“The riskiest moment will be when you first go in and your shadow will be visible, so I’m going to move you very quickly. Don’t make a sound—I know for a fact that your voice carries well in this cursed place.”
“Not a peep.” I was shaking, and it had nothing to do with the winter air. Removing my riding gloves, I shoved them into my pocket and wiped my sweating palms on my skirts. Before I could even think to back down, magic wrapped around my waist and hips and I lifted up into the air. I scrunched myself up into a ball, resting my cheek against my knees and gripping my ankles with one arm. With my free hand, I clutched Tristan’s magic like it was a rope.
“You really don’t need to do that.”
“Makes me feel better.” My voice sounded high-pitched and strange.
“Ready?”
I wasn’t. I really wasn’t. But I nodded anyway.
He needn’t have worried about me making a sound. The force of being snapped backwards and down stole my breath, and before I could think, much less squeak, I was hanging suspended beneath the rocks, all of Trollus laid out below me. Letting go of my ankles, I clung with both hands to the rope of magic, trying to get my breathing under control.
Although Tristan had assured me that it would be all but impossible for anyone to see me in the darkness, I still felt utterly exposed, and panic began to erode my self-control. There was no surviving a fall from this height. I’d be nothing more than a splatter of gore against the paving stones, my screams echoing long after my life winked out. A whimper of noise forced its way from my lips.
Sensing I was close to cracking, Tristan began to slowly move me along the ceiling of the cavern. It wasn’t simply a matter of setting me down in the middle of the city—he needed to keep me hidden in the shadows, dropping me down where the rock rested against the highest reaches of the valley. But he was working blind, entirely dependent on memory to navigate me not only to my destination, but around the magic columns and arcs and canopies that held the rock off the city. His concentration on the task steadied my nerves, and my mind refocused on what was below me.
Trollus was beautiful. It had always felt like a dream to me, so otherworldly that it seemed impossible that it existed in the same reality as my farm, the Hollow, and even Trianon. Seeing it like this transported me back, made me feel as though I’d never left. The familiar roar of the falls, the water sparkling as it fell from the heights at the far end of the city to explode into spray and foam in the river that drove straight and true toward the mouth of the river road.
The terraced streets rising like steps for a giant’s feet up the sides of the valley and bisected by staircases that swept and curved around the pale stone buildings. The palace was massive, white and gold and stately where it sat overlooking the river, the glass gardens lying behind it, black but for the troll-lights that lined the meandering pathways. I wondered if anyone walked those paths now that I was gone, or if the flowers, bushes, and trees had languished in darkness.
But not everything was the same.
Dozens of massive stone columns rose up from the city streets, some grown so high that they seemed almost within reach if I stretched my fingers out. But no one was working on them now, and as I twisted around to see back toward the base of the valley, I could see why. The Dregs, which butted up against the wall of rock, was entirely barricaded in with collapsed buildings and piled debris, and behind those hastily constructed walls, there was a flurry of activity marked by tiny bobbing troll-lights. For there to be that many half-bloods in the streets meant they weren’t in the mines, and my heart sped as I considered the implications of what that meant.
Not that I had much time to think about it. I was over the Elysium quarter now, the massive manors of the troll aristocracy gleaming with silvery troll-light as they passed beneath me. After the highest row of homes was a strip of empty space between the walls at the rear of the properties and where rockslide rested against the lip of the valley. It was patrolled once daily for any signs of sluag intrusion, but otherwise it was dark, empty, and the safest place to set me down. I stumbled a bit as my feet hit the ground, my legs feeling like pudding, and I held onto the magic until I had my balance. As soon as I let go, it unraveled from around my waist.
I knew Tristan could feel things through his magic in some fashion, but the effect was still eerily strange, like some great sentient serpent stretched between us. Shivering, I stepped away from where it waited and retrieved the more familiar bit of power that I’d tucked into my pocket.
After a bit of whispered coaxing, my little orb began to gleam softly, and my disguise was complete. I hurried toward one of the narrow lanes between two properties; then, looking both ways to make sure no one was coming, I stepped out onto the street.
Keeping my head low and hidden in the hood of my cloak, I chose a brisk pace fitting a servant on an errand for her mistress and prayed no one would pay me any mind. I hardly needed to worry—the streets of this area of Trollus were quieter than the rest of the city, but never had I seen them so empty. It made me uneasy, and I almost breathed a sigh of relief when I finally passed two half-bloods on a set of stairs. It was short-lived though—they gave me a wide berth, and as much as it reduced my risk of discovery, I knew it wasn’t normal.
The tension grew palpable as I descended toward the valley floor, magic thick and hot in the air, full and half-bloods alike all looking as though they expected to be attacked at any moment. No one spoke unless they traveled together and many of them wore bands of colored fabric around their arms. I needed no explanation to know the city was divided.
When I finally caught sight of Pierre’s home, it was all I could do not to run toward it. Trotting up the front steps, I knocked once and then went inside.
“Get out!” Pierre’s shrill voice made me flinch. “You never take my advice anyway!”
He sat on his little wheeled stool at one of his desks, pen in hand and back to me.
“Pierre?”
The tiny troll froze, then very slowly, he looked over his shoulder. “You hide your face,” he said. “But your voice is that of the dearest girl I’ve ever known.”
I flung myself at him, wrapping my arms around his narrow shoulders and squeezing them tight. “It’s me, Pierre. It’s Cécile. Oh, it is so good to see you are well.”
Gripping my shoulders, he pushed me back. “What are you doing here? Is Tristan with you? Is he well?”
“He’s well,” I said, and Pierre’s shoulders sagged with visible relief. “He’s up on top of the rock fall waiting to lift me out when I’m ready. He lowered me through the moon hole, and Pierre, I was so terrified that Trollus almost got the first rainstorm it’s had in five hundred years.”
He laughed. “If I had any doubts that you’re really Cécile, they are chased away now.” His smile didn’t last. “Be a dear and bolt the door; the Builder’s Guild has little enough time for me, but we dare not risk one of them arriving unannounced and discovering you here.”
I did as he asked, making certain the curtains covered the front windows. “What is happening in Trollus? It feels as though fighting will break out at any minute.”
“It already has.” He passed a weary hand over his face. “The city is quite divided. After Tristan left Trollus, the half-bloods went to the King to demand their autonomy and for him to reinstate Tristan as his heir, but he refused to receive them. So they revolted and are now refusing to work until their demands are met. They’ve barricaded themselves in the Dregs, but they can’t last forever. Even if they could adequately supply themselves, Angoulême will see them put down. Already there are dead in the streets each morning, and all have been identified as those who support the half-bloods’ cause. Consorting with half-bloods not your property has become a dangerous business.”