Cassian stumbled and staggered for us a moment later, a hand braced on his chest, Mor on his heels. She did not so much as look at me, nor I her, as Rhys told them. Standing together in the dead of night—
The Cauldron sang one final note—then went silent.
The presence, the weight … vanished.
Amren loosed a sigh. “Hybern knows where we are by now. The Cauldron likely wanted to have a look for itself. After we taunted it.”
I rubbed at my face. “Let’s pray that’s the last we see of it.”
Varian angled his head. “So you three … because you were Made, you can hear it? Sense it?”
“It would appear so,” Amren said, looking inclined to tug him back to wherever they’d been, to finish what they’d no doubt still been in the middle of doing.
But Azriel asked softly, “What about Elain?”
Something cold went through me. Nesta was just staring at Azriel. Staring and staring—
Then she broke into a run.
Her bare feet slid through the mud, splattering me as we charged for our sister’s tent.
“Elain—” Nesta shoved open the tent.
She stopped short so fast I slammed into her. The tent—the tent was empty.
Nesta flung herself inside, tossing away blankets, as if Elain had somehow sunk into the ground. “Elain!”
I whirled into the camp, scanning the tents nearby. One look at Rhys conveyed what we’d found inside. An Illyrian blade appeared in his hand just before he winnowed.
Azriel stalked to my side, right into the tent where Nesta had now come to her feet. He tucked his wings in tightly as he squeezed through the narrow space, ignoring Nesta’s snarl of warning, and knelt at the cot.
He ran a scarred hand over the rumpled blankets. “They’re still warm.”
Outside, Cassian was barking orders, the camp rousing.
“The Cauldron,” I breathed. “The Cauldron was fading away—going somewhere—”
Nesta was already moving, sprinting for where we’d heard that voice. Luring Elain out.
I knew how it had done it.
I’d dreamed of it.
Graysen standing on the edge of camp, calling to her, promising her love and healing.
We reached the copse of trees at the edge of the camp, just as Rhys appeared out of the night, his blade now sheathed across his back. There was something in his hands. No emotion on his carefully neutral face.
Nesta let out a sound that might have been a sob as I realized what he’d found at the edge of the forest. What the Cauldron had left behind in its haste to return to Hybern’s war-camp. Or as a mocking gift.
Elain’s dark blue cloak, still warm from her body.
CHAPTER
64
Nesta sat with her head in her hands inside my tent. She did not speak, did not move. Coiled in on herself, clinging to stay whole—that’s how she looked. How I felt.
Elain—taken to Hybern’s army.
Nesta had stolen something vital from the Cauldron. And in those moments Nesta had hunted it down for us … The Cauldron had learned what was vital to her.
So the Cauldron had stolen something in return.
“We’ll get her back,” Cassian rasped from where he perched on the rolled arm of the chaise longue across the small sitting area, watching her carefully. Rhys, Amren, and Mor were meeting with the other High Lords, informing them what had been done. Seeing if they knew anything. Had any way of helping.
Nesta lowered her hands, lifting her head. Her eyes were red-rimmed, lips thin. “No, you will not.” She pointed to the map on the table. “I saw that army. Its size, who is in it. I saw it, and there is no chance of any of you getting into its heart. Even you,” she added when Cassian opened his mouth again. “Especially not when you’re injured.”
And what Hybern would do to Elain, might already be doing—
From the shadows near the entrance to the tent, Azriel said, as if in answer to some unspoken debate, “I’m getting her back.”
Nesta slid her gaze to the shadowsinger. Azriel’s hazel eyes glowed golden in the shadows.
Nesta said, “Then you will die.”
Azriel only repeated, rage glazing that stare, “I’m getting her back.”
With the shadows, he might stand a chance of slipping in. But there were wards to consider, and ancient magic, and the king with those spells and the Cauldron …
For a moment, I saw that set of paints Elain had once bought me with the extra money she’d saved. The red, yellow, and blue I’d savored, used to paint that dresser in our cottage. I had not painted in years at that point, had not dared spend the money on myself … But Elain had.
I stood. Met Azriel’s wrathful stare.
“I’m going with you,” I said.
Azriel only nodded.
“You’ll never get far enough into the camp,” Cassian warned.
“I’m going to walk right in.”
And as they narrowed their brows, I shifted myself. Not a glamour, but a true changing of features.
“Shit,” Cassian breathed when I was done.
Nesta rose to her feet. “They might already know she’s dead.”
For it was Ianthe’s face, her hair, that I now possessed. It nearly drained what was left of my depleted magic. Anything more … I might not have enough left to keep her features in place. But there were other ways. Routes. For the rest of what I needed.
“I need one of your Siphons,” I said to Azriel. The blue was slightly deeper, but at night … they might not notice the difference.
He held out his palm, a round, flat blue stone appearing in it, and chucked it to me. I wrapped my fingers around the warm stone, its power throbbing in my veins like an unearthly heartbeat as I looked to Cassian. “Where is the blacksmith.”
The camp blacksmith did not ask any questions when I handed over the silver candlesticks from my tent and Azriel’s Siphon. When I asked him to craft that circlet. Immediately.
A mortal blacksmith might have taken a while—days. But a Fae one …
By the time he finished, Azriel had gone to the camp priestess and retrieved a spare set of her robes. Perhaps not identical to Ianthe’s, but close enough. As High Priestess, none would dare look too closely at her. Ask questions.
I had just set the circlet atop my hood when Rhys prowled into our tent. Azriel was honing Truth-Teller with relentless focus, Cassian sharpening the weapons I was to fasten beneath the robe—atop the Illyrian leathers.
“He’ll sense your power,” I said to Rhys before he could speak.
“I know,” Rhys said hoarsely. And I realized—realized the other High Lords had come up empty.
My hands began shaking. I knew the odds. Knew what I’d face in there. I’d seen it in Nesta’s mind hours ago.
Rhys closed the distance between us, clutching my hands. Gazing at me, and not Ianthe’s face, as if he could see the soul beneath. “There are wards around the camp. You can’t winnow. You have to walk in—and out. Then you can make the jump back here.”
I nodded.
He brushed a kiss to my brow. “Ianthe sold out your sisters,” he said, his voice turning sharp and hard. “It’s only fitting that you use her to get Elain back.”
He gripped the sides of my face, bringing us nose to nose.
“Do not get distracted. Do not linger. You are a warrior, and warriors know when to pick their fights.”
I nodded, our breath mingling.
Rhys growled. “They took what is ours. And we do not allow those crimes to go unpunished.”
His power rippled and swirled around me.
“You do not fear,” Rhys breathed. “You do not falter. You do not yield. You go in, you get her, and you come out again.”
I nodded again, holding his stare.
“Remember that you are a wolf. And you cannot be caged.”
He kissed my brow one more time, my blood thrumming and boiling in me, howling to draw blood.
I
began to buckle on the weapons Cassian had lined up in neat rows on the table, Rhys helping me with the straps and loops, positioning them so that they wouldn’t be visible beneath my robe. The only one I couldn’t fit was the Illyrian blade—no way to hide it and be able to easily draw it. Cassian gave me an extra dagger to make up for its absence.
“You get them in and out again, shadowsinger,” Rhys said to Azriel as I walked to the spymaster’s side, getting a feel for the weight of the weapons and the flow of the heavy robe. “I don’t care how many of them you have to kill to do it. They both come out.”
Azriel gave a grave, steady nod. “I swear it, High Lord.”
Formal words, formal titles.
I gripped Azriel’s scarred hand, the weight of his Siphon pressing on my brow through the hood. We looked to Rhys, to Cassian and Nesta, to Mor—right as she appeared, breathless, between the tent flaps. Her eyes went to me, then the shadowsinger, and flared with shock and fear—
But we were gone.
Azriel’s dark breeze was different from Rhys’s. Colder. Sharper. It cut through the world like a blade, spearing us toward that army camp.
Night was still overhead, dawn perhaps two hours away, when he landed us in a thick forest on a hilltop that overlooked the outskirts of the mighty camp.
The king had used the same spells that Rhys had put around Velaris and our own forces. Spells to hide it from sight, and dispel people who got too close.
We’d landed inside of them, thanks to Nesta’s specifics. With a perfect view of the city of soldiers that sprawled away into the night.
Campfires burned, as numerous as the stars. Beasts snapped and snarled, yanking on leashes and chains. On and on and on that army went, a squatting terror drinking the life from the earth.
Azriel silently faded into blackness—until he was my own shadow and nothing more.
I fluffed out the priestess’s pale robe, adjusted the circlet atop my head, and began to pick my way down the hill.
Into the heart of Hybern’s army.
CHAPTER
65
The first test would be the most dangerous—and informative.
Passing through the guards stationed at the edge of the camp—and learning if they’d heard of Ianthe’s demise. Learning what sort of power Ianthe truly wielded here.
I kept my features in that beatific, pretty mask she’d always plastered on her face, head held just so, my mating ring turned facedown and put onto my other hand, a few silver bracelets Azriel had borrowed from the camp priestess dangling at my wrists. I let them jangle loudly, as she had, like a cat with a bell on its collar.
A pet—I supposed Ianthe was no more than a pet of the king.
I couldn’t see Azriel, but I could feel him, as if the Siphon parading itself as Ianthe’s jewel was a tether. He dwelled in every pocket of shadow, darting ahead and behind.
The six guards flanking the camp entrance monitored Ianthe, strutting out of the dark, with unmasked distaste. I steadied my heart, became her, preening and coy, vain and predatory, holy and sensual.
They did not stop me as I walked past them and onto the long avenue that cut through the endless camp. Did not look confused or expectant.
I didn’t dare let my shoulders slump, or even heave a sigh of utter relief. Not as I headed down the broad artery lined by tents and forges, fires and—and things I did not look at, did not even turn toward as the sounds coming out of them charged at me.
This place made the Court of Nightmares seem like a human sitting room filled with chaste maidens embroidering pillows.
And somewhere in this hell-pit … Elain. Had the Cauldron presented her to the king? Or was she in some in-between, trapped in whatever dark world the Cauldron occupied?
I’d seen the king’s tent in Nesta’s scrying. It had not seemed as far away as it did now, rising like a gargantuan, spiny beast from the center of the camp. Entrance to it would present another set of obstacles.
If we made it that far without being noticed.
The time of night worked to our advantage. The soldiers who were awake were either engaged in activities of varying awfulness, or were on guard and wishing they could be. The rest were asleep.
It was strange, I realized with each bouncing step and jangle of jewelry toward the heart of camp, to consider that Hybern actually needed rest.
I’d somehow assumed they were beyond it—mythic, unending in their strength and rage.
But they, too, tired. And ate. And slept.
Perhaps not as easily or as much as humans, but, with two hours until dawn, we were lucky. Once the sun chased away the shadows, though … Once it made some gaps in my costume all too clear …
It was hard to scan the tents we passed, hard to focus on the sounds of the camp while pretending to be someone wholly used to it. I didn’t even know if Ianthe had a tent here—if she was allowed near the king whenever she wished.
I doubted it—doubted we’d be able to stroll right into his personal tent and find wherever the hell Elain was.
A massive bonfire smoldered and crackled near the center of camp, the sounds of revelry reaching us long before we got a good visual.
I knew within a few heartbeats that most of the soldiers were not sleeping.
They were here.
Celebrating.
Some danced in wicked circles around the fire, their contorted shapes little more than twisted shadows flinging through the night. Some drank from enormous oak barrels of beer I recognized—right from Tamlin’s stores. Some writhed with each other—some merely watched.
But through the laughter and singing and music, over the roar of the fire … Screaming.
A shadow gripped my shoulder, reminding me not to run.
Ianthe would not run—would not show alarm.
My mouth went dry as that scream sounded again.
I couldn’t bear it—to let it go on, to see what was being done—
Azriel’s shadow-hand grasped my own, tugging me closer. His rage rippled off his invisible form.
We made a lazy circuit of the revelry, other parts of it becoming clear. The screaming—
It was not Elain.
It was not Elain who hung from a rack near a makeshift dais of granite.
It was one of the Children of the Blessed, young and slender—
My stomach twisted, threatening to surge up my throat. Two others were chained up beside her. From the way they sagged, the injuries on their naked bodies—
Clare. It was like Clare, what had been done to them. And like Clare, they had been left there to rot, left for the crows surely to arrive at dawn.
This one had held out for longer.
I couldn’t. I couldn’t—couldn’t leave her there—
But if I lingered too long, they’d see. And drawing attention to myself …
Could I live with it? I’d once killed two innocents to save Tamlin and his people. I’d be as good as killing her if I left her there in favor of saving my sister …
Stranger. She was a stranger—
“He’s been looking for you,” drawled a hard male voice.
I pivoted to find Jurian striding from between two tents, buckling his sword-belt. I glanced at the dais. And as if an invisible hand wiped away the smoke …
There sat the King of Hybern. He lounged in his chair, head propped on a fist, face a mask of vague amusement as he surveyed the revelry, the torture and torment. The adulation of the crowd that occasionally turned to toast or bow to him.
I willed my voice to soften, adapted that lilt. “I have been busy with my sisters.”
Jurian stared at me for a long moment, eyes sliding to the Siphon atop my head.
I knew the moment he realized who I was. Those brown eyes flared—barely.
“Where is she,” was all I breathed.
Jurian gave a cocky grin. Not directed at me, but anyone watching us. “You’ve been lusting after me for weeks now,” he purred. “Act like it.”
My throat
constricted. But I laid a hand on his forearm, batting my eyelashes at him as I stepped closer.
A bemused snort. “I have trouble believing that’s how you won his heart.”
I tried not to scowl. “Where is she.”
“Safe. Untouched.”
My chest caved in at the word.
“Not for long,” Jurian said. “It gave him a shock when she appeared before the Cauldron. He had her contained. Came here to brood over what to do with her. And how to make you pay for it.”
I ran a hand up his arm, then rested it over his heart. “Where. Is. She.”
Jurian leaned in as if he’d kiss me, and brought his mouth to my ear. “Were you smart enough to kill her before you took her skin?”
My hands tightened on his jacket. “She got what she deserved.”
I could feel Jurian’s smile against my ear. “She’s in his tent. Chained with steel and a little spell from his favorite book.”
Shit. Shit. Perhaps I should have gotten Helion, who could break almost any—
Jurian caught my chin between his thumb and forefinger. “Come to my tent with me, Ianthe. Let me see what that pretty mouth can do.”
It was an effort not to recoil, but I let Jurian put a hand on my lower back. He chuckled. “Seems like you’ve already got some steel in you. No need for mine.”
I gave him a pretty, sunshine smile. “What of the girl on the rack?”
Darkness flickered in those eyes. “There have been many before her, and many will come after.”
“I can’t leave her here,” I said through my teeth.
Jurian led me into the labyrinth of tents, heading for that inner circle. “Your sister or her—you won’t be able to take two out.”
“Get her to me, and I’ll make it happen.”
Jurian muttered, “Say you would like to pray before the Cauldron before we retire.”
I blinked, and realized there were guards—guards and that giant, bone-colored tent ahead of us. I clasped my hands before me and said to Jurian, “Before we … retire, I should like to pray before the great Cauldron. To give thanks for today’s bounty.”
Jurian glowered—a man ready for rutting who had been delayed. “Make it quick,” he said, jerking his chin to the guards on either side of the tent flaps. I caught the look he gave them—male to male. They didn’t bother to hide their leering as I passed.
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