by Mary Taranta
I realize my mother’s spell is still unwinding ahead of me, guiding me toward the manor house, which can only mean one thing: Merlock is inside.
Panicked, I grab the thread of the spell, trying to pull it back, but it tightens, turns taut, in danger of snapping. I release it with a flash, terrified of fraying the edges or somehow destroying it. It resumes its impatient tugging, and I stumble after it, scanning the ground around me for a weapon. The last time I faced Merlock, he was not happy to see me, and I doubt his opinion has changed.
Shadows shift through the petrified trees as I pass; something grunts, as if wounded. I pause, squinting, searching out the source. My mother’s spell will attract hellborne addicts desperate for clean magic to cut through the fog of poison in their veins; standing still out in the open like this is dangerous.
The grunting repeats, then a pitiful mewl, raising the hair on the back of my neck. The air turns heavy, as though I’m being watched, and I hurry toward the gaping mouth of the manor house, pausing only to grab a chunk of broken stone from the long sweep of stairs leading up. There are other stones, stacked like a cairn, and the topmost stone catches my eye. It’s still pale—full of magic that has yet to be consumed by the Burn. Did Merlock put it there?
Pushing inside the manor, I expect darkness and decay and an angry king. Instead the first thing I see is a small boy running through a marble hall, his leather shoes hissing against the slick tiles. He laughs, but the sound is distant, as though caught underwater. When he turns to beckon toward an unseen figure, my heart seizes. North? His features are there, but somehow rounded with youth.
A piece of painted plaster falls from the ceiling and hits the tiles, shattering like glass. Rather than getting hit, the boy—North—flickers and then fades, his colors dulling. The ruins of the manor house come into sharp relief behind him, cracking walls and broken columns and a ceiling that continues to fall apart.
Magic, I realize with a jolt. North as a child is merely a memory, and the spell that summoned him is being consumed by the Burn, feeding into the decay of the house around me.
Merlock. Too late I remember the thread, only to find its end, wavering above the heart of the missing King of Avinea.
Stunned, I drop the stone I grabbed outside. My breath catches in my throat and sticks. There are glimpses of North in Merlock’s weathered face: the wide nose and black eyes, the olive color of his skin. But where North’s edges are softened by kindness, Merlock is all cruel planes and sharp angles. The military uniform he wears is in tatters on his back, worn through at the elbows and knees, Avinean black and silver muted to muddy charcoal and smoke. Frayed epaulets hang from his shoulders in threads.
For a moment he ignores me, watching as North fades from view, with a kind of hunger I know too well. “I know you’re there,” he whispers in the dark, hoarse and uneven. “I can feel you. Talk to me. Set me free.”
Did he even know North as a child? North told me he was raised by his mother, protected from his crumbling kingdom by the monks of Saint Ergoet’s. And Merlock has been hunted since the Burn began. Waltzing into New Prevast to see his bastard son—giving credence to North’s claim to the throne, legitimizing him and creating the means of destroying himself—goes against every cowardly action Merlock has taken since killing his brother.
And yet the yearning is nearly palpable, his bitterness evoking an overwhelming sense of pity.
As if feeling the weight of my gaze, Merlock finally focuses on me. His eyes slide to the thread that spans the distance between us and his hunger dissipates, replaced with a flicker of surprise that quickly melts into an air of boredom. “You are not who I thought you were,” he says, lifting a hand to the spell, fingers skimming the thread. I feel each twitch of it, like a heartbeat jerked out of me.
I wet my lips and taste the sulfur of the Burn. “You expected my mother,” I say, voice trembling. Is this real? Or am I caught in a dream, induced by the poisoned magic in my blood?
Merlock offers the barest ghost of a smile. “The tailor taught her well,” he says, advancing toward me, still tracing the thread with one feather-light finger. “It’s a magnificent spell. But useless in your hands, apparently.”
The tailor? Does he mean my father? I open my mouth to ask, but find myself swallowing the question as he stops in front of me, head angled toward one shoulder.
“She was your age the first time she tried to kill me,” he says.
His expression twists into something ferocious as he grabs me by the shoulder, igniting pain under my skin. All at once the spell retracts and I’m thrown back across the continent, slamming into my bed so hard I seem to bounce against the mattress. Heart racing, I stare at my curtained window before pain consumes me. Biting back a howl, I reach for my shoulder, only to cringe away when I feel the scorched collar of my nightdress and the raw, gummy flesh underneath, where Merlock’s skin touched mine.
Bile floods my throat, and I curl over the edge of my bed, dry heaving before throwing myself back against my pillows. With a shaking hand I touch my shoulder again, lightly, assessing the damage. What happened? Did Merlock just try to kill me?
Blood begins to soak my nightdress. Sucking in a deep breath, I force myself to my feet, yank aside my curtains, and flinch away from the sliver of dawn that greets me. Turning my back to the sun, I position myself in front of my mirror and slowly—grimacing—fold back the collar of my nightdress.
Mother of a sainted virgin.
The memory of Merlock’s touch is burnt into my shoulder, ringed with a spreading shadow of poison. My entire collarbone is an angry violet-and-yellow smear of bruises. The poison he transferred into me dilutes like ink, spilling perilously close to my mother’s spell, which still glows silver from being used. I stare at the damage, transfixed. Terrified. I knew that Merlock was a magician—inherently the most powerful one in Avinea—yet I also believed North had a chance to fight him. To win.
But if Merlock can do this with just a touch, what damage can he do casting an actual spell?
I begin to shiver as I lower my hand, spreading my fingers above my breast. Half an inch lower, and Merlock could have pulled my mother’s spell out of my chest—
And then I realize with a sickening lurch: That is exactly what he intended to do.
Three
SOFREYA OPENS HER DOOR WARILY, dark hair pinned back from her face. When she sees me, her face blanches. I terrify her. Most people do. Plucked off the streets by Chadwick years ago, she was brought to the palace to help excise the poison North would invariably bring home after another fruitless search for his father. Now she views magic the way more of us should: as a danger.
I bite the inside of my cheek and uncover my shoulder, demonstrating the spreading infection. “I had an accident,” I say.
Her eyes widen in alarm, but she dutifully steps back, allowing me entry into her study. It always reminds me of North’s wagon, made stationary: shelves of books, drawers full of supplies, and jars and jars of rocks. Even Tobek, North’s former apprentice, is here, tousle-headed and scowling as he pushes himself out of his cot and begins shoving his shirt back into his trousers. He doesn’t acknowledge me, but as Sofreya leads me to a seat by her fire, Tobek begins slamming tea things onto the table across the room—loud enough to make sure I know he’s ignoring me.
He’s never volunteered the story of what happened after North and I left him with Bryn en route to New Prevast, the day her father intercepted them. But I know the end result: two cracked ribs, a broken leg, and a scar that runs jaggedly down his lower back. And I know another truth: that he blames me for all of it. After Bryn infected me with dead magic to prove a point, Tobek wanted to cut his losses and leave me to die. Instead North saved my life at the sacrifice of their mission, and that decision—that distraction—cost Tobek his apprenticeship. He answers to Sofreya now, trapped in the palace like all the rest of us.
“What accident could cause this much damage?” Sofreya pulls back the collar of my
dress and sucks a breath in between her teeth, pressing gently around the breadth of the infected skin.
She’s earned the trust of both North and Chadwick over the years, and yet I hesitate to admit the truth: that I have no control over my mother’s spell when my anger runs deep, which is danger enough—and now Merlock knows I’m looking for him. More than that, he spoke of my mother with a familiarity that eats at me. Overnight I’ve turned into the liability Chadwick warned me against becoming.
“A moment of weakness,” I finally say, avoiding her eyes. It’s not a lie, exactly; more of a confession.
Her alarm sharpens, turns to rebuke as she rakes up my sleeve to see her protection spells, still sitting untouched in the crook of my arm. While she looks relieved that I haven’t thrown away her magic, she still scowls as she drops my sleeve. “We can’t afford weakness.”
“Yes, Captain,” I mutter.
Tobek slams a book onto his desk, his own form of rebuke at my petulance. It is a welcome glimmer of the boy I knew before. For the most part, whatever happened that day still haunts his eyes and flattens his smile and makes him quiet, and I accept his blame as a reminder of what happens when you stray from the course, when you let your heart triumph over your head.
“These are finger marks,” Sofreya continues, fanning her own fingers in demonstration. “Did you go into the city? Were you fighting someone?”
I allow my silence to condemn me. Her hands hook into fists, and she begins to blink rapidly, as if holding back tears. “Prince Corbin needs this spell,” she explodes at last. “Why would you even risk infecting it? What does that prove, Faris? That you’re strong? This isn’t one of your tavern brawls back home, and Prince Corbin isn’t a drunk gambling a few copper tretkas on you to win. He’s betting all of Avinea on you. If you’re defeated out there, you don’t get another chance tomorrow night. None of us do.”
Her words cut deeply, for someone so meek. I work my jaw, struggling to come up with something to say in my defense, only to sigh. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I know this is important.”
“Then act like it,” she snaps, stalking to the opposite wall and pulling a jar of white rocks from a shelf.
I catch Tobek glowering at me over three cups of freshly poured tea. Another silent barb. He knows I don’t drink it.
“Lean back,” Sofreya demands, shoving me hard against the chair. “Does Captain Chadwick know?”
Not yet, but he will, if Tobek’s sudden smirk is any indication. “I’ll tell him after—God Above!” I grunt as she begins excising the poison out of my shoulder and into the stone pressed to my skin. “A warning would have been nice!”
“A morning without having to see you would have been nice,” she counters.
I tip my head back and grit my teeth. While Sofreya has never been as gentle as North could be when pulling poison from my veins, she’s not making any effort at all today.
Almost an hour passes before we all hear the sound of wagon wheels on gravel coming from the drive outside. Tobek straightens, pushing aside the heavy curtains to peer out the window. All pain vanishes, and I sit up, ignoring Sofreya’s protests, my mouth opening to ask what I already know from the way his expression mirrors my own racing heart.
They’re here. The convoy from Brindaigel.
Cadence.
Any thoughts of Merlock or my mother fly from my head as I jump to my feet, nearly knocking Sofreya over in my haste for the door. She calls after me, frustrated, but she’s excised enough of the poison that I can wait an hour or two before I need to return. It’s reckless, ridiculous, and yet—it’s Cadence. Nothing else matters.
I bolt through the halls, ignoring the reproving stares of the guards standing by, nearly giddy as I turn corners and cut through servants’ halls.
After bursting out from behind a tapestry, I catch myself on the carved balustrade of the grand stairway that sweeps into the foyer. An instant later, I’m racing down the stairs and out the wide front doors onto the veranda outside.
The council stands to the left—a trio of old men and one younger woman, all dressed in somber grays with high lace collars that went out of fashion when Merlock did. Guards form two staggered lines down the stairs leading to the gravel drive, where the carriages now stop, the Brindaigelian banners snapping in the sea breeze. Ducking between two guards, I smooth my hair with one hand, realizing—too late—that I should have brought a coat. The wind is bitter this early, hinting at the winter to come. But my adrenaline keeps me warm enough as I lean forward, staring hungrily at the first carriage door as a footman pulls it open and extends a hand to those seated inside.
Bryn’s mother, Robetta, exits in a flounce of skirts and feathers, followed by Rialdo, Perrote’s second son. Disappointed, I immediately dismiss the carriage and start eyeing the next one, fingers drumming an impatient beat against the balustrade.
The guards suddenly shift into attention behind me, and I glance over, double-taking as I see Bryn emerging from the palace, a vision of perfection in a dress of deep blue with silver trim, her dark red hair coiled around a gold comb. North stands at her side in all black, a slim shadow against her light. They’re linked arm in arm, and while Bryn hasn’t touched the binding spell that links us, her possessiveness stings deeply in the scars of magic around my wrist. She whispers something into his ear—he has to bend down to reach her. Whatever she said earns a forced, tired smile in reply.
Wife, I think, and it is still sharp as a knife.
Bryn scans the veranda before she catches my eye and arches an eyebrow in greeting, tightening her arm around North’s.
I know better than to rise to her bait, yet my jealousy is an animal, vicious and uncaged. The poison still breeding in my shoulder ignites in warning, and my heart shudders once, as if struggling to pump my thickened blood. I force myself to look away, spreading my fingers against the cruelly cold stone of the balustrade.
It’s only a title, I tell myself.
As Rialdo escorts his mother up the stairs, North starts down to greet them, only for Bryn to hold him back, her plastered smile never wavering. Let them come to her, she must be thinking. This is her palace, her prince, her crown. When her family greets her, it will be from one deferential step beneath her.
Even more Dossels emerge from the next two carriages: four elder sisters and a parade of spouses. Footmen stack mountains of luggage onto the drive, and I find myself tensing in annoyance. How many ball gowns do they think they need for only six weeks in a city too dangerous to explore, with barely enough noble families to fill one of the three dining rooms available here?
But no matter. Only one carriage left.
I edge closer to the stairs, weaving in between the guards, goose bumps from the cold alternating with chills of terror. What if she’s not here? What if Perrote changed his mind and amended his agreement, demanding more in return for my sister? North can’t afford concessions, and I can’t afford much longer without her.
The final carriage door opens, and Perrote himself steps out, tugging down the bottom of his waistcoat before snapping the collar of his traveling coat. Seeing him awakens a ferocity inside me that feeds on the infection, a natural instinct to fight, to wound, to kill. He killed my mother, enslaved my sister, and withheld magic, enough to find Merlock, from its rightful master. I stare him down as he ascends the stairs, but he doesn’t even glance my way. In my anger I feel the slight to be intentional, his dismissal a ruse. He knows I’m here.
Below, another figure emerges, running a hand through his dark hair. Alistair Pembrough. The king’s executioner and another piece of the marriage treaty: a borrowed servant Perrote gave to North at my request. Like my sister, Alistair returned to Brindaigel two weeks ago, but now that he’s back, he can fulfill the promise he made to me—that he’ll find a way to remove the infection from my blood. From North’s. Without needing more magic.
His expression bears the strained mark of a journey spent sharing a carriage with Perrote, but his face b
rightens as he turns back into the carriage, helping a third figure down. She moves hesitantly, looking to the palace with enormous eyes free of the spell that once shadowed them.
Cadence.
I start toward her, as an arm slides through mine. Bryn’s smile doesn’t waver, and she speaks from the corner of her mouth. “Slow and steady,” she says. “My family feeds on weakness, and they see everything.”
I straighten, free hand clenching my skirts in frustration. They’ve dressed Cadence like a handmaiden, in a plain but pretty dress that peeks out from beneath her dark traveling cloak.
She’s a ray of sunshine in the gathering storm, a flicker of hope in my cracking heart. Despite Bryn’s warning, I lift my hand, only for my greeting to wilt when Alistair offers her his arm.
How dare he try to touch her, after all that he’s done to us?!
Don’t take it, I think. You can do this, all on your own.
Cadence accepts his arm with a timid smile that makes no sense. How can she cling to Thaelan’s murderer? What could he have possibly done to make her overlook his role in her enslavement?
As they move toward the stairs, Cadence flinches at every bray of laughter, dipping her face into Alistair’s shoulder when a servant makes an unexpected movement. She’s been too long lost to Perrote’s magic, too long a mindless slave trained as a machine without capacity for expression. Now every thought, every feeling is painted brightly across her sweet face for the whole world to exploit. Alistair cradles her with a protective arm.
I want to kill him.
North excuses himself from the flock of Dossels who crowd him on the veranda, and quickly meets Alistair and Cadence halfway down the stairs. Alistair shakes his hand, and Cadence dips into a clumsy curtsy, staring at North as though he’s made of starlight. North speaks to her, low and inaudible while bowing, and she flushes, hiding her face in Alistair’s shoulder again. It’s a newfound shyness, so sharply different from the bold, fearless little girl who argued with me over everything.
