Horatio del Seve’s notes had mentioned waiting for winter, but the north wind at my back had nothing to do with the chill running down my spine. I had to get out of here. “I have to talk to Ruby.”
Elise frowned. “What?”
“I’ll be back. I promise.” I held her close, comforted in the fact that I’d see her again no matter what. “Talking to your father reminded me of something I meant to ask Ruby before he left.”
Even if I was wrong, he’d understand. And if I was right, hopefully it wasn’t too late.
“Go.” She sighed, long and sad, but smiled. “I should’ve realized I’d not have you to myself yet.”
I laced our fingers together, brought them to my false lips, and pressed our foreheads together. “I’ll make it up to you.”
I’d all the time and resources to do that. Soon as I figured out what Winter—her father—was up to, I could let Nicolas and Our Queen do as they wanted with it. It wasn’t my fault or Elise’s that her father was what he was. It wasn’t my fault that I had to do what I was about to do, but she couldn’t know my part in it. Not yet. Not if I was right.
Lady, let me be wrong.
Forty-Seven
Winter walked for ages. We passed through a dozen different buildings and wove our way toward the outskirts of the palace where the number of servants and guards thinned. He shared Elise’s round frame and dark curls, hair bound by a forest green ribbon trimmed in gold, and wore Erlend’s old colors hidden in the pleats and stitches of his clothes. He was easy to follow through the open walkways high above the forests where I’d lived as Twenty-Three. He finally stopped in a hallway populated by unlabeled, locked doors.
He slipped through a door and locked it behind him. Muffled voices echoed behind it.
I sighed. His faked illness, Seve’s note, and his life as Winter all pointed to some nasty plan brewing. Seve had been told to wait for Winter, but there’d been no notion of what the waiting was for. I darted back to the open-air path I’d followed and glanced over the edge. I’d not thought to bring lock picks to a party.
The ends of supports jutted out from the building, a broken pathway three stories above the swirling waters of the Caracol.
Best not fall then.
I leapt over the wall and onto a beam. Dimly lit windows shone in the darkness, and I stepped onto the next support. The remnants of an old bird’s nest crumbled under my feet, falling off the metal-enforced wood, and a handful of bird bones tumbled into the river. I focused on a far window as Winter’s voice leaked through the paper screen. A line of marching turtles decorated the bottom of the screen.
Turtles meant a Royal Physician—Isidora dal Abreu.
“Remarkable,” Winter said, Erlenian polished as Elise’s but the drawl all his own. His voice wasn’t rough or weak. “How did you notice? I can hardly tell when they speak, much less drink.”
“Noticing things you miss is my job.” Five’s familiar voice cut through any lingering doubts in my mind. Winter had bad intentions, and this was his endgame. “Celso and I used to do the same, and with him at her side, no one would ever think to poison her.”
I tilted my ear toward the window. Five was working for him, with him, and had to be talking about Isidora and Ruby. They did share drinks—they’d shared water tonight.
Hand-delivered by a blond, pale-eyed server.
A body hit the floor. Isidora let out a slurred cry, and Five laughed. I bit back the anger bubbling up my throat. Whatever he was plotting, she’d no place in it. She was a physician.
One of the good ones. One who’d never broken her oath and harmed someone even in the middle of war.
“Restrain yourself.” Winter crossed the room. “Your little revenge fantasy has already forced me to move well ahead of schedule. We need to make this believable.”
“Fantasy?” Five’s voice pitched, and metal clattered against metal. “I’ve already done this once. You messed up your end. That’s your problem.”
I curled my fingers around the window’s edge and pulled myself up. Memories and finger bones weren’t enough for Five. He had to have more, had to have revenge for a mage who didn’t deserve it. But Rodolfo da Abreu was dead, and Isidora had nothing to do with her brother’s actions. Why take it out on her?
“Lay her here.” Winter picked something up from the floor and snapped a piece of cloth. “Box there—opened.”
Cloth whispered over the stones, heels smacking wood. Five’s familiar quiet steps drew closer to me. The memory of Amethyst’s training still in my muscles, I pulled myself up by my fingers and peeked under the window screen.
Five stood over the prone Isidora dal Abreu. He was dressed as a server, but his tray had been traded for a sword. The room was plain and efficient, a writing desk in one corner and the walls lined with bookshelves. Isidora’s orange blossom water rested on the desk. Ruby’s limp body lay next to it.
He groaned. Five was on him in a heartbeat, crushing Ruby’s fingers under his heel.
“Nothing to protest yet.” Five leaned over him. “Haven’t even started.”
Shit.
I’d missed it. The runes lining his eyes, the shared freckles and eyes, the closeness, the anger at my outburst when he’d changed my disqualification to a probation. Ruby had lost everything.
His life as Rodolfo da Abreu.
He was the perfect Ruby—unquestionably loyal to Our Queen, prepared to do anything for her, and undoubtedly had been living locked away on family lands, keeping his entire existence a lonely secret. Being Ruby gave him back his life, gave him back a purpose.
And meant Five had every reason to want him dead.
Winter rolled his eyes at Five and sighed. I couldn’t think of him as Elise’s father any longer, not if this would end with his blood on my hands. I’d expected something suspicious but not this. Not tonight. “No broken bones. Shadows only take the flesh.”
Five turned, eyes bright and fingers twitching. “I know.”
“Then stop.” Winter picked up the water glass and turned toward my window. “We need this set before Nicolas arrives.”
That was it then. The last folks who knew how to create the shadows were to be killed as though they’d lost control of one they’d made. If the people thought Our Queen was a fraud who’d never banished magic and shadows in the first place, and she was making shadows on top of that, they’d tear Igna down before she could even mount a defense. Weylin and his lords could swoop in and take over without a fuss.
I ducked and flattened myself against the wall. Winter opened the window screen, tossed the water out, and took a deep breath of the breeze. I slid my hands over my head slow as I could. The orange slices splashed into the water far beneath us.
“You said I could do it!” Five’s voice pitched, wilder and more frightening than I’d ever heard it, all his careful cleverness gone. Metal clattered against stone—Ruby’s mask hitting the ground. Hard. “I suffered through days of your ‘stay low and stay alive’ shit with those fools you foisted on me, and I’m not walking out of here without his head and hands.”
Winter whipped around, window screen falling. I jammed one finger in the way before it could latch shut.
Five was replaying his brother’s death. When Ruby had been Rodolfo, he’d gifted the Erlend mages with a taste of their own medicine by flaying them like the shadows flayed their victims, and now Five would return the favor.
Two on one weren’t the worst odds, but I had to look after Isidora and Ruby. And Five wasn’t well.
The hitch in his voice, I knew too well. Ruby would not leave alive so long as Five still breathed.
“You’ll leave when I say you leave and with what I say you can have.” Winter moved away from the window. “He’ll be dead either way.”
“Shadows flayed the living.” Five grinned, pulling off his coat and revealing the paring knives strapped to his side. He pulled back his sword. “Three thrashed, but I’m going to pin you.”
I lurched up, muscles burning, and
quietly shoved the screen out of the way. Ruby swatted Five’s sword aside.
“I’ve been to worse parties.” Metal muffled Ruby’s voice, and blood dripped out from under his chin. “You finally figured it out then?”
Buying time. Good. I dragged myself onto the windowsill, legs dangling out, and paused. Winter and Five faced Ruby, and I’d no weapon. I picked up the empty glass.
“This is it.” Five kicked Ruby onto his back. He punctuated each word with a well-placed kick to the kidneys, ribs, stomach. “Don’t be predictable, don’t be predictable, don’t share the same drink every single meal and have the same damn schedule every night. You made me give up my brother when you couldn’t even do the same for your sister, and look what your carelessness has done to her. You’re bad at hiding your tracks, Rodolfo.”
“You’re bad at kicking.” Ruby struggled to rise but tilted his head toward Isidora. “I suppose this is about that nonsense with your brother then?”
Five slapped Ruby with the broad side of the sword. Ruby went flying, arms weak and legs trembling. I inhaled, drawing myself fully into the window, and gripped the glass tighter. Ruby collapsed.
“Nonsense!” Five yanked Ruby’s hands in front of them and crushed Ruby’s wrists under his boots. “You stripped his arms before you took his head. He was alive.”
“Yes, he lived through a flaying like the victims of his shadows did. Very poetic of me.” Ruby beckoned Winter forward and away from Isidora—never looking at me, but he had to know I was here, had to be hyperaware of everything happening. “But what are you doing here?”
Good. Keep talking.
Winter shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”
Five ripped off Ruby’s mask and punched him.
“This is it?” Ruby laughed and spat out a tooth. “We at least thought you were going for an assassination, but revenge?”
Five punched him again, and Ruby’s neck snapped back.
“This is petty!” Ruby cackled, a spray of pink coloring the air with each word. “All that work for this?”
I shuddered as Ruby’s high-pitched, echoing laughter rang in my ears. Five sucked in a breath, shoulders rising, and I knew that look, knew the tightness of his muscles and shuddering desire for vengeance in his fingers. I lunged, and he slashed his sword. Blood splattered across my face.
I slammed the water glass into Five’s temple, ducked, and ripped a knife from his side. He crumbled.
“I’d scream, but you’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Ruby slammed a shoulder into Five, knocking him back to the floor, and rose to his knees. His right hand hung from his wrist, fingers still and tendons snapped. The left arm was red as dawn and soaked. No magic left to stitch the artery shut. No chance he’d live through this night. “Your brother Celso screamed. I thought his throat would tear with so much sobbing, but he kept going, one new curse for each new cut till I took his head. And not one word was an apology to his shadows’ victims.”
I kicked Five’s sword away from him. He opened his mouth, hands reaching for his knives, and I jammed my stolen blade into his neck. He fell to his knees, gurgling. Ruby turned toward the sword.
“You’re terrible.” Ruby groaned and collapsed against me. “Never discard better weapons.”
“Knife down.” Winter leveled Five’s sword with my heart, stance perfect—everything Ruby always demanded I be—and stepped forward. “You’re what happened to my handkerchief, aren’t you?”
Ruby sighed. No world without magic could return the blood he’d lost. He looked at me, mask gone and face smeared with red, dark eyes glazed. He mouthed, “Improvise.”
Winter raised his sword.
Lady, let Elise understand.
I shoved Ruby in front of him. The sword tore through his stomach, ripping a hole from navel to spine. Winter paused, stunned with the blade stuck in Ruby, and I punched his throat. He stumbled. I ripped the knife from Five’s neck and lunged.
“Stop!”
We froze. Winter turned slowly, mouth open in shock. I didn’t, couldn’t look.
“What is this?” Elise asked, breaths coming fast and scared. “What have you done?”
Forty-Eight
The cloying scent of blood-soaked silk seeped through my mask. A steady drip echoed in the silence, keeping my eyes fixed to the growing red stain on Winter’s shoulder. My knife trembled against his neck, nothing between him and death except Elise’s voice. I couldn’t look at her, couldn’t see her face twisted into rage. Winter dropped his arm.
“Elise,” said Winter as Ruby slid off his sword and collapsed at his feet.
“What is this?” She stepped forward, voice breathy and small. Her footsteps were loud in my ears. “Opal?”
I shifted, still and cold under her gaze. Winter sighed.
“Darling, this brute—”
“No, not you,” Elise said quickly. “He knows me better and wouldn’t insult me by lying. His knife may be at your neck, but your sword was in my friend. I know this has nothing to do with Opal or me. Nicolas was the one who was called, but he sent me in his stead.”
Winter stiffened. A flutter of warmth grew in my chest. Of course Elise was smarter than him—she hated politics, but she studied it. She’d know every trick ever used, and she’d handed me the missing piece. They’d wanted Nicolas too.
He’d been right. The shadow kill in the woods was only the start. This was all planned, all connected, and Erlend was making a play for Our Queen’s crown by making her look weak. If she’d never banished magic, if she’d never freed us of the shadows, if she’d let her most trusted advisors bring back those horrors, everyone would hate her. Igna would be no more.
The one person we’d trusted to protect us from monsters had lied all along. That was all Erlend would need to say. Anyone unhappy for any reason—Our Queen’s fault or not—would lose faith.
“So your daughter or your plot?” Elise asked, squaring her shoulders at him.
Winter sighed. “You are too young to remember life under a good ruler. You will understand with time.”
“I’m too young to remember?” Elise laughed, hollow and high, and let out a shuddering breath. “My childhood memories are of soldiers and funeral pyres, air so thick with ash I could taste their souls. And you would bring that back? For what?”
“For us!” Winter stepped back, forcing me to step farther away from Elise too. “We are worse off under that woman than we have ever been, and sacrifices to repair the balance must be made. She would see us ruined.”
“She would see us equal.” Elise, eyes narrowed to furious slits and cheeks flushed, glanced at Isidora. She stared at her, unable to look at Winter. I knew that look, that disgust. “You would throw aside peace hard-won for personal gain, and I will not help you.”
She’d understand.
“Tell her what else you did.” I licked my lips, heart heavy but so ready to draw out my second confession, like pus from a wound. “To Nacea.”
Winter and Elise both looked at me, confusion clear on their faces. He shook his head.
I scraped the knife up his jaw, drawing blood. “Tell her about Nacea, Winter.”
He flinched at the name. Elise moved toward us.
“Nacea? The old coast territory?” She shook her head. “What does he have to do with it?”
“Everything.” I flicked my blade up and scratched a thin line along the edge of his face.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Winter.
“I found your name with Horatio del Seve’s, and I know your circle was in charge of directing troops.” I looked at Elise, fully seeing her for the first time, and wanted to rip off my damned mask so she could see the hurt and truth in my eyes. See my apology for what I wanted to do to her father. “Tell her, or she’ll hear it from me when you’re dead.”
“The shadows were drawing closer to Erlend—”
“The shadows you released among Alona’s civilians.” I swallowed, unable to stop my disgust from
seeping into the words.
“And we chose to withdraw a few troops from Nacea so they could protect Erlend.” He leaned away from my knife. He was too calm, too steady with this happening, and he stared over my shoulder, never at me. “Nacea’s lack of an army unfortunately meant they were ill prepared, and many failed to evacuate in time.”
“Yes, we were very ill prepared for the shadows you didn’t warn us about.” I glanced at Elise, trying to say as much as I could with the motion since I still wore my mask. “I’m sorry.”
“You shouldn’t be,” she said. “He should. I might be too young to remember the politics, but I remember our agreements with Nacea.”
We both fell silent under the cutting, cold voice of Elise. She was utterly unrecognizable in her horror—eyes wide, lips twisted into a sneer, and body reeling back from her father like physical distance could erase the past between them.
“Darling.” Winter recovered before me, sweeping the sword he’d gutted Ruby with to one side. “You really can’t believe—”
“I can believe whatever I damn well please, and if it’s anyone’s fault for making your hand in a massacre seem plausible, it’s you.” She glanced between him and Isidora, gaze falling on Ruby’s crumpled body, before finally looking at me. “Nacea?”
“Nacea had no protection except Erlend soldiers.” I swallowed, the words heavy on my tongue. “And the Erlend lords decided that when the shadows got close, they’d buy time to fortify their lands by withdrawing their soldiers and letting the shadows tear through us like battle fodder. And the names in the letters planning the massacre were North Star, Deadfall, Riparian, Caldera, Coachwhip, and Winter.”
Elise sniffed. She shook her head and leaned back, failing to keep the tears at bay.
“I’m so sorry,” I said quickly. “I never wanted to take your father from you. I never would, but he took my whole family, my whole world. I’m sorry. I am. And this, I didn’t do this.”
I gestured weakly to Ruby’s blood splattered across the room, praying she’d understand.
“I have always done what is best for you and our family, and that woman is not it!” shouted Winter.
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