It is the moment Iseult needs. She mule-kicks, straight back until her bootheel connects with Hell-Bard flesh. Then she jerks upright, too hard to stop. Too quick to evade. Her skull hits the Emperor’s chin where he’d leaned over.
The wintry pain releases, and clarity charges in. She is standing tall now, and the room has devolved into chaos. Two Hell-Bards lurch for her, two lurch for the Emperor. But Iseult recognizes one of the Threads, so she doesn’t resist when Caden grabs her. Nor when she feels steel slice the bindings at her wrist. It is subtle, invisible, and quickly followed by a fake attempt to grab her biceps and control her.
Darkness veils her sight, cloth dulls her hearing. But she has never needed those senses. Moon Mother gave her the ability to see Threads, and she has spent years honing that awareness.
She controls this room. She controls these souls.
A woman lurches in, Threads burning with focused violence, and Iseult ducks. A blade whistles over her head, then Iseult is upright again with her arms outstretched.
She has only cleaved a man once, but it was second nature then and it is second nature now. Her fingers close on the Threads, slippery and frozen like the first Hell-Bard’s.
Then she brings them to her teeth and bites.
The strands of Aether snap. The soul that bound this woman as a Hell-Bard finishes the cleaving it had begun so many years ago. And the woman’s shrieks rip loose, tainted by oil and power. A Stonewitch, Iseult realizes as Earthwitch-green power rattles the marble pillars and crumbles the table.
She is cleaving. Her magic is exploding. In moments, the room will collapse. Iseult releases the Stonewitch, but before she can turn on another Hell-Bard, Caden is beside her again. He hauls her toward the exit, and Iseult doesn’t resist. Safi is no longer in the room. Her broken Threads are somewhere outside, and Henrick is with her.
Iseult will kill him.
They reach the hall. A crack thunders behind them—the first pillar to break. Then a heartbeat later, a second snaps in two and a wall collapses inward. The woman’s Threads are shrinking fast, shadowy lines that will soon end in death.
The first Hell-Bard is still trapped inside. The one Iseult had controlled and kicked. His death and the Stonewitch’s will be marked on Iseult’s conscience, branded on her heart for the rest of her days. She should care, but right now, she doesn’t.
All she wants is to get to Safi. All she wants is to destroy the Emperor who would dare hurt her family.
But Safi is nowhere near—her Threads are streaking away, fast, fast, and surrounded by shadows. As if the Hell-Bards carry her.
Worse, more shadows approach. Storm clouds rolling in, and Iseult knows Caden cannot help her. Not without losing his own life, and that is too far. Even for her tainted soul. So she does the only thing she can think of to help him: she grabs his Threads too.
A clasp, a tug, a burst of heat in her palms and elbows. He falls to his knees. Iseult tears off her black bag and takes his longsword. Then she finally bolts after Safi and the Emperor. There are Hell-Bards ahead. Six people Iseult must cleave. They chose the wrong person to try to control. She knows how everyone imagines her: the quiet one, the hidden one, the one who blends and melts away.
No more. She is done with scarves and shadows. Why must she hide while Safi displays? Why must she feel nothing while Safi feels it all? Stasis has taken Iseult nowhere. Stasis has held her back, kept her separate from the world. But rage … Oh, it will carry her far.
Esme was right all along.
She is done being the left hand. It is time to become the right hand too. It is time to become the fangs.
The rear guards notice Iseult’s clattering approach. A barked command from their emperor, and two break off to face her. But Iseult has no interest in them. She dodges the first attack, then slices into the second. Swords have never been her best weapon, but she does not need finesse here. She has magic, and these poor, indentured Hell-Bards have no idea what is coming.
Like with Caden and the others, Iseult grabs their Threads. It is messy, but the result is instant. They drop.
The result is instant for Iseult too. So much heat, so many flames. They scorch up her bones and into her skull, and suddenly, it’s too much to hold on to. Her vision turns to fire. Her knees weaken beneath her.
Cleave them! she screams inwardly, trying to pull the Threads to her mouth. Cleave them, you fool!
Before she can collapse from the force of it all, their Threads wink out. One moment, they are in her grasp and alive. Molten whips she can barely contain.
Then suddenly they are dust. Vanishing twirls of Aether. No heat, no pain, no power. Their bodies fall, and a third set of Threads hits her senses.
“Leopold,” she croaks, taking in the prince and the bloodied scene at his feet: two dead Hell-Bards, spines severed. He holds two short sabers, his Threads a cacophony of rage, focus, disgust, pain. And, of course, the wild core that never seems to fade. A crown of silver to pour into the sky.
He drops the two swords and strides toward Iseult, stepping lightly to avoid blood. She doesn’t realize she is about to fall until he is there to catch her.
“We have to go,” he tells her.
“But Safi,” she begins.
He only shakes his head. “It is too late for her, Iseult, but it is not too late for you.” And without another word, he slides a bracing arm behind her back and hauls her into a run.
THIRTY-FIVE
There was only one place Vivia knew to go: her final Fox ship, Baile’s Blessing, still waiting in the Hundred Isles. It was the last hole this little fox had to run to. The final place she might find safety.
She and Vaness had sprinted for the first mile, the sun rising before them as the Well’s power and the magic in their blood fueled them east along a worn coastal road. Vivia couldn’t maintain the curtain of water forever, though, and eventually, the hunters would wrest themselves free of Vaness’s restraints. But they had a lead—a large one—and they used it. Even when they were both barely sucking in air and Vivia’s vision was starting to spin, she didn’t let them slow. She insisted they half jog, half walk, each step thudding after the other.
Every rasping breath, Vivia expected Yoris’s hunters to appear. Every heartbeat clashing in her ears, she expected to hear Dalmotti fire. But no one and nothing came.
At some point, she and Vaness released hands. At some point, where a limestone cliff came close enough to the sea to reveal the Dalmottis, they abandoned the road and flew into the wild, breathing forest. Vivia led the way. She was not a hunter; she was not trained for stealth. But at least moving within the trees offered shelter against Dalmotti weapons or mounted hunters on the prowl.
Eventually, they reached a stream heading east. Its burbling waters calmed Vivia’s muscles and pacified her frantic mind. Though logic told her there would be no undergrowth, no minnows darting in the sunlight if this water were poison, she couldn’t bring herself to drink it.
Vaness did, even as Vivia barked a warning. “The waters in Nubrevna aren’t safe.”
“Just a sip,” Vaness pleaded through panting breaths. Then one iron bracelet melted into a cup, and she scooped up stream water and drank. Nothing happened. No jolt of pain or sudden wrenching. No choking or screams.
Still, Vivia could do nothing but watch her. So many years of fear could not be counteracted in a single moment, no matter how pure the water might seem.