by K. A. Linde
“How did you survive the attack?”
“Good fortune.”
“I just passed through to see it. I can’t imagine how you could have made it out of the castle. It was demolished.” He ran a hand back through his messy hair.
“With luck, we had left the castle and were on our way to a neighboring island for a name day ceremony. We heard the first attack and made it out of the city before it reached us.”
“We?” Dean asked. Hope bloomed in his chest, but he didn’t want to acknowledge it.
“That’s why I came to collect you.”
“How did you know where I was?”
Darmian grinned and nodded toward the door. “I’ve known you your entire life, Captain. When I heard of a sailor dressed finely, wandering around the market district, I hazarded a guess. A hopeful one.”
Dean shook his head. “Only you would figure all of that out from such little information.”
“I swore an oath to protect you. That hasn’t changed. With you gone, it nearly killed me the last couple of months, but I did the best I could.”
“You’re alive,” Dean said. “That’s good enough for me.”
They exited Dean’s room, and Darmian directed them out of the inn. They walked down the crowded market streets. Even this late at night, Rasine hadn’t gone to sleep. It was a busy fishing town with the wealthiest district besides the former capital. With the capital gone, the wealthy had just become even wealthier.
“They can still drink and party, despite all that has happened,” Dean muttered.
“I think…because of what happened, Captain.”
“Darmian, how many times have I asked you to call me Dean?”
“Titles are important, sir.”
Dean supposed he was right. They moved out of the market district and into one of the more ramshackle parts of town. After a few blocks, Darmian drew Dean down a back alley and through a defaced door.
“Where have you taken me?” Dean asked as he followed him through.
But he stopped dead in his tracks when he saw who was waiting for him.
“Hello, dear brother,” Brigette said with a strained smile.
“Your Majesty,” he said with a bow.
“Oh, come here!” She pulled him into a hug and seemed to collapse into his weight. “We are the only two left.”
“I thought you were gone, too,” he whispered in horror. “Why are you in this hovel and not sitting on the throne?”
She glanced at Darmian. “No one knows I’m alive. I was worried…well, Darmian was worried that there would still be a target.”
“You let the Anders and Mayhews threaten our queendom?” Dean asked.
“We were waiting for the right time,” Darmian interjected. “We have been rallying support behind the Ellison banner. If we had the pair of you together, it would be an even better claim.”
“What claim?” Dean demanded. “You are the rightful ruler of Eleysia. No one could challenge your claim.”
“It is always better to go into a fight with a trained warrior at your side,” Brigette said. “You will be at my side, right? Your ex-fiancée sent her dogs after us, and now, we’re ruined. I need you.”
“Cyrene didn’t do this,” Dean said. “The king and prince of Byern did this after I saved her from court.”
“It appears that you have a habit of doing that.”
“She wasn’t a part of Mother’s and Father’s deaths.”
“Death follows that girl everywhere!” Brigette snapped.
“She wasn’t in on the plot, and she didn’t know that Edric would retaliate. You can lay the blame at my feet if you prefer. Cyrene is innocent.”
“You defend her? After all of this? After our parents and then ten of our siblings were slaughtered along with all of our nieces and nephews and thousands of Eleysian citizens?”
“I put the blame where it’s due—on the Byern throne. And I think it’s time to take the fight to them,” Dean said.
“I agree wholeheartedly,” Brigette said with a wicked smile. “I cannot believe I ever considered diplomacy. I’m ready to take back my throne and topple those bastards and whoever else thought they could tear us down.”
“Is it just me, or does this place feel…alive?” Ahlvie whispered, hunching over his horse and peering into the trees.
“No, it’s not just you,” Cyrene said. “I sense it, too.”
“The city has been abandoned for millennia. Civil war tore it asunder. Thousands of Leifs were killed in the great battle, and Isola was ripped inside out. What you are feeling is all the death and slaughter,” Avoca said before heeling her horse forward.
“Well, on that pleasant note,” Ahlvie said.
He followed behind Avoca regardless. Orden trotted after them, probably to make sure they wouldn’t rip out each other’s throats.
Cyrene turned to Matilde and Vera, who were conferring with one another. “How did you know to bring us here?”
“We were able to reconfigure the coin to portal us to a different door. I’ve done it in the past,” Matilde said. “Though it was always when I was standing at the gate myself. I’ve never had an independent portaling talisman. So, I wasn’t sure if it would work.”
“But we knew that Isola had a gate, and it would be the least likely to have people around it. Also, it was the closest to the human settlement in Alba,” Vera said.
“The capital city of Kell?” Cyrene gasped. “We just traveled all the way across the world in one step?”
“The joys of portaling,” Matilde said with a keen smile.
Cyrene shook her head in disbelief. It was unbelievably efficient. She couldn’t imagine walking all the way anywhere ever again. Not if she could just open a door and walk straight through it to wherever she wanted to go. Or at least anywhere where there was a portal.
“Cyrene,” Vera said, “will you take a look at this?”
She turned to face the twins again and peered over Vera’s shoulder. She was holding the two coins in her hands.
“Did you figure out what the words mean?” Cyrene asked.
“No,” Matilde said irritably. “Vera is the scholar though.”
“You always were the politician, which baffles me.” Vera grinned at her sister. “What we wanted you to look at is whether or not you see any differences. We were able to change the location of our portal with Maelia’s coin, but this one, the one you received in your dream, it doesn’t seem to work. Or if it does work, it will not let either of us open it up.”
Cyrene frowned. “Do you think I should try it?”
Matilde shook her head. “If it were a regular portal, it would open up for us as well. It should open up for anyone with enough energy to power it.”
“We worry about this woman you described. If Serafina was trying to keep you away from her, I’m not sure we should use the coin she handed to you,” Vera said. “It might be best to wait until we have more information.”
Cyrene nodded. “I won’t use it.”
She understood where they were coming from, but she didn’t know how long it would take for her to access her spirit magic. But using the coin and possibly meeting the woman that Serafina was warning her against didn’t sound like her idea of a good time.
Vera handed the coin over to Cyrene, and she observed the front. It didn’t feel any different. Holding the coins in each hand, she couldn’t see anything at all that marked them differently. The only difference was that one had been given to Maelia by Kael and one was given to Cyrene by a strange woman. If it couldn’t open or work for the twins it had to be because of that.
“Nothing. I’m sorry,” she said, passing them back.
“We wondered,” Matilde said with a pensive look, “if we might be able to put you under in a sort of trance. It seems that your visions hit you when you are at your most vulnerable, like after passing out or during your blood magic detox. We could see if we could put you into a state where you could communicate with Serafina bef
ore you mastered spirit.”
“You could ask her more questions, and you might be more prepared if you can control when you enter the vision,” Vera added.
Cyrene’s face split in two. “Absolutely! I would love to be able to get more answers. She was always worried about having enough time. We were always getting torn apart. I think it would be—”
But she didn’t get to say what she thought because a savage war cry went up all around them.
Cyrene instantly reached for her magic, calling it to her with ease after hours and hours of practice. It still wasn’t perfect. She still had her moments of weakness. Sometimes, she could even feel the craving of the blood magic seeping through her, but right now, she was in her element.
They rushed as a unit to where they had had heard the cry. Ceffy broke through the tree line, and Cyrene gaped at what she saw before her. The view was stunning. Isola stood on the top of a long, sloping hill. From so high up, they could see all the way down the grassy slopes to Lake Mische, which was so large that it was impossible to see the other side from any point around its mystical depths.
But even more shocking were the thirty or so warriors clad in all black, surrounding Avoca, Ahlvie, and Orden. Avoca’s wrists were bound before her. Cyrene could feel her holding on to her magic tight, but there was something…odd about it. It didn’t feel quite right. Ahlvie and Orden, it seemed, had been completely disarmed, which was truly incredible. Both were excellent swordsmen. Ahlvie was practically rippling as he tried to control himself from turning into an Indres.
Cyrene was about to move forward to attack, not even caring that they were all clearly outnumbered, but Matilde reached for her.
“No,” she whispered.
Vera was stark white in shock, but her voice was strong. “We mean you no harm. We believed the area to be deserted. If you will release our friends, we will leave here and never speak of this meeting.”
A man as broad-shouldered and muscular as Cyrene had ever seen moved forward to take point. “Unfortunately, we cannot allow that to happen. Your people must suffer the consequences for attacking a Guild member and trespassing.”
“What are the consequences?” Matilde asked, docilely holding her hands before her.
“That is up to the leaders to decide.” He nodded his head at a few of the people to his left. “Tie them up. We’ll see what the Honorary has to say about this.”
“What should we do?” Cyrene hissed.
“Nothing,” Vera said.
“What the hell do you mean, nothing?”
“If we act, they will kill the others.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because we’ve encountered them before,” Matilde said. “Many years ago. Many, many years ago.”
Vera sighed. “We left them unchecked, and the problem has only gotten worse. I knew that we should have come to Kell sooner. Two hundred years is too long between visits.”
“Don’t try to blame this on me,” Matilde said.
“You do hate the snow.”
“Everyone hates the snow.”
“Can you two stop it for one minute?” Cyrene snarled. “Who are these people?”
A man approached her to tie her up, and she retreated away from him. She was not going to go down easy for nothing.
“Do not touch me,” she warned.
The man gave her a piercing look. “You are only making this harder on yourself.”
“Thanks for the tip,” she said before shooting past him and blasting her way through the first row of people in her attempt to reach her friends.
She made it as far as the incredibly built man before she was thoroughly knocked off her horse with a blast of something so sharp that it felt as if her entire body had been sliced open. She cried out as she hit the ground and rolled out of the blow. She stared down at the dress she’d worn out of Tahne, expecting to see a slash down the fabric…but there was nothing.
Her mouth opened wide in shock as she stared at the man. He’d dismounted in the time that it took her to get her bearings again.
“What did you just do?” she gasped.
The man flicked back his hood, and she stared up into his churning gray eyes. His dark hair was pulled back into a topknot. From top to bottom, he was sculpted and etched and chiseled into a weapon.
“Someone should teach you some manners.” He snatched up her wrists and bound them in a tight black rope.
She struggled against him, but after the knot was tied…she couldn’t seem to manage it. She reached for her powers, but nothing was there. She could sense her magic. It hadn’t been stripped from her, but it was out of her reach.
“What is this?” she demanded.
“A necessary precaution, spitfire,” he said with a cocky grin. “Now, get on your horse, and try to keep your tongue under control, or you might have another tumble, and I might not be so gentle next time.”
Cyrene glared at him, and called him a pretty spectacular list of vulgar names, but he grabbed her by the waist and threw her back up onto Ceffy. Ceffy bucked against him, and he just laughed. He stroked her nose twice and then gave her a treat from his own bag. Ceffy sidled right up to him after that.
Traitor.
The Guild, as they called themselves, pushed them into a single file line. Matilde and Vera willingly offered up their hands to be tied, but Cyrene had no idea why. How could they want to be taken away from their magic?
But she never got a chance to ask. The big, muscular brute had decided she was the troublemaker, which wasn’t entirely wrong, rode next to her.
“Where are you taking us?” Cyrene demanded.
He grinned at her. All feral predator and barely contained aggression. “To the Guild leader.”
“You’re not the leader? I’m shocked.”
“I lead these people but not everyone.”
“How many more of you are there?”
He pulled his hood back up. “Trying to assess our numbers won’t help you.”
Cyrene humphed. “Are you at least going to tell me your name?”
“Names are very expensive,” he said with a look that said he wasn’t joking. “What will you give me for it?”
“What do you want for it?” she asked, befuddled.
This man was even more confusing than Ahlvie, and that was a feat.
“Don’t ask questions you won’t like the answer to, spitfire.”
Cyrene snapped her mouth closed. Perhaps antagonizing their leader wasn’t a good place to start. But she couldn’t believe that they had been outmaneuvered so efficiently. Who are these Guild people? What are they doing in Isola? And what did they want with us?
She got no answers the hours that they trekked through the forest around Isola and out onto the open plains that led toward Alba. They came upon the sprawling city at twilight, and Cyrene barely got to see anything. As soon as they were inside the grounds, a hood was thrown over each of their heads. Cyrene swore at their leader when he did it, but he chuckled and hurled insults back at her.
Cyrene tried to memorize all the twists and turns they were taking, but it seemed they were purposely taking her on an indirect route. Soon, she lost track and sat back hard into Ceffy with frustration. She was lost, imprisoned, and without access to her magic.
Finally, they entered a room, and their hoods were ripped off. Cyrene’s eyes adjusted to the dim lighting. They were in a cavernous room about the size of three ballrooms back home. At least a hundred people were inside. Almost all of them were fighting or going through some kind of exercise. A few trainers walked around the room and made corrections.
But, from what Cyrene could gather…all of them had magic.
Every. Single. One.
“How is this possible?” she whispered.
Her new friend shook his head and dragged her past the trainees. They moved to the front of the room where a panel of men and women were watching what was going on with keen eyes.
“Good to have you back, Commander
,” a man said. “Though it is unexpected. Did your men complete the exercise so quickly?”
“Unfortunately, our operation was cut short due to these six trespassers on Guild land.”
A woman raised a highly arched eyebrow. “You allowed six people into your camp? How?”
“They appeared out of nowhere. We had wards up, and they didn’t trigger them until they were already in the heart of Guild territory.”
“Hmm,” the woman said, tapping her finger to her mouth. “Interesting.”
“Who speaks for these people?” a man with a thick, bushy mustache asked.
“I do,” Cyrene spoke up.
She heard a groan from behind her. Yes, she was sometimes rash, but these were her people. She had brought them here, and she would put herself in the line of fire for them.
“Very well. What are you doing in Guild territory, and why were you trespassing on our ancient grounds?”
“We were unaware that this was Guild territory. By the time we realized it, we were ambushed and dragged here against our will,” Cyrene told them.
“This girl,” he said, pointing to Avoca, “injured one of my men as well.”
The woman’s mouth popped open in surprise. “A mere human managed to touch one of you?”
“She has Guild energy,” he added reluctantly. “Along with these three. We have them tied off, so they can’t do anything rash.”
“Four foreigners with the energy,” the man said, “and they just happened onto Guild property while you were there. That seems rather suspect. Are the lords conspiring again? I would love to cut off Dahl’s head and deal with his arrogant but obedient son.”
“Truly, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Cyrene said. “We were simply passing through.”
“What she says is true,” Matilde cut in. “We submitted to your men without a fight.”
The commander scoffed.
“It was a mistake, and it will not happen again. We thought that the area had been abandoned for some time,” Vera added.
The woman held up her hand. “Foreign trespassers are subject to Guild law, as is everyone in the Triangle.”