I Gave Water to the Villainess Who Would Die Tomorrow

When I first opened my eyes, I thought someone was dragging a lump of iron back and forth beside my head. A scraping sound raked at my ears again and again, a damp smell stabbed up into my nose, and the moment I tried to sit, my forehead struck solid wood. A curse tore out of me. Still half-asleep, I reached out on instinct, but neither the familiar nightstand beside my bed nor the phone I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠had left on its charger came to hand. What slid under my palm was a coarse wool blanket, and across the back of my hand lay a small scar I did not know.

It was not a bed. It was a narrow wooden platform shoved against the wall. I was lying on it in a gray uniform, a ring of six keys—each a different size—hanging at my waist. The last thing I remembered was reading a novel at home and switching the screen off. I had not been drinking. I had not made plans with anyone. Yet before me was a windowless room, a guttering oil lamp, and a flight of stone steps leading out beyond the door.

"Evan! You alive in there?"

The door opened, and a brown-haired young man stuck his head in. I recoiled before I could answer and slammed my back into the wall. He raised an eyebrow. The face was a stranger's. I was certain I had never seen him before, and yet the name came anyway. Thomas Reed. Two years younger than me, and the moment last month's wages touched his hand, the first thing he had bought was a pair of winter boots for his younger sibling. The instant I wondered how I knew that, other memories crashed in all at once—the back of a hand struck for a late ration delivery, the shift log turned in at the top of the stairs, the section you were never, under any circumstances, to descend into alone on night patrol. My head throbbed. I shut my eyes.

"Still dizzy? You made quite a racket when you fell yesterday. The medic said if you're still off today, come back in."

"Where is this?"

I regretted it the moment the words left me. The young man's expression changed. Pressing a hand to my forehead, I clung to the story of the fall. If I had struck my head, even a question like that might be excused. If I had not, there was no way to explain it.

"I can't even remember yesterday properly. Just—give me a second. Tell me slowly."

"Mort. The Imperial Underground Prison Mort. The place you've been working for two years."

The name Mort dropped straight through me. The most notorious prison in the Arcane Empire—a place where noble and mage alike were said to break, mind and body, before they ever reached trial. It was a name from the novel I had been reading the night before. Thomas said something more, but I barely heard it. I looked down at the worn metal badge on my chest. Small letters were engraved there. Evan Locke. They ought to have been characters I could not read, and yet the meaning came to me of its own accord.

Kang Jihan was twenty-eight. He had lived all twenty-eight of those years under that name. And yet the two years a man called Evan had spent after walking into Mort remained in my head as well. I knew which of the keys in my hand opened the guards' break room, and I knew that Thomas touched his right ear whenever he lied. I could not tell whether I had become him, or become someone else who merely carried his memories. Honestly, I was afraid. I thought that if I closed my eyes and opened them again I might be home, so I tried it. Thomas was still standing in the doorway.

"Think you can work? You've got four ration runs in the West Section today."

I started to say I couldn't, then shut my mouth. Ration duty, at least, seemed like something I could manage. More than that, the thought of being left alone frightened me worse. That fear came before any calculation about keeping Thomas from noticing.

"If I keel over in the corridor again, catch me, will you?"

"Which is why I told you not to drink last night."

Thomas scolded me with the ease of long habit, left the door standing open, and went out. Only after he turned away did I let out a long breath. Evan had been drinking, and he had fallen on the stairs. After that, I woke. What had happened in between, I had no way of knowing. I pulled on the boots stowed beneath the platform and stood. My right heel was blistered raw. Strangely, the sense that this was someone else's body went thin before that pain. If it hurt, then it was my foot. For now, that was the only way I could let myself think of it.

Besides Thomas, two other guards stood in the corridor. The pot-bellied one, a middle-aged man, ran his eyes over my face and jerked his chin at the ration cart. I reached into Evan's memories for a name and came up empty. What rose first instead was the instinct to keep my words few in front of this man. I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠took hold of the cart's handles. Six bowls of cooling barley porridge, scraps of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠bread, and a single water jug sitting on the floor. I lifted the jug to set it on the cart, and the middle-aged guard struck my wrist.

"Leave the water."

"Isn't it part of the ration, sir?"

"Cell No. 1 gets no water today. The other cells get theirs put in separately this afternoon."

I set the jug down. While I was still deciding whether it was wise to ask why, he tapped a finger against a paper pinned to the wall. An execution schedule, stamped with a red seal. A single name was written beneath it.

The novel I had been reading was A Crown Dedicated to the Saintess. A story in which the Crown Prince and the Saintess chose each other, and everyone who stood in their way fell, one after another. Servia had been the Crown Prince's fiancée—the villainess who tried to poison the Saintess and failed. Even after the engagement was annulled she would not admit her guilt, was thrown into prison, and in the end was executed. Readers had found that scene grimly satisfying. I had not lingered on the passage long myself.

The date written on the schedule was tomorrow.

In the original, she had cursed the Crown Prince by name until the moment before she died. That was how I remembered it. The exact lines would not come, but the scene remained: the Crown Prince shielding the Saintess, the screaming woman left behind them. That woman was at the end of this corridor now. I could not take my eyes off the paper. The middle-aged guard shoved my shoulder.

"Don't stand there gaping. Move. Tomorrow's going to be busy, so today all you do is feed her and keep quiet."

"May I ask the reason for cutting off the water as well, sir?"

The question left me faster than I had expected. The man's face hardened. I was startled too. I had not meant to pick a quarrel on my first day. But the words were already out, and a forced smile would only look more suspicious. I lowered my voice and added to it.

"If she collapses from dehydration, we'll have to call the medic and rewrite the log. I was told the paperwork already backed up because I fell yesterday."

He clicked his tongue as if the whole matter were a nuisance, then glanced once toward the door of the western cells.

"The Confession Statement's still blank. If she means to hold out until tomorrow, let her hold out. Sign the document and they'll give her water and a change of blanket, they say—but my, the lady's stubbornness is something else."

I did not ask why a confession was still required when the guilty verdict was already sealed. This man had no intention of entertaining questions. He walked off toward the stairs with the other guard, and Thomas, who had been following me, stopped at the fork. His own run was the east side, he said, and told me not to be late. I nodded. One wheel of the cart was warped, so it kept pulling left. Even as I put my strength into correcting it, the name on the execution schedule would not leave me.

The West Section was made up of six cells. The first key took me through the iron gate at the entrance; the third opened the ration slot farther in. Without the habits left in this body, I would have been lost before I cleared the threshold. On one wall hung each prisoner's name beside the items forbidden to bring in. Under Servia's entry, the list was plain.

Nothing on it said that water was forbidden.

I stopped the cart in front of Cell No. 1. The inside was smaller than I had expected. In place of a bed there was a low stone ledge, and a woman sat upon it. Disheveled silver hair hid her cheeks, and black collars were locked around her neck and both wrists. Her right hand rested on her knee, the fingertips trembling slightly. Only then did I realize I had been standing at the door, looking down at her all this while. She was looking at me, too.

The thought that she was beautiful came first, and it flustered me. It shamed me that I could think such a thing while looking at a pale face and dry, cracked lips. Right on its heels came the fact that she would die tomorrow. In the novel it had ended in a handful of sentences, but here she was a person sitting in front of me. I opened the ration ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠slot, pushed the bowl of porridge through, and set the bread beside it. The woman did not look at the food.

"And the water?"

Her voice was low and hoarse. I had no answer prepared. All I had to say was that the order had come from above. Evan's memories were full of lines like that. Those are the orders. Those are the regulations. I have no authority to decide. Words like those must have carried him through two years in this place.

"I've been ordered not to issue any today."

"Today as well."

She corrected me in a few short words. I stopped with my hand resting on the open slot. This was not the first day they had cut it off. I disliked myself for seeing only the missing jug and assuming it was a matter of a single day. The woman moved her dry lips with care.

"They told you not to give it unless I sign, I suppose."

I could not answer. She lowered her gaze first. I saw the paper resting on her knee. I was too far to read all of the writing, but the blank at the very bottom was clear. The short chain running from her wrist collars made even lifting the paper look difficult. In the original, she had denied her crimes to the very end. Remembering that, I hesitated again. If she truly had tried to poison someone—was I allowed to throw away everything I had read, only because the state she was in now looked pitiful?

The thought did not last. Guilty or not, it was a request for water. She was not asking me to open the door this instant, or to kill anyone. I looked beneath the cart. There was the small tin flask Evan always carried, and the memory of filling it in the break room was still there. I stopped my hand before it could move on its own and checked the end of the corridor. No footsteps. That only made me feel more cowardly. What kind of place was this, that I had to be sure no one was there before I could give someone water?

"Wait a moment, please."

Her eyes lifted again. I took an empty bowl from the cart and poured from the flask. The water filled it about halfway. I started to push it through the slot, stopped, and looked down the corridor once more. No one was coming. When I set the bowl down, the woman bent forward. The chain was too short for her to bring it to her mouth. She tried once, then lowered her hands. Her expression hardened. She seemed to have realized she would have to put her face to the bowl and drink in front of me.

I did not know what to say. Telling her it was all right would have been easy. But what about any of this was all right, with me standing there watching? I reached an arm through the slot and lifted the bowl a little.

"I'll hold it."

"Are you going to laugh?"

The unexpected words made me look at her. Only then did I understand why she was not moving. Even a moment like this, it seemed, had been turned into a spectacle in this cell. Anger rose in me. I did not know whom it was for, and still my face went hot first.

"I won't laugh. Drink."

The words came out a little rough. She watched me for a while, then came closer. I tilted the bowl. She tried to swallow too quickly and coughed, so I lowered my hand at once. I waited, then tipped it little by little again. In the process our fingertips touched. Before the thought that she was cold, I saw the mark the collar had ground into her wrist. The skin there was rubbed raw. I looked away. Even after she finished the water, she did not draw back at once.

"What's your name?"

In Evan's memories, there was no reason to give a prisoner your name. Least of all a noble prisoner. If trouble came, blame could fall on the one whose name had been remembered. I kept my mouth shut for a moment, then answered.

"Evan Locke."

She checked the metal badge on my chest, as if to see whether I had lied. Strangely, I understood the gesture. A single bowl of water was no reason to trust a strange guard. I still did not know what kind of person she was, either.

"Why did you give it to me?"

The question came before any thanks. I drew the bowl back out and set it on the cart. I could not say it was because I was a good person. I was the one who had checked twice that the corridor was empty. Nor could I explain that I knew the original story. After a brief hesitation, I chose the words nearest to the truth.

"Because you said you were thirsty."

Servia did not answer. I started to close the slot, then saw that the bread had been left where her hand could not reach. I pushed it farther in and moved the bowl of porridge closer as well. At last she picked up the spoon. That was enough. I had given her water, and I had made it so she could eat. I still had the other cells to feed. If I stayed here too long, I would have to explain why.

When I took hold of the cart's handles, the sound of a spoon striking a bowl came from behind me.

"Evan."

It was the first time she had said my name. I turned. The hand holding the spoon had gone still. Her face was not the face of a moment before. Her lips were still dry, but her eyes were fixed straight on the bowl.

"This food. Where did you bring it from?"

"The ration distribution room. I received the other cells' portions along with it."

"Was mine handed to you separately?"

I looked at the bowls on the cart. It was the same barley porridge. But when I searched Evan's memories, I recalled the ration clerk holding one bowl out first and saying it was for Cell No. 1. The small nick along the rim matched, too. Earlier I had taken it without a thought. Before I could answer, she set the spoon down.

"Don't eat it. Don't even taste it to check."

Her voice had gone clear. I crouched in front of the slot again. She did not push the bowl away. She only looked down at it with care, so the food would not spill.

"What do you mean?"

"The Royal Inquisitor showed it to me. The poison they say I tried to feed the Saintess."

I waited for what she would say next. Somewhere in the corridor, someone opened the iron gate. Servia's gaze moved past my shoulder, then came back.