pooled in Rebecca’s eyes. “So…Sarie and Velvet and Flinn are…”

“All dead, far as I know,” Han said. “Cat’s the only one that escaped.”

“It was all just a waste?” Rebecca’s voice wavered. “Why didn’t you tell me? About your family and…and everything?”

“You never asked,” Han said. “People die in Ragmarket and Southbridge every day. They don’t count in the blueblood world. It’s just one more sad story.”

“But…we’re not all like that,” she said, her lower lip trembling.

“’Course not.” He snorted. “Her bloody Highness the princess heir tosses her pin money our way and we’re supposed to get down on our knees and thank her.”