by Sara Raasch
The stairwell folded into a hall. One more hall led to another staircase, and at the top of that, Brigitte’s footsteps stopped. Metal jingled, thin and light—keys. Mather waited a few steps back, bracing himself for soldiers, arrows . . . Angra.
He clenched and unclenched his hands, staring sightlessly down at them in the blackness. He had killed Angra himself. He had broken the deranged king’s conduit on Abril’s ground and seen his body vanish.
What had that truly done to him?
Brigitte opened a door. Mather forced his eyes to adjust, lingering long enough for the yellow light to reveal a little of the room beyond: a thick scarlet rug, a short table, blue walls. No soldiers that he could see.
Brigitte stepped inside and Mather followed, a beat behind.
“Grandmamma!” came a child’s cry.
They were in a bedroom filled with mahogany furniture—a table and chairs, a wide bed, a few armoires positioned between floor-to-ceiling tapestries. This door stood behind one such tapestry while two more doors waited closed at other points in the room, unhidden.
Brigitte was the mother of Jesse Donati, the Ventrallan king. The king Mather had watched go from weak to infuriated and back while his wife seized control of his kingdom. The king who sat on a padded chair before Mather now, one child in his lap, another clinging to his arm as if it were a barrier she could hide behind.
A third child, the oldest but not by much, toddled forward. “Grandmamma,” she said again, tears tumbling over her lace mask.
Brigitte stroked the girl’s dark curls and looked over her shoulder at Mather. “I’ll help you leave, but you’ll take my son and grandchildren with you.”
The Ventrallan king rose. The daughter who had been hiding behind him instantly latched onto his leg, and the boy in his arms, not more than a year old, stared with wide, calm eyes from behind a small green mask.
Phil moved beside Mather, and he felt the rest of the Thaw gather around. All the time they had spent in their clandestine trainings in Jannuari had let him learn each of them by heart, and he didn’t need to look to know Trace’s fingers twitched over his empty knife sheaths; Eli squared his jaw in a mimic of the glowers around him; Kiefer hesitated near the back, watching, cautiously ready to help; and Hollis and Feige hovered, quiet, on the edge of the group.
It was Dendera, Conall, and Nessa whom Mather had to check on. Dendera had her arms around Nessa, freeing Conall to stand alert, his face gray and hard. His brother had died as unexpectedly as Alysson.
Mather turned away from him. He wouldn’t let his own grief rise any higher. Hopefully Conall could keep himself under control too.
“Mother,” Jesse said, his surprise palpable even from behind his mask. “Who are—”
“Do we have a deal?” Brigitte asked Mather.
Mather narrowed his eyes. “You’re saving us?” He had little to no experience with children, but even he could tell that getting them out of the palace would be nearly impossible.
Someone in his group stepped forward. Mather expected it to be Dendera—she, of all of them, was the most capable with children, but when Mather turned, he blinked in surprise.
Nessa faced Brigitte. “Of course we have a deal.”
Mather had been on the verge of saying the same thing. Impossible or no, they wouldn’t leave children here, defenseless. What surprised Mather was the ease with which Nessa moved forward and knelt in front of the oldest girl.
“Hi there,” she said. “I’m Nessa. And that’s my brother, Conall.”
Conall gaped when his sister pointed up at him, but he managed a small bow at the princess.
“Melania,” the girl told Nessa, rolling her l on an awkward tongue.
The smile Nessa gave her was impossibly soft for someone whose eyes still looked so haunted. “Well, Melania, how would you like to go on an adventure?”
Melania looked up at her grandmother. Brigitte’s sternness melted as she smiled, and Melania placed her small fingers in Nessa’s outstretched hand.
Things happened quickly after that. Brigitte pulled blankets and other meager supplies out of her armoires; Dendera and, more surprising still, Hollis eased forward to coax the other two children into coming on the same “adventure.”
The room began to hum with movement, but the Ventrallan king stayed motionless before his chair. He didn’t hold his son anymore—the boy now clung to Hollis—but instead stared at the floor with jaw-clenched ferocity.
“I have to go after her,” the king said suddenly, echoing Mather’s own looping thoughts.
Mather picked a dagger from the supplies, unsure of how to respond. No one else said a word. “Your wife sided with Angra,” he tried. “Freeing her—”
“I don’t give a damn about Raelyn,” the king snapped, and something in his words made Brigitte, across the room, stop folding a blanket.
“No. I will not let you get yourself killed for—”
“For whom?” The king whirled on his mother. “You’ve called her many things over the years. Useless, harmful—a whore. But it would seem Raelyn is the one who most strongly embodies those attributes. So do not tell me not to go after Ceridwen.”
By the time he finished, the room was silent. Mather felt that name dredge up memories of Meira’s parting words. She had told him to save Ceridwen. Why would the Ventrallan king care about the Summerian princess too?
But the look on the king’s face told Mather exactly why he cared.
Brigitte’s lips puckered. She didn’t utter another word before her son removed his dark green mask and pointed it at her.
“I’m not leaving until I break this mask and save Ceridwen.”
Mather frowned. “Break your mask?”
The king didn’t miss a beat, as though he had repeated this explanation to himself many times. “To break one’s mask in the presence of someone you reject is an act of permanent separation. To say that you are finished with them in your life, so much so that you do not worry about them seeing your true face. You’ll never see them again, so your secrets are nothing in their hands.”
Mather nodded. It mattered little what the king wanted to do, honestly—if Jesse intended to confront his wife and save Ceridwen, Mather would follow, especially if it meant he could complete one of the tasks Meira had entrusted to him.
“Everyone else should escape while they can,” Mather said, aiming the order at his group. “I’ll accompany the king out of the palace. There’s something I need to do as well.”
“You’re leaving us too?” Kiefer snapped.
But Phil stepped forward, his eyes on Mather’s. “He’s going after our queen.”
Mather bowed his head in response. He expected more protest, but all that met him was silence, even from Kiefer. They realized the seriousness of Meira’s situation—how she had left with someone none of them knew, and could at this moment be fighting for her life. . . .
Thankfully, Dendera picked up where he could not. “Bring her back. The rest of us”—she shrugged toward his Thaw, Nessa, and Conall—“will get the children to safety.”
And then what? Mather held back the question, because he knew the answers too well. They would have to face the Cordellan takeover of Winter and whatever Angra was doing to the world, and bringing Meira back would put her at the center of those conflicts.
But she was the queen. She was his queen. Whatever she wanted Winter to do in this brewing war, he would obey—but never again would he leave her to face any conflict alone.
Dendera turned to Brigitte. “How do we leave?”
It took visible force for Brigitte to look away from her son, and when she did, she ran a hand along her own mask as if making sure it was still in place. “There’s another passageway, just through here,” she said, and moved to a different tapestry.
But as Dendera neared it, Nessa put a hand on her arm.
“Where will we go?” she whispered. Melania clutched Nessa’s skirts, burrowing into her, and Nessa straightened. “Winte
r is no longer safe.”
“There’s a Summerian refugee camp,” Jesse offered, “a day’s ride from where the Southern Eldridge Forest meets the Langstone River. You’ll be safe there.”
“Fine,” Dendera said. “We’ll steal some horses. A carriage, maybe, or a boat, and we’ll meet you there.” She pinned Mather with a gaze that told him it wasn’t a suggestion. He would make it, with Meira, to that camp.
Dendera shifted the princess in her arms as the king bade a final farewell to his daughter. A kiss on her forehead, then one each for his son and other daughter, quickly, as if he didn’t trust himself to linger over good-byes. When he turned away, his eyes were bloodshot, tears welling—there was pain on his face, but determination.
The king faced Brigitte, but she looked at Mather now. “Go down the way we came,” she told him. “At the second landing, turn left—there’s a door that will take you into the main hall.”
“Thank you,” Mather said as Dendera, Nessa, and Conall started moving for the other passage. Hollis held the Ventrallan prince, and it was plain on Hollis’s face as well as Feige’s that they knew they had to follow Dendera. The rest of the Thaw lingered, casting uncertain glances at Mather. He would have taken them in an instant if he didn’t need to travel quickly, even faster than they had traveled here from Winter. Plus, the children needed all the protection they could get—of the group, only Dendera had ever truly fought, though Conall looked as deadly as any soldier Mather had seen.
Mather still swallowed a pang of reluctance. He felt stronger with his Thaw. More complete.
Hollis broke the Thaw’s uncertainty with a grunt. “We will not be defeated,” he said, a quiet declaration—the same pledge from their training.
Mather smiled. “We will not be defeated.”
Hollis and Feige moved, with Eli closing in to coax his brother on. Kiefer jerked away and dove into the new passage, face dark, shoulders slumped.
Trace hesitated, sucking in a breath like he had questions prepared, but he just shrugged. “We’ll race you to the camp,” he teased with a flash of a smile.
Only Phil remained, motionless.
“Go,” Mather told him. “The others need you.”
Phil cocked a brow. “Sorry, Once-King—you’re stuck with me.”
“Phil, I’m serious.”
Any further protest shriveled in the way Phil looked at him. “We’re in this together. All of us. And if any of us splits off from the rest, he won’t go alone.”
Feige’s head whipped up from where she followed Hollis into the passage. “Or she.”
Phil smiled. “Or she. Point is, I’m coming with you.”
His grin was infectious, his confidence resolute.
Mather found himself relenting.
In truth, he was glad not to be alone.
Moments later, the door to the new passage shut with a soft thud, leaving Mather alone with Jesse, Phil, and Brigitte.
Brigitte arranged herself on a chair, wrinkled mouth pursed. Jesse stepped up to her as Mather moved back to the first passage. He waved Phil through and hesitated.
“Thank you,” Jesse said to his mother.
Brigitte shrugged. “Go. Raelyn will soon notice I had you moved to my chambers.”
The king wrapped his fingers around his mother’s shoulder with a delicate squeeze. Finally she looked up at him, the stoniness in her eyes dissipating in a tear-glazed rush.
“Go,” she whispered. “I’ll be fine.”
Mather’s throat swelled, and he looked away, eyes stinging.
Jesse pushed himself past Mather, into the passage.
Brigitte adjusted her gown and leveled her eyes at the door Raelyn would no doubt barrel through at any moment with a retaliation just as harsh as the one she had dealt the Summerian king. Mather had seen only the end of that fight, the Summerian king’s neck snapping, but that had been enough to confirm that Raelyn showed no mercy.
Mather ducked into the stairwell and shut the door behind him. The bolt clicked.
There was no going back now. For anyone.
3
Ceridwen
THE INSIDE OF Simon’s brothel wagon was musky with sweat and plumeria incense, the air hazy with smoke that hadn’t been ventilated properly, the floor covered by silk pillows and satin quilts. Ceridwen had never been inside one of her brother’s wagons, despite his endless prodding for her to “be a true Summerian” and join his exploits. As she drew her knees to her chin now, all she could hear were the teasing reprimands she had hated for so long.
And the grating pop of his neck when Raelyn had snapped it.
The wagon jostled, oxen tugging it through Rintiero’s streets, and Ceridwen let her body sway with it, too exhausted to fight its movements.
“Cerie.” Lekan crouched before her, wincing until he straightened his leg and dropped to the floor of the wagon. A gash cut across his knee, another stretched down his cheek, and she knew the rest of his body was just as covered in wounds. “Cerie—”
But his voice broke. What could he say? What could she say?
Ceridwen closed her eyes. In her mind, Simon’s face flared purple from Raelyn’s choking magic.
“Stop . . . Raelyn . . . leave her alone!”
Simon had pleaded for her life. Even though, minutes before, Ceridwen had barged into the square intent on murdering him herself.
And before she had been able to utter more than a feeble croak of protest, his head had jolted to the side, cracking his life away with it.
Ceridwen opened her eyes.
Lekan tore a section of blanket and worked at wiping the blood off her arms.
“Leave it,” she bit through clenched teeth.
He didn’t listen. “He was your brother. You loved him,” he whispered quietly.
Ceridwen’s muscles turned to stone. “I hated him.”
Lekan’s fingers tightened around the ragged strip of satin and he scrubbed harder at her shoulder. He stayed silent, eyes on his work, like he was just a normal slave and she a normal princess and the stains on her body weren’t her brother’s blood.
Ceridwen stared at the splatters. Raelyn’s joy had been demented as she had ordered Simon’s head to be severed. And as a soldier had begun sawing at her brother’s neck, Ceridwen hadn’t been able to back away from the blood that had spurted under the pressure of the knife.
Simon was dead. His body, decapitated before her.
Ceridwen shoved Lekan away and tried to scramble to her feet. The shortness of the wagon’s roof made it impossible and her back cut along the stained ceiling. She toppled forward, wrists popping as they caught her weight, the wagon rocking with her frenzy.
“Quiet in there!” a Ventrallan soldier shouted from outside.
Ceridwen leaped up again and slammed her whole body into the side of the wagon until it teetered even more, but it didn’t break stride as it continued to haul them through the city. She screamed, reared back, slammed again, because if she didn’t let it out in some form, her body wouldn’t be able to sustain the misery within her.
She shouldn’t feel miserable for Simon’s death. She had wanted him to die—she had wanted him to feel just a piece of the terror he inflicted on his slaves. She had wanted that damned eternal smile of his to burn out so that he’d weep for forgiveness instead of brightening at the sight of her.
Ceridwen choked, sobs twisting in her throat.
He always brightened when he saw her. He’d smile like she was his favorite person in all of Summer, and that made her whole body feel like it was incinerating. She remembered when he’d first met Meira in his brothel in what should have been some show of politics, but his primary concern had been where Ceridwen was, whether he could see her.
Flame and heat, he had always loved her, even as he destroyed their kingdom and drove their people to destitution. She had wanted, more than anything, for him to hate her, because—
Then, maybe, she could hate him.
Lekan clamped his arms aroun
d Ceridwen and jerked her down as a blade shot through the narrow window, the one that had been boarded up shortly after they were tossed inside. A flash of silver licked the air above Ceridwen’s head.
The remnants of her screams made her throat raw, pain shooting through her mouth. It was fitting for sorrow to hurt, especially this sorrow, this . . . betrayal.
That was what it was. She had turned her back on Simon. And he had still loved her.
Ceridwen desperately clutched Lekan, unable to relax for fear of what she might do again. There was nothing left in her, very little that Raelyn could take from her. Ceridwen had given up Jesse hours before, and now Raelyn had taken Simon and Summer, too.
But no, it hadn’t been Raelyn. It had been Angra, if Raelyn’s mad ramblings were to be believed. Ceridwen found herself wishing it was all Raelyn. She hadn’t the slightest idea how to go about undoing what Angra had done. She didn’t even entirely know the extent of all that had happened—he had given Raelyn magic. He had given Simon the power to control non-Summerians.
This war was so much bigger than her. Corrupt kings, she could handle; but this? Dark magic and webs of evil that stretched through all of Primoria?
Terror threatened to cripple her, but she inhaled the smoky, nauseatingly sweet air, using Lekan to orient herself.
“Meira got away,” she told him, because she needed to believe it. “She’ll stop . . . this.”
One of Lekan’s arms unhooked from her and dropped with a thud against the wagon floor. He flexed his fingers, rubbed his injured leg, and hissed in pain at one of the movements.
Ceridwen ripped sections from another quilt and made a pathetic compress before Lekan could protest. She tightened it over his knee and rubbed her hands on her thighs, working rational thoughts back into her mind.
“They locked the doors?” she asked, more of herself than him.
Lekan adjusted the compress. “Raelyn left five guards for us, took the rest with her.” He paused, and Ceridwen knew what other piece of information flitted through his mind that he didn’t voice aloud.