“Heard of it, yes. Know where it is, no. It’s a name that refers to one of the ancient Corovjan royal crypts,” Nismae said.
Hope rose in me. “So it still exists?”
“Exists? Certainly. But most of the crypts are in interconnected tunnels beneath Corovja. Nearly all the entrances have caved in or been built over. I doubt anyone besides the shadow god knows where it is. Good luck getting her to talk to you.” Nismae laughed.
“What do you mean, only the shadow god knows where it is?” I asked.
“About one hundred and fifty years ago, the fox king decided he wanted to be buried with all his monarchal treasures. He burned all the crypt maps and burial records during his reign so that no one would be able to take his riches from him, even in death. Historians and cartographers may never be able to re-create them,” she said with disgust. “Greedy bastard.”
“I remember you complaining about the fox king before,” Hal said.
“He had very little regard for the history of his kingdom, which is probably why he only managed to rule for five years before the hawk queen took the throne. But the damage to the records was done before they laid him to rest. He planned well.”
“So there are no maps of Atheon or the other crypts . . . but are there lists of what might be in them? Or other clues to where they might be?” I asked.
Nismae shook her head.
Despair wormed its way in, crushing the air from my lungs. How was I ever going to find Atheon and the Fatestone now?
“Why are you looking for Atheon, anyway?” Nismae asked.
I refocused on her, trying to gather myself.
“It’s the only clue I have about someone who might be part of my family. He died a long time ago,” I said glumly. I didn’t want to tell her it had anything to do with the Fatestone—not yet. I didn’t know if I could trust her.
“I’m sorry,” Nismae said. “Family is important. It’s the only thing you can count on in this world.” She looked at Hal with love in her eyes, and he smiled back at her.
I tried to smile, too, but the expression wouldn’t quite come.
“So tell me what happened after Valenko,” Nismae said.
Hal launched into our story, with Nismae asking questions to methodically extract all the information she could. The only time she broke eye contact with him to glance at me was when he told her about how I’d chased the dragon out of the Tamers’ forest. He left out my history with Ina, perhaps because he understood it was only mine to reveal.
As for Ina, I hoped she was far, far away, still in that town to the west where the merchant’s cousin had seen her. Even though she was the one who had declared she never wanted to see me again, the longer we were apart, the less certain I was that I had any desire to face her either. I wanted to fix our history, but now more for myself than her. The guilt I carried might still be possible to ease if I could restore Amalska. But once that guilt was gone . . . I wasn’t sure what would be left.
Now that I knew Nismae couldn’t help me, all I wanted was to leave. It didn’t seem like she knew any more about the Fatestone than I did, and the longer we stayed, the more uncomfortable I became. These weren’t my people. I couldn’t see myself becoming a part of their community.
In that moment, I wondered if Hal might leave with me if I asked him to. Perhaps seeking the Fatestone alone was a foolish quest. The subtle ways he was considerate comforted me and gave me strength to go on. The ways he’d made me laugh had filled me with the only happiness I’d known since leaving Amalska. I wasn’t sure I could stand to lose him yet. But I didn’t know if his sister would let him go—or if he’d even want to leave.
As it turned out, I didn’t get a chance to ask.
CHAPTER 20
THE FOLLOWING NIGHT I WAS TALKING WITH POE AND the other medics and herbalists in the common room when the door swung open. I raised my head, startled, having become accustomed to the way the Nightswifts entered and exited only through the window as birds.
Nismae swept into the room with another person behind her. The figure wore an ivory robe that looked like a death shroud, the hood pulled up to obscure their face. Nismae called for silence in the room.
“Nightswifts, rise!” she commanded.
Everyone leaped to their feet.
“We have a new member. One who will make our betrayer bow before us. Meet my champion.” Nismae’s eyes glittered with pride.
The figure reached up to pull down the white hood of the robe, and the sleeves slid down to reveal slender wrists I would have recognized anywhere.
Ina.
I inhaled sharply, feeling as though the floor had dropped out from under me. It had been nearly a moon since I’d seen her at the top of the Tamers’ cliff. She pulled down the hood of her white robe, a slow smile blossoming on her face. But this time, it wasn’t the friendly smile that she’d favored me with in our past life together. This smile was small and dark and triumphant.
“This autumn, she will challenge the boar king for his crown. One day she will be your queen,” Nismae continued.
I waited for someone to question Nismae’s proclamations, but no one did. I could hardly breathe. How had this happened? Beneath Ina’s robe I could barely make out the gentle swell of her belly. In the time since I’d last seen her, her pregnancy had begun to show. The reminder of how she’d hurt me twisted like a knife already buried deep in my flesh. I hadn’t been ready to face her yet—not until I knew I could rewrite our past. Not until I’d found the Fatestone.
“Show them what you can do,” Nismae said, eagerness shining in her eyes.
Ina looked around the room, seeming to enjoy the way the audience hung on her next move. I shot a panicked look at Hal, hoping to silently communicate the magnitude of the situation. Then Ina opened her palms and sent columns of white-hot flame bursting up toward the ceiling.
This time, the Nightswifts reacted. They sank to their knees with wide eyes, Ina seeming to grow taller and more fierce as they bowed before her. She fed on their worship, letting the fire surround her until she blazed bright as the sun. When the last head had bowed, she drew the fire back into her palms. Twin black marks remained on the ceiling.
“Isn’t her gift extraordinary?” Nismae asked. “With a few moons of training and practice, she’ll be unstoppable.” Pride blazed in her eyes.
I felt faint. How had they met, and when had this training begun? Nismae’s knowledge honing Ina’s power would considerably even their odds against the king. I’d never given thought to what might happen if she actually won. She wasn’t bound to the gods. What would that mean for the battle and the aftermath? It couldn’t be good either way. I had to get the Fatestone and stop it—save Amalska, prevent any of this from coming to pass.
“I will be proud to serve as a champion for the people of Zumorda,” Ina said. “We deserve better than to have our villages destroyed by bandits, to be taxed into poverty, or to be turned away after years of loyal service to the king.”
The Nightswifts murmured their agreement.
“Leave us for now and return at sundown,” Nismae said. “I’ll have new assignments for you then.” She waved a hand to dismiss her people.
Squawks and screeches filled the room as the Nightswifts took their manifests and bolted for the windows, feathers flying. In mere seconds the room stood empty save for me, Ina, Nismae, and Hal, the last feathers still drifting to settle on the floor.
In the emptiness left by the Nightswifts’ departure, Ina faced me. If she was surprised to see me, it didn’t show. She pointed a graceful finger at me, then looked at Nismae. “That’s her. The one with the ability to change the future with her blood.”
“No,” I said, panic choking off any further words.
Nismae shot a look at Hal. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Hal looked at me in confusion. “I’ve never seen her do that. Asra . . . is it true?”
Nismae walked toward me slowly, like a puma stalking its prey. Her friendly demea
nor was gone, replaced with calculating tranquility.
“Don’t touch me!” I leaped to my feet and backed up against the door that led back to the street-level exit, but it didn’t budge when I tugged on the handle behind me. If only I had wings like the others.
“Don’t bother trying to run,” Ina said. “Even if you refuse to write for us, we can still use your blood. Painted with it, I’ll have as much power as a god.” She still wore the same cruel smile.
“Please don’t do this,” I begged.
“I’m sorry, but there is no choice,” Nismae said. “From the moment Invasya told me about your gift, I knew your blood could be the final key to seal the king’s fate.”
Hal took a step forward. “Wait a minute, Nis. You can’t just hurt my friend. She doesn’t even know the full extent of her powers. She should be given a choice to join the Swifts if she wants—”
“I gave her that choice already,” Nismae said.
She reached for me and I screamed.
I scrambled away, but not fast enough. She slammed into me like a battering ram, sending me sprawling. My satchel fell open and vials scattered, clinking over the stone floor. My journal slipped out and fell open to a page written in Miriel’s angular script.
Ina folded her arms and watched with satisfaction.
“Nis, stop it!” Hal grabbed his sister from behind, but she tore her arm easily out of his grip. His height advantage was no match for the strength she’d honed over years of working as an assassin.
“There will be time for friendship after this battle is over. Family comes first,” Nismae said. She moved toward me again.
The only nonliving magical thing close enough to draw power from was the chandelier just on the other side of the wooden door. In desperation, I twined my own magic together with that of the light fixture and pulled, hard. Glass shattered in the adjacent room. I flung the stolen magic out in front of me like a shield.
“You didn’t,” she said coldly. She lunged, only to be repelled. “What the—”
I stood up, feeling stronger, but even as I pulled the magic closer and tried to weave it together more tightly, I knew it wouldn’t hold forever. There wasn’t any more energy to draw on in this prison of stone.
Instead of attacking me again, Nismae stepped back and swept Hal’s feet out from under him without so much as an apology. She snatched the blade he held—one of the enchanted ones her craftsmen had forged. In one fluid motion, she whirled around and thrust the knife toward me.
The blade cracked my shield of magic in half, and as her enchanted cuffs passed through the fissure, the whole thing disintegrated. Threads of power recoiled on me like the smack of a hundred bent branches, making stars dance in front of my eyes.
Before my vision cleared, one of Nismae’s hands closed around my throat.
“This would have been less painful if you’d told the truth right away,” she said, and plunged her knife through my forearm into the door.
I choked on my own breath as pain shot up my arm. The agony of it obliterated my ability to string together a single thought. Blood trickled from the wound and dripped off my fingertips. Where it hit the floor, fissures formed in the stone, red cracks scattering in lightning patterns like broken ice.
“Stop moving,” Nismae said, so close I felt her breath on my cheek and the brush of her braids on one of my legs. My heart pounded, echoing in my ears.
“Hal.” My voice came out a weak cry. I could barely see him over Nismae’s shoulder, registering the horror of what she’d done and starting to move toward me. Behind him, Ina’s face remained in an impassive mask. She raised her hand and Hal’s cloak ignited.
Fear for him lanced through my pain.
He tore off the burning garment, but then she set his shirt ablaze, forcing him to drop and roll to put out the flames. Nismae craned her head around to see the cause of the commotion. As he stumbled to his knees, Ina gestured to him in warning.
“Don’t hurt my brother,” Nismae said.
“Oh, I won’t. As long as he doesn’t make a nuisance of himself,” Ina said, raising her hand and lighting another ball of fire in her palm. She hurled it in his general direction, forcing him to scramble out of the way. She scattered sparks to herd him toward the open window. “Can you fly like the other birds?” she asked, her voice dripping with venom.
I couldn’t believe this was the girl I had once loved. What had the dragon done to her? Or was she always this way and I’d been too blinded by love to see?
“Nis!” Hal pulled a hidden knife from his boot, but Ina used her fire magic to make it blaze with heat. He dropped the red-hot metal with a cry.
Nismae’s grip on me didn’t waver.
“Let Asra go. I’m begging you,” he said, clutching his burned hand. “We can talk about this.”
“Stand down, both of you,” Nismae said to them.
Ina shrugged and lowered her hands. Hal obeyed, staring at me, shifting his weight, a muscle in his jaw clenching. How could he let this happen? Was he just going to back down from his sister? And then the truth dawned on me . . . family came first for him just as it did for Nismae. Despair swallowed me whole.
Nismae whistled sharply, and two birds flew in through the window, a tiny sparrow and a red-tailed hawk. One transformed back into a large warrior, and the other was Poe, the mousy scholar girl I remembered talking to about some of my healing potions. The girl trembled when she saw Ina.
Ina grinned and snapped her teeth at her, and the girl shrank away.
“Take him somewhere quiet. I’ll talk sense into him later,” Nismae said, pointing to Hal. The warrior grunted something inaudible, then pulled a pinch of powder out of a bag on his belt and blew it into Hal’s face.
“Hal!” I said. It came out like the yelp of a trapped animal, high and pathetic.
Hal’s eyes glazed over and Ina took several steps back. They must have dosed him with peaceroot—an herb that silenced a magic user’s ability to wield any power. If I had been able to think through the pain, I might have jerked my arm free of the door and hoped to bleed out. Peaceroot was rare in Zumorda but grew abundantly in the kingdom of Mynaria to the west—if Nismae’s reach in work and trade extended that far, there was no telling what other horrors she had on her side.
“Damn it, I didn’t mean you needed to do that!” Nismae said to the warrior.
“I’m not taking any chances after the last time he caught me unaware,” the warrior grumbled. “Ended up having to fetch my weapons from the bottom of a latrine.”
Nismae let out an exasperated sigh. “Fine. Poe, get over here and help me with this.”
As the warrior heaved Hal to his feet and shuffled him out of the room, the girl approached us and removed a set of glass vials from her belt pouch.
“Stop,” I said, my voice weak. “Don’t do this.” It terrified me to think what Nismae would do with my blood.
“I’m sorry,” the girl whispered softly. She jerked the blade out of my arm and blood gushed from the wound. I nearly blacked out, only aware enough to dimly note that the wound wasn’t spurting, which meant the knife had missed any major arteries. The wrap bracelet Ina had given me fell away—it had been cut clean through.
Nismae held me pinned against the door while Poe funneled my blood into glass vials. I stared at Ina, cycling between pain and rage. She watched the whole time as if my suffering was a show put on for her amusement. Somewhere deep inside, the cinder of anger born of her betrayal smoldered. I had never hurt her intentionally. Now she’d done it to me twice.
I deserved better than that.
They drained me until I could barely hold on to consciousness, until Nismae declared it enough. Then Nismae let me fall to the floor. I had no energy to try to fight them off or to run.
The needle pinched as Poe stitched me back together with confident hands. Nearby, Nismae flipped through the pages of my journal, her excitement growing as she read. The pit of dread in my stomach deepened. If she and her peo
ple had the ability to restore something like the chandelier I’d destroyed, I had no doubt she’d figure out how to decipher the notes Miriel and I had spent years compiling. She’d learn how to use my blood to enchant Ina and make her powerful beyond all reality—and like all enchantments, only their creator could break them.
“This is the last bit of luck we needed,” Nismae said, her face glowing with satisfaction as she shut the journal and gathered my vials.
“No,” I whispered, knowing it was futile. If Nismae hadn’t known how to enchant my blood before, the journal would give her all the information she needed. Combined with her own research, who knew what horrible things she’d be able to achieve?
“The king won’t know what hit him until I tear out his throat with my teeth,” Ina said.
I weakly turned my gaze to Poe.
“Let me die,” I whispered to her. If I bled enough, I could die like a regular mortal. In this state I would never be able to fight my way free of them. If they had enough peaceroot, they could keep me captive for a long time. They wouldn’t care about the vicious headaches caused by use of the herb. They could drain me as many times as they wanted. Perhaps they could even figure out a way to use my own blood and potions to force me to write for them. I prayed they wouldn’t use enough peaceroot to cause me to suffer the worst effects—necrosis of the fingers and toes.
Poe ducked her head and kept stitching, refusing to meet my eyes.
Nismae came over and crouched beside me.
“I wouldn’t dream of letting you die.” She brushed a lock of hair from my face, tucking it behind my ear as gently as a lover. “This is just the beginning.”
I shuddered, and a tear traced its way down my cheek.
“This is the least you can offer after the way you lied to me,” Ina cut in. “Your gift is what got us into this situation in the first place. Now it will make me queen.” The iciness of her voice froze me to the bone.
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