by K. A. Tucker
“You mean my father and, yes, we both knew she would. The spineless lout would have ended up giving Ybaris to these demons.”
I school my expression. His father. But not Romeria’s?
“We thought you were dead,” Tyree says.
“Obviously, I’m not.”
“Has Ianca contacted you?”
“Ianca …” I repeat, absorbing that name to memory and making sure Zander catches it. “No.” Is that the traitor within the castle?
“She has escaped, along with another. With help from the casters. There were reports that they crossed into Skatrana, so we assume they are on their way here,” he mutters, more to himself.
Not the traitor within the castle, then. Someone from Ybaris? I bite my tongue against the urge to ask who this woman is. Princess Romeria would know. “Why would she come here?”
Loud voices carry on the other end of the dungeon block. Someone is demanding to be let through. It sounds like Atticus. It gives me an excuse to glance that way. Zander’s silhouette lingers behind the torchlight, but I don’t stall there, turning my attention back to Tyree. My window of opportunity to learn something useful is shrinking fast. I move in closer, and the pungent smell of a sour body and foul breath grows stronger. “The vials …”
“Being dispersed as we speak.”
My heart skips a beat. “How many have already gone out?”
“Not as many as we’d hoped. We distributed the last of ours in Bellcross. But it is harder than we anticipated, traveling among these demons. They can smell us from across the room.”
I don’t know if that’s a figure of speech, but it’s a question for Zander for later. Now, I need to focus. “And you’ve targeted the tributaries.” I keep my voice firm—a statement rather than a query.
“The tributaries, the cooks, the blacksmiths. Anyone willing. They are tired of having their kin taken from them.”
Anyone willing. That means this isn’t a case of tributaries being targeted, their blood tainted without their knowledge. They’re finding humans who will voluntarily take the poison. “What happened in Bellcross?”
He shrugs. “We misjudged her. Is it true, what I’ve heard about the marriage to the king?”
“Yes. Next Hudem.”
“So, the fool is still enchanted by you, despite everything you’ve done.” He chuckles darkly. “Obviously, he has not tried feeding on you yet.”
“No.” How does Tyree know about Margrethe’s invocation? Unless … the rumors are right and it wasn’t Margrethe’s invocation to begin with.
“I must get back to the men.”
“Where are they now?”
“Still in the mountains, waiting for my instruction. You must get me out of here.”
Zander was right. They’ve found a hiding place north of Lyndel. “I’m trying, but you poisoned Quill, and that makes it difficult. The royal guard is crawling all over this place.”
Tyree frowns. “Who?”
“Lord Quill, of Innswick. He was poisoned last night, right here in the royal grounds.”
“That wasn’t us. We haven’t risked coming back to Cirilea yet.”
“What about Kettling?” Maybe Adley got hold of a vial in his own city.
He shakes his head. “The river is vast and too well guarded. Who else did you give a vial to?”
I falter on my answer. It’s a mistake. I see it the moment his eyes narrow. “I shouldn’t be down here. This is a big risk.”
“Something is off. You aren’t yourself.” His gaze skitters over my face. “What have they done to you?”
A curse slips through my thoughts. If lies and ambiguity won’t work, half-truths might. “It’s the invocation. I have holes in my memory.”
“What kind of holes?”
“Big ones.”
Voices in the hall grow louder.
He hesitates. “Then you need to find Ianca. She might be able to explain this.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s the one who summoned Aoife for you. But after you get what you need, make sure you kill her—”
“Zander, we need to talk!” Atticus’s deep voice echoes down the corridor.
Tyree’s head snaps in the direction before shifting back to me. I recognize the change in his expression—from caution to complete distrust.
I’ve lost him.
“He’s here, isn’t he? Listening to us. He brought you here.”
The next few seconds happen in a blur.
The space between the bars is just wide enough for Tyree to shoot his forearm through. He seizes the back of my head and yanks me forward. Pain explodes in my nose and left eye as my face crashes into the iron.
“Traitor!” Tyree seethes, spittle spraying against my cheek. But then he releases me with a yelp and stumbles backward. A deceptively small orange flame skips over his pant leg.
Zander is suddenly beside me. “Who helped Romeria poison the king and queen?” he demands, leveling Tyree with a cold, lethal stare.
Tyree smacks his hand against his thigh, trying to extinguish the fire.
“Who was she working with inside these walls?” Zander roars, and the tiny flame multiplies, crawling over Tyree like fast-moving bugs, flaring brighter.
“She never told me!” Tyree’s teeth are gritted as he struggles to hold back the scream, until the flames have converged and engulf the frayed fabric covering his body. Any second now, his restraint will break, and the bloodcurdling shrieks will begin.
I am instantly transported back to a wooded area outside the city years ago, with a pyre and a woman’s relentless screams. “Stop,” I croak, my head swirling. Zander will burn him alive in his cell if this continues.
Zander ignores me. “Lord Muirn?”
“A stooge looking for more power,” Tyree hisses.
“Adley?”
“Would rather die than trust a Ybarisan!”
The smell of blistering skin turns my stomach. It won’t be long before my knees give out and I collapse. I reach for Zander, squeezing his forearm as hard as I can to get his attention. “Please. Stop.” It’s barely a whisper, but between that and my death grip, Zander finally notices me. Something registers in his eyes, and the flames extinguish.
Tyree collapses within his cell.
“Looks like you don’t need Abarrane to do your questioning for you,” Atticus says from behind us, his nose curled with disgust. The warriors let him through, but they trail him.
Zander’s focus is on me, his brow furrowed, and I can’t tell if it’s on account of my mangled face or the terror that consumes me.
“Brother—”
“What are you doing here?” Zander snaps.
Atticus holds up two scrolls. “Messages from Meadwell and Hawkrest.”
“They couldn’t wait?”
Atticus squares off against his brother. “No, they couldn’t, Your Highness.” It’s a sarcastic address, Atticus’s anger flaring.
Zander’s attention turns back to me. My nose is likely shattered, and my left eye is swelling shut, a steady stream of blood gushes down my lip. Yet there’s something oddly warm in his gaze.
“Let’s get you fixed up,” he whispers, slipping an arm around my shoulders in a protective move that I’m in too much pain to shrink away from.
The Legion warriors fall back against cell doors, allowing us room to pass.
“What about him?” Atticus asks, nodding toward the cell.
“He will heal. Eventually.”
With a shrug, Atticus leads the way down the corridor. The commotion has stirred the prisoners. Soiled faces peek out from behind the bars, their forlorn eyes on my bloodied face.
“Did you get anything out of him?” Atticus asks.
“Nothing of use,” Zander answers without missing a beat.
I wouldn’t call what Tyree told us of no use—far from it—but it’s a conversation better had when a dozen ears can’t listen in.
To the Legion soldiers trailing us out, Z
ander commands, “Move him to the tower. No one is to see or talk to him unless I am present. Under no circumstances. No one.”
Atticus peers over his shoulder, his attention on me now. “Do you wish to parade her through the castle looking like that?”
Zander sighs with resignation. “No.”
Atticus nods at the guard as we exit through the main door, but instead of ascending the stairs, he reaches for the panel of weapons mounted on the wall. It swings open with a creak.
Even wrapped in the throbbing pain of my face, I feel a spike of delight at the discovery of a secret passage.
“Tell Elisaf to send for Wendeline,” Zander instructs his brother before guiding me in. Behind us, the hidden door shuts with a loud thud, throwing us into inky darkness. The air is dank from lack of ventilation and oddly cool.
“You can’t see anything at all, can you?” Zander asks.
“No?” I wouldn’t be able to, even if my left eye wasn’t swollen shut. “You can?”
“I told you already, Islorians are far superior to Ybarisans.” He shifts into me. I gasp with surprise as he collects me in his arms, sweeping my legs from under me. “I’d prefer not to spend the day crawling behind the castle walls,” he explains, pulling me tight against his chest. “Stay close to me. The passage is narrow.”
I curl my body in as we move forward at what feels like a clipped pace.
To be able to see in the pitch-black … it reminds me of Sofie traversing those winding stairs down to her dungeon with such ease. In fact, there are many similarities between them besides that—her speed, the way she moves, her affinity to fire. A thought pricks me. She claimed she could navigate those stairs in her sleep because she used them every day, but what if it had nothing to do with that? She must be an elemental, but what else is she?
Could Sofie be like Ailill? An immortal elemental, bound to Malachi? It would explain the way she spoke of missing her husband, as if she hadn’t seen him in decades—or longer.
“What troubles you now?” Zander asks.
I hate that he’s able to read me the way he does. It makes something as simple as thinking dangerous. Part of me is growing tired of hiding my secret from him. Maybe I should tell him who I really am. Maybe Sofie was being paranoid. Maybe she was deceiving me as she did with the truth about the stone.
Or maybe telling Zander will change everything for the worst, just when things aren’t horrible between us. And they’re not, I admit, even given my current excruciating predicament. But I need to understand what I am and what my purpose here is before I trust anyone with the truth.
I need to find Ianca.
“Just wondering how often you’ve watched me in the dark.”
His low, deep chuckle vibrates inside me. “Only a few times. And I wasn’t the one skulking on your terrace the other night.”
“I wasn’t skulking,” I mutter weakly, leaning the uninjured side of my face against the crook of his neck.
He inhales deeply.
It triggers Tyree’s earlier words. “Can you smell our blood from across the room?”
“That is an exaggeration.”
“But it’s true?”
“Yes.”
“What does it smell like?” All I think about is the office in the back of the warehouse, with sprays of blood across the walls and a metallic tinge in the air.
“It’s a honeyed scent, with a hint of spice. Like neroli oil from the orange blossom.”
“So, it’s pleasant?”
He inhales again, as if prompted to do so. “Enough talking. You’re in pain.”
I am in pain. “How did he do so much damage with one hit?”
“You are weaker than my kind, but you are far from weak.”
I don’t feel strong right now. I focus on my breathing, anxious for any relief Wendeline might provide.
Zander slows and maneuvers me in his arms. A loud click and bang sounds, followed by the grating sound of stone.
I sense us stepping through another doorway, punctuated by the same stone sliding back into place. It reminds me of the church pew in the sanctum, grinding across the floor.
“Do not speak of what Tyree told you. To anyone. I must think first.”
I hum my agreement as we ascend stairs that I sense are steep and winding. I keep waiting for Zander’s pace to slow, his breathing to falter, but there is no sign of fatigue as we go up … up … up.
Zander fidgets with another lever. A clunk and thud of mechanics click into place, and then we’re stepping into a bedchamber.
My bedchamber.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“As good as new. And much easier to manage than some of your past injuries.” Wendeline holds up the mirror in front of me.
I scrunch my nose and wiggle it. Aside from a touch of stiffness that she promised would vanish by tomorrow and the dried blood on my lips and chin, no one would ever know that only hours ago, half my face had been shattered by my darling brother.
“Thank you.” I offer the priestess a genuine smile.
She returns it, though it’s laced with the exhaustion that comes after a healing—her eyelids drooping, the whites of her eyes tinged with red. “You would have healed within a week or so regardless, but I am always happy to speed up that process.”
I was eleven when I broke my ankle playing soccer. It took four weeks for it to heal. As much as I am loath to agree with Sofie, this elven body I’ve inhabited is superior to the human one I left behind.
“Sit down and have some tea, Priestess,” Corrin orders, pointing to the tray next to the settee and the pot she fetched when Wendeline set to work. “Let’s get you cleaned up.” Corrin sets a bowl of water on the table beside my chair and begins wiping away the streaks of blood with a damp cloth. Her touch is unusually gentle, her efforts motherly. For once, I don’t argue or begrudge the attention, my focus intent on my bed and the secret passage I now know hides behind it. Zander was reluctant to reveal it to me. I don’t blame him. How the mechanism unlocks from this side is still a trick I need to figure out, but I am determined.
“I hope the visit with your brother was worth all this.” She dabs under my nostril.
“We’ll see what Zander thinks.” It’s the safest answer, and it reveals nothing.
A heavy knock sounds on the door to my suite, followed by Elisaf’s voice carrying through the sitting room. “Your Highness, the seamstress Dagny requests an audience.”
An audience—as if I’m someone important. Will I ever get used to this?
“What does she want now?” Corrin mutters, pausing in her ministrations to rush for my bedchamber door. “Her Highness will see to Dagny in the sitting room shortly. In the meantime, stop hollering at us like we’re animals in a barnyard. You know better,” she scolds, shutting the door with a thump. “A bloodied princess would make for delightful gossip, and there isn’t a soul in this castle that woman does not talk to on a daily basis.” She smooths the rag over my neck and chest.
Dagny can’t be that bad. “Have you ever tried just asking her to keep quiet about something?”
Corrin snorts. “That’s like dropping a bale of hay in front of a horse and asking it not to eat. Quickly now, into a fresh dress.”
“Your Highness! I have the most thrilling news!” Dagny announces, her knee practically grazing the stone floor in a curtsy as I approach. “The Silver Mage has arrived in time for the city fair. I’ve already sent word, tellin’ Odier that I’d be down to his booth in the morn to see the fine silks that were promised. Her Highness must be seein’ them before anyone else. I was thinkin’ why don’t ya come along? You could pick something ya like for those designs of yours. Or for your wedding gown.”
“To the market?”
“Yes, Your Highness! First thing in the morn, before the streets get busy. It’s the biggest market of the year. Lasts for ten days. People come from all over Islor to enjoy the wares, the delicious food. There are street buskers and actors in costume! The clothi
er section will be especially hectic.”
“I’d love to—”
“The future queen traipsing around with the commoners! Are you daft?” Corrin blurts.
The seamstress’s head bobs. “It was a thought. A silly one, of course. Albe always likes to tell me what a foolish woman I am—”
“It wasn’t silly at all, Dagny. I would love to go. We’ll see if we can make it work.” I shoot Corrin a warning glare, to which she lifts her stubborn chin but says nothing.
Dagny beams. “Also, here. I brought you these.” She collects a stack of folded cloth from the settee and hands them to me. “Made one in every fine cloth I could scrounge up.”
I finger through them. They’re capelets, of varying color, material, and style—some heavily detailed with embroidery and lace, others simple and unadorned. I count twelve in total. “These are gorgeous. This is … how did you make them all so fast?” And by hand.
Pink blossoms in her cheeks. “Oh, these take nothin’ to whip up. Nothing at all. And I’ve got me some keen helpers lookin’ to learn and eager to have a hand in somethin’ Her Highness might wear. But don’t worry. I watched their stitchwork like a mother hen, makin’ sure it was impeccable. I said nothin’ but the best for our future queen.”
“I’m sure they’re all perfect. Tell them thank you.”
Corrin swoops in to collect them from me. “I’ll hang these in your dressing room. If there’s nothing else, Dagny …” She disappears into the other room.
“Best get back to your gown, Your Highness.” Dagny marches away, her hips swinging with her determined steps.
An impulsive urge seizes me. I know this will probably be my only chance. I rush forward, grabbing her arm. “Dagny.” I glance over my shoulder to make sure Corrin’s not there and then lower my voice to ask, “Do you know anyone by the name of Ianca?”
Dagny’s brow creases as she shakes her head. “No, Your Highness. Can’t say I do. Is she here in the castle?”
“I don’t believe so.” If what Corrin says is right, Dagny would know if she was, unless she’s using an alias.
She hesitates, her eyes flipping to my bedroom doorway before she asks quietly, “Would you like me to ask around?”