“And here,” he repeats, “I believed that was you.” He reveals nothing on his face or in his posture. He is the epitome of stasis, and even Gretchya would have been impressed. His Threads, though, reveal everything. They bleed with blue. They drip and ooze as if tears fall—more tears than a single body could ever contain.
A thousand years’ worth of loneliness.
And Iseult realizes she has hurt him. Deeply. She also cannot lie to him. She sees no Threads of family on his soul; she sees only emptiness and solitude.
A new song begins below. Leopold watches the tapestry of dancers in silence, and Iseult watches too. Only when it ends does Leopold finally straighten and declare, “I am going down, if you wish to join.”
Iseult shakes her head. “No.”
“Hmmm,” he replies, and his green eyes meet hers for half a breath before he stalks away, off the balcony and out of sight. His Threads, however, linger in Iseult’s awareness long after. Confused, lonely, angry that someone in this world now knows the one thing he hides away.
The one truth at the heart of all his masks.
He is not gone long before another set of known Threads arrive, a shadowy core roiling inside pale urgency. Then Caden’s voice skates in from the hallway—overloud as if he wants Iseult to hear.
“There has been a change of plans,” he calls. “His Imperial Majesty will be going into the city once the dancing ends. Be ready.”
And just like that, all of Iseult’s and Safi’s preparations turn to ash.
TWENTY-SEVEN
“You did what?” A muscle feathered in Ryber’s jaw. She and Stix were back in their carriage, the usual orange tabby nestled at their feet, while outside a darkening swamp lugged by. Even with the carriage curtains swept wide, there was no finding a breeze. Only this thick, motionless humidity.
“I told Kahina where I found the—”
“I heard you.” Ryber pinched the bridge of her nose. “I meant, how could you do that? If Kahina really is this Paladin called Lovats—and honestly, is there any doubt at this point?—then she is the last person in the Witchlands who should know how to enter the Sightwitch mountain.”
“But the blade and glass aren’t there. You have them.”
“For now. But what about when she figures out we’ve moved them?” Ryber’s hand dropped. “You just told her how to access a thousand years’ worth of guarded secrets. Goddess, what if she finds Eridysi’s workshop, Stix? Or she gets into the Crypts? Or … “Horror bulged in her eyes. “What if she finds the tombs? My sisters are frozen there. Kullen is frozen there.”
For the first time since leaving Kahina, the triumphant surge in Stix’s chest faltered. She had thought herself so clever for telling Kahina where she had found the tools, instead of where they were. After all, that meant she had lost nothing, while hundreds of prisoners had gained freedom.
“She won’t find the Crypts or tombs,” Stix murmured, but Ryber only wagged her head.
“You can’t know that. And again, what will happen when Kahina finds out you’ve tricked her? Need I remind you of what those tools can do? Why they were created in the first place?”
“No,” Stix mumbled.
Ryber reminded her anyway. “Eridysi made them to kill the Exalted Ones after they ruined the Witchlands with their tyranny. That broken looking glass will show Paladins for what they are, and that blade will kill them. It will kill you, Stix. Forever.”
“I know.” Stix’s mumble turned to a growl. “I’ve seen my own death a hundred times, remember?”
“But that wasn’t a real death.” Ryber fumbled her diary off her belt and thrust it toward Stix. Humidity-muffled moonlight beamed over it. “If you would just read this, you’d understand what I’m talking about. You’d understand why Kahina can’t have Eridysi’s tools—”
“I do understand,” Stix snapped. “And I have no plans to tell her where they are.” She dug a knuckle into her forehead; her crooked spectacles shifted down her nose. She didn’t want to fight with Ryber because it wasn’t Ryber she was actually frustrated with. It was herself—had she made a mistake?—and it was the voices gathering once more at the base of her skull. Why are you leaving? they wanted to know. Come back this way, keep coming!
She wasn’t sure how much longer she could endure this swollen pressure always buzzing. And she certainly couldn’t watch another person die in the Ring.
She had done the right thing to free them. Of course it was the right thing.
As if sensing Stix’s misery, the orange tabby piled onto her lap. Ryber must have sensed too, for when she spoke again, her tone had softened. “Kahina isn’t stupid, Stix. She has lived countless lifetimes, just like you.”
“Not like me,” Stix countered, but her heart wasn’t in the argument. She was tired of the Ring, tired of Kahina, tired of the blade and the glass, and above all else, tired of this Paladin soul she’d never asked for.
As the carriage thumped through a deep divot in the softened road, moonlight speared into the carriage. It bounced off the cat’s green eyes, which glimmered like Kahina’s ring. Instinctively, Stix rubbed her thumb.
Pain spiked through her.
She flinched, startled by the intensity of it, by the lightning flaring up her arm and down her spine. She jerked her hand into the dim light, only to find a raw, blistering line striped around her thumb.
The cat stopped her purring. Ryber gasped, and Stix gulped over a sudden tangle in her throat. The voices, for once, were silent—as if they too were stunned by what Stix saw. As if they too had grown cold with horror.
“What is that?” Ryber asked. For some reason, she was whispering.
And for some reason, Stix was whispering too when she answered, “I don’t know, Ryber. I really don’t know.” Except that in the most remote corners of her brain, a place fully usurped by voices, there was a quiet memory of a green ring, the person who’d worn it, and the pain that came from breaking a bargain bound in jade.
* * *
Vivia awoke with the sense that something was off. She’d forgotten where she was. Why, how. Then came the scent of sandy earth and plant exhales. Thick, alive, a smell she’d never known she missed until it reached her again.
This was Nihar, a place that had been dead for so long. The place where her father had been raised, and then Merik after him. She’d always wished it had been her to come here, even if she never admitted that to anyone but herself—and only then during these dark, solo moments of the night.
Katydids choired aboveground, outside of this prison where Vivia’s crew waited for her to do something. To lead. If only she knew what steps to take, if only someone were here to tell her.
What a great queen she was.
She pushed off the earthen floor and fumbled for Vaness nearby. The lanterns had been extinguished outside the cells—all save one—yet no amount of squinting was making Vaness’s unconscious form appear.
She isn’t here. It took Vivia several moments to realize this. Too many moments to realize the floor beside her was empty, and the rest of the cell too.
Horror battered through her. She scrambled to her feet, ready to shout for guards and demand answers. Yet as soon as she pounded her fist against the door, it creaked open. Lantern light slid in, and Vivia gaped, brain too stunned to understand. Muscles too stunned to move. Her door was open, Vaness was gone, and …