The magicked wind hit the water; waves toppled and foamed backward.
But the cleaving Tidewitch didn’t care. His blackened eyes had latched on to Safi now. His bloodstained hands clawed up and he barreled toward her like a squall.
Safi sprang into a flying kick. Her heel crashed into his ribs; he toppled forward right as Iseult spun into a hook-kick. Her boot pummeled the man’s chin, shifted the angle of his fall.
He hit the cobblestones. Black pustules burst all over his skin, splattering the street with his blood.
But he was still alive—still conscious. With a roar like a hurricane, he struggled to get upright.
That was when the Nubrevnan man decided to reappear. He sidled close to the Cleaved—and Safi’s panic burned up her throat. “What are you doing?”
“I told you I’d handle this!” he bellowed. Then his arms flung back, and in a surge of power that sparked through Safi’s lungs, his cupped hands hit the cleaved sailor’s ears. Air exploded through the man’s brain. His blackened eyes rolled backward.
The Tidewitch crumpled to the street. Dead.
* * *
Iseult swept aside her skirts and shoved her moon scythes back into their concealed calf-scabbards. Nearby, Dalmottis made frantic two-fingered swipes across their eyes. It was a sign to ward off evil—to ask their gods to protect their souls. Some aimed their movements at the dead Cleaved, but more than a few aimed the swipe at Iseult.
As if she had any interest in claiming their souls.
She did, however, have an interest in not being mobbed and beaten today, so, twisting toward the dead Tidewitch, she readjusted her headscarf—and thanked the Moon Mother it hadn’t been removed in the fight.
She also thanked the goddess that no one else had cleaved. Such a powerful burst in magic could easily send other witches over the brink—a brink from which there was no return.
Though no one knew what made a person cleave, Iseult had read theories that linked the corruption to the five Origin Wells spread across the Witchlands. Each Well was linked to one of the five elements: Aether, Earth, Water, Wind, or Fire. Though people spoke of a Void element—and of Voidwitches like that Bloodwitch—there was no record of an actual Void Well.
Perhaps a Void Well was out there, but it had been long forgotten. The springs that had fed it were dried up. The trees that had blossomed year-round were shriveled to desiccated husks. Such stagnation had certainly happened with the Earth, Wind, and Water Wells, and perhaps they too would one day be lost to history.
No matter the Wells’ fates, though, scholars didn’t think it mere coincidence that the only witcheries to cleave were those linked to Earth, Wind, or Water. And if the Carawen monks were to be believed, then only the return of the Cahr Awen could ever heal the dead Wells or the Cleaved.
Well, Iseult didn’t think that would be happening anytime soon. No return of the Cahr Awen—and no escaping all these hateful stares, either.
Once Iseult felt certain that her hair was sufficiently covered, her face sufficiently shaded, and her sleeves sufficiently low enough to hide her pale skin, she reached for Safi’s Threads so she could find her Threadsister among the crowds.
But her eyes and her magic caught something off. Threads like she’d never seen before. Directly beside her … on the corpse.
Her gaze slid to the cleaved man’s body. Blackened blood … and perhaps something else oozed from his ears, between the cobblestones. The pustules on his body had erupted—some of that oily spray was on Iseult’s slashed skirts and sweaty bodice.
And yet, though the man was undoubtedly dead, there were still three Threads wriggling over his chest. Like maggots, they shimmied and coiled inward. Short Threads. The Threads that break.
It shouldn’t have been possible—Iseult’s mother had always told her that the dead have no Threads, and in all the Nomatsi burning ceremonies Iseult had attended as a child, she had never seen Threads on a corpse.
The longer Iseult gaped, the more the crowds closed in. Spectators curious over the body were everywhere, and Iseult had to squint to see through their Threads. To tamp down on all the emotions around her.
Then one crimson, raging Thread flashed nearby—and with it came a waspish snarl. “Who the hell-flames do you think you are? We had that under control.”
“Under control?” retorted a male voice with a sharp accent. “I just saved your lives!”
“Are you Cleaved?” Safi cried—and Iseult winced at the poor word choice. But of course, Safi was venting her grief. Her terror. Her explosive Threads. She was always like this when something bad—truly bad—happened. She either ran from her emotions as fast as her legs would carry her or she beat them into submission.
When at last Iseult popped out beside her Threadsister, it was just in time to see Safi grab a fistful of the young man’s unbuttoned shirt.
“Is this how all Nubrevnans dress?” Safi snatched the other side of his shirt. “These go inside these.”
To his credit, the Nubrevnan didn’t move. His face simply flushed a wild scarlet—as did his Threads—and his lips pressed tight.
“I know,” he gritted out, “how a button operates.” He knocked Safi’s wrists away. “And I don’t need advice from a woman with bird shit on her shoulder.”
Oh no, Iseult thought, lips parting to warn—
Fingers clamped on Iseult’s arm. Before she could flip up her hand and snap the wrist of her grabber, the person flipped up her wrist and shoved it against her back.
And a Thread of clayish red pulsed in Iseult’s vision. It was a familiar shade of annoyance that spoke of years enduring Safi’s tantrums—which meant Habim had arrived.
The Marstoki man shoved Iseult’s wrist harder to her back and snarled, “Walk, Iseult. To that cats’ alley over there.”
“You can let me go,” she said, voice toneless. She could just see Habim from the corner of her eyes. He wore the Hasstrel family’s gray and blue livery.
“Voidwitch?! You called me a Voidwitch?! I speak Nubrevnan, you horse’s ass!” The rest of Safi’s bloodthirsty screams were in Nubrevnan—and swallowed up by the crowds.
Iseult hated when Safi’s Threads got so bright they blazed over everything else. When they seared into Iseult’s eyes, into her heart. But Habim didn’t slow as he guided Iseult around a one-legged beggar singing “Eridysi’s Lament.” Then they’d reached a narrow slip of space between a dingy tavern and an even dingier secondhand shop. Iseult staggered into it. Her boots kicked through unseen puddles and the stench of cat piss burned in her skull.
She shook out her wrist and spun back to her mentor. This behavior wasn’t like the gentle Habim. He was a deadly man, certainly—he had served Eron fon Hasstrel for two decades as a man-at-arms—but Habim was also soft-spoken and careful. Cool and in control of his temper.
At least he was normally.
“What,” he began, marching at Iseult, “were you doing? Pulling your weapons out like that? Hell-gates, Iseult, you should have run.”
“That cleaving Tidewitch,” she began—but Habim only stomped in closer. He was not a tall man, and his eyes had been level with Iseult’s for the past three years.
Right now, those line-seamed eyes were rounded with his ire, and his Threads glittered an irate red. “Any Cleaved are the city guards’ problem—and the guards are now your problem. Highway robbery, Iseult?”
Her breath hitched. “How did you find out?”
“There are blockades everywhere. Mathew and I met one on our way into the city—only to learn that the city guards are looking for two girls, one with a sword and one with moon scythes. How many people do you think fight with moon scythes, Iseult? Those”—Habim pointed at her scabbards—“are obvious. And as a Nomatsi, you have no legal protection in this country, and simply carrying a weapon in public will get you hanged.” Habim pivoted on his heel to march away three steps. Then back three steps. “Think, Iseult! Think!”
Iseult compressed her lips. Stasis. Sta
sis in your fingertips and in your toes.
In the distance, she could just hear the growing roll of snare drums that meant the Veñaza City guards were on their way. They would behead the Tidewitch’s body as required by law for all cleaved corpses.
“A-are you done screaming at me?” she asked at last, her old stammer grabbing her tongue. Distorting her words. “Because I need to get back to Safi, and we n-need to leave the city.”
Habim’s nostrils fluttered with a deep inhale, and Iseult watched as he pushed aside his emotions. As the lines of his face smoothed out and his Threads turned calm. “You cannot go back to Safi. In fact, you will not leave this alley by the way you came in. Guildmaster Yotiluzzi has a Bloodwitch in his employ, and that creature is straight from the Void with no mercy or fear.” Habim shook his head, and the first hints of gray fear twined into his Threads.
Which only made Iseult’s throat clog tighter. Habim was never scared.
Blood. Witch. Blood. Witch.
“Safi’s uncle is in town,” Habim went on, “for the Truce Summit, so—”
“Dom fon Hasstrel is here?” Iseult’s jaw slackened. Habim could have said a thousand things, but none would have surprised her more. She’d met the battle-scarred Eron twice in the past, and his sloppy inebriation had instantly verified all of Safi’s stories and complaints.
“All Cartorran nobility are required to be here,” Habim explained, falling back into his three-step pace. Left. Right. “Henrick has some grand announcement to make, and in his usual fashion, he’s using this summit as his stage.”
Iseult was scarcely listening. “Does all the nobility i-include Safi?”
Habim’s expression softened. His Threads flickered to a gentle, peach tenderness. “That includes Safi. Which means she currently has her uncle—and an entire court of doms and domnas—to protect her from Yotiluzzi’s Bloodwitch. But you…”
Habim didn’t have to utter the rest. Safi had her title to protect her, and Iseult had her heritage to damn her.
Iseult’s hands lifted. Rubbed her cheeks. Her temples. But her fingers were only a distant sensation of pressure on her skin—just as the crowds were a throbbing hum, the rattle of the guards’ drums a low hiss.
“So what can I do?” she asked at last. “I can’t afford passage on a boat, and even if I could, I have nowhere to go.”
Habim waved to the end of the alley. “There’s an inn called The Hawthorn Canal a few blocks away. I’ve hired a room and a horse there. You’ll stay overnight, and then tomorrow, at sunset, you can travel to The Hawthorn Canal’s sister inn on the north side. Mathew and I will be waiting for you. In the meantime, we’ll deal with the Bloodwitch.”
“Why only one night, though? What could possibly h-happen in one night?”
For a long breath, Habim stared so intently it was as if he could read Iseult’s Threads. As if he could search her for truth or lies. “Safi was born a domna. You have to remember that, Iseult. All her training has been toward that one thing. Tonight, she is needed at the Truce Summit. Henrick has openly demanded her presence, which means she cannot refuse—and it means you cannot stand in her way.”
With those simple words—you cannot stand in her way—Iseult’s breath hardened in her lungs. For all that Safi might have lost their savings, and for all that a Bloodwitch might have latched on to their trail, Iseult had still believed that everything would blow over. That this snarl in the loom would somehow untangle, and life would return to normal in a few weeks.
But this … this felt like the end. Safi was going to have to be a domna, plain and simple, and there was no room for Iseult in that life.
Loss, she thought vaguely as she tried to identify the feeling in her chest. This must be loss.
“I’ve told you this before,” Habim said gruffly. His gaze raked up and down, like a general inspecting a soldier. “A hundred times, I’ve told you, Iseult, yet you never listen to me. You never believe. Why did Mathew and I encourage your friendship with Safi? Why did we decide to train you alongside her?”
Iseult squeezed the air from her chest, willing the thoughts and the shame to ebb away. “Because,” she recited, “no one can protect Safi like her Thread-family.”
“Exactly. Thread-family bonds are unbreakable—and you know that better than anyone else. The day that you saved Safi’s life six years ago, you and she were bound together as Threadsisters. To this day, you would die for Safi, just as she would die for you. So do this for her, Iseult. Hide away for the night, let Mathew and I deal with the Bloodwitch, and then return to Safi’s side tomorrow.”
A pause. Then Iseult nodded gravely. Quit being a fanciful fool, she chided herself—exactly as her mother had always done. This wasn’t the end at all, and Iseult should have been smart enough to see that right away.
“Give me your scythes,” Habim ordered. “I’ll return them to you tomorrow.”
“They’re my only weapons.”
“Yes, but you’re Nomatsi. If you get stopped at another blockade … We can’t risk it.”
Iseult gave a rough scrub at her nose, and then muttered, “Fine,” before unstrapping her prized blades. Almost childishly, she thrust them at Habim. His Threads flickered with a sad blue as he moved deeper into the alley and swooped up a waxed canvas bag from the shadows. He withdrew a rough black blanket.
“This is salamander fiber.” He draped it over Iseult’s head and shoulders and fastened it with a simple pin. “As long as you wear this, the Bloodwitch can’t smell you. Do not remove it until we’re together tomorrow night.”
Iseult nodded; the stiff fabric resisted the movement. And Moon Mother save her, it was hot.
Habim then reached into his pocket and plunked out a sack of clanking coins. “This should cover the cost of the inn and a horse.”
After accepting the piestras, Iseult turned to a dilapidated door. The sounds of chopping knives and boiling pots drifted through the wood, yet her hand paused on the rusted doorknob.
This felt … wrong.
What sort of Threadsister would Iseult be if she left Safi without a good-bye—or at least a backup plan for those inevitable worst-case scenarios?
“Can you give Safi a message?” Iseult asked, keeping her words calm. At Habim’s nod, she continued. “Tell Safi that I’m sorry I had to go and that she’d better not lose my favorite book. And … oh.” Iseult raised her eyebrows, feigning an afterthought. “Please tell her not to slit your throat, since I’m sure she’ll try to once she finds out you’ve sent me away.”
“I’ll tell her,” Habim said, voice and Threads solemn. “Now hurry. That Bloodwitch is no doubt on his way right now.”
Iseult bowed her head once—a soldier to her general—before yanking open the door and marching into the steamy, crowded kitchen.
SIX
As the snare drums approached, Safi’s wrath riled higher and higher. The only reason she didn’t chase after that cursed Nubrevnan as he strode toward his ship (with his shirt still unbuttoned) was because the tallest, palest man she’d ever seen marched beside him … And because Safi had lost sight of Iseult.
But her frantic search for her Threadsister was interrupted when the footsteps and the drumbeats of the approaching guard cut off. When the crowds along the pier fell silent.
A slice, a thunk … a splatter.
For a long moment, the only sounds were the pigeons, the breeze, and the calm waves.
Then a strangled sob—someone who’d known the dead man, perhaps—cut the silence like a serrated knife. It echoed in Safi’s ears. Shook in her rib cage. A minor chord to fill a hole left behind.
A hand landed on Safi’s bicep. Habim. “This way, Safi. There’s a carriage—”
“I need to find Iseult,” she said, unmoving. Unblinking.
“She’s gone somewhere safe.” Habim’s expression was grim—but that was nothing unusual. “I promise,” he added, and Safi’s magic whispered, True. A warm purr in her chest.
So, stiff as a ship�
�s mast, Safi followed Habim to a nondescript, covered carriage. Once she was seated within, he shut the door and yanked a heavy black curtain over the window. Then, in curt tones, Habim explained how he and Mathew had recognized the girls by their weapons and had shortly thereafter found Mathew’s destroyed shop.
Shame crept up Safi’s neck as she listened. Mathew was more than just her tutor. He was family, and now Safi’s mistakes had ruined his home.
Yet when Habim mentioned sending Iseult to an inn—alone, unprotected—all of the afternoon’s horror was swallowed up by skull-rattling rage. Safi dove for the door …
Habim had her in a stranglehold before she could even twist the knob. “If you open that door,” he growled, “the Bloodwitch will smell you. If you keep it shut, however, then the monk can’t trace you. That curtain is made of salamander fiber, Safi, and Iseult is wearing a cloak of the same fabric right now.”
Safi froze, her vision crossing from lack of air and the scarred back of Habim’s right hand blurring. She couldn’t believe Iseult had simply walked away without a fight. Without Safi …
It made no sense, yet Safi’s magic shouted in her rib cage that it was true.
So she nodded, Habim released her, and she straggled into her seat. Habim had always been the more tightly keyed of her mentors. A chime-piece wound faster than the rest of the world, and it left him without patience for Safi’s impulsiveness.
“I know this holdup was your doing, Safi.” Habim’s soft voice somehow filled every space of the carriage. “Only you would be so reckless, and then Iseult followed you as she always does.”
Safi didn’t argue with that—it was undeniably true. The card game might have been Iseult’s idea, yet every single bad decision since could be laid at Safi’s doorstep.
“This mistake,” Habim continued, “has complicated—possibly ruined—twenty years of planning. Now, with Eron here, we’re doing what we can to salvage the situation.”
Safi stiffened. “Uncle Eron,” she repeated. “Here?”
As Habim offered up some story about Henrick summoning all the Cartorran nobility for a grand announcement, Safi forced herself to mimic Habim. To settle back and relax. She needed to think through everything like Iseult always did. She needed to analyze her opponents and her terrain …
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