He yanked off his belt. “Between the teeth,” he barked at Safi, and she quickly moved to do the same with Caden.
But Caden grabbed her wrist. Stopped her from shoving the leather in. “Dump us. Run.”
“Never.”
“You have to,” he begged. His eyes blackened, pupils claiming everything. “Please, Safi—”
“No.” Leopold’s voice sliced out, calm and commanding. He stalked toward them from the tiller. “Safiya claimed she could stop Henrick’s command, so…” He pinned her with a hooded stare. “Stop the command, please.”
Safi stared right back. Caden’s grip tightened on her wrist; nails dug in. But she didn’t withdraw—and she didn’t recoil from Leopold’s challenge. She had known this moment would come, and if Leopold sought to make an example, to teach her a lesson, to catch her in her earlier lie and force her to watch as her friends were doomed before her eyes …
Well, Leopold fon Cartorra—and Henrick fon Cartorra too—could eat goat shit.
She pulled her wrist free from Caden. He was convulsing now. His nails had drawn blood on the sliver of space between cuff and glove. She welcomed the pain, the welling heat. It brought her clarity as she forced her belt between his teeth. Then she sank onto her haunches and grabbed the gold chain still looped about her wrist.
Instantly, Caden and Lev stopped seizing.
At first, Safi thought she’d done it. That just by touching the chain and willing her friends to be better, she had stopped the doom and interfered with Henrick’s command. Leopold seemed to think the same, for his posture softened as if on the cusp of an apology.
But then Lev’s voice croaked out. “He has a message.”
“Yes,” Caden wheezed, a broken beat later. “He says you will not … get far. He will find you.”
And Safi realized in that moment that she had done nothing; Henrick had simply released them and finished his punishment.
Leopold realized the same. His sneer returned, hard eyes sweeping over the Hell-Bards before settling at last on Safi. “Do you still believe they should have joined us?”
“Yes.” No hesitation. Safi clambered to her feet and met Leopold’s gaze. “And the Hell-Bards are with us now, so our course is set no matter what.”
“Oh yes,” he answered softly, and his eyes lingered on her neck, keen as a hawk’s. No, as a crow’s. Two breaths passed. He knows, Safi realized, watching as he smiled. He sees my own doom.
Yet the prince made no comment on the lines that must be tracing there. He simply said, “Our course is set, Safiya, so let us hope you chose the right one.” Then he returned to the tiller, graceful as a prince crossing a ballroom. Graceful as a crow taking flight.
* * *
It was like before. As soon as the golden chain touched Iseult’s skin, she was inside the Dreaming. Gray waves undulated around her. The sense of endless expanse somehow condensed to muffled containment.
Beside her, Corlant stood, his Threads twice as bright—and twice as wrong too, for the icy core shone silvery here.
“The souls,” Iseult began, lifting a hand to the wave of shadows speeding their way. She’d once read of tidal waves, massive and destructive. How people could do nothing but watch as the deadly waters charged in.
She felt like that now. Helpless to escape the voices and ghost hands that wanted to drag her down.
Except they did not reach her like before. This time, as the broken Threads and vague shapes barreled close, Corlant lifted a single hand, and the Hell-Bard ghosts parted. Splitting left and right, they streamed around Iseult and Corlant like a river glides around stone.
Cold heaved against Iseult, shouts, screams, pleas from the damned. But she simply watched them pass. It was like the image from the diary, the one Esme had shown Iseult, of a single leader at the Loom’s heart
But that person couldn’t be Corlant. He was the first bound to it, not the Loom’s creator. Which meant if he could move here, then so could she. “How do you do that?”
Corlant turned to her. Here, his one eye was golden and unhurt. Iseult glanced down. She too was healed, her fingers unmarred.
“You can do it too, Iseult. All you need is more power.” Corlant seemed only to whisper, yet the words cut directly into Iseult’s ears. As if his lips were against her, each breath made of ice. “But first you must find the Threadstones. Use your magic to locate them in the Loom.”
Iseult shuddered—and Corlant smiled. “I don’t know how to find them.” She pulled her gaze from him to stare at the Hell-Bards, still closing in.
So many lost lives. And one of them, somewhere, was Safi.
“Imagine what it felt like to use the stones. Imagine what it feels like to be bound to your Threadsister.”
“Maybe if you told me what the stones were, I could find them—”
“You will learn soon.” Annoyed red whipped up his Threads. “Once I possess the stones again, I will show you. First, though, we must find them. Now imagine.” He reached for Iseult, his palm flat as if to touch her forehead—as if to steal her magic like he’d taken the Herdwitch’s. She reeled back. Her heel hit the current of shadows.
And the ghosts swept her away. So fast, she had no time to cry out. So hard, she had no strength to fight. The dead carried her, and it was worse than before. This time, the souls claimed her before she had a goal. All she could do was be punched along, carried by a thousand cold hands and screamed at by a thousand lost throats. She became their fury, she became their need.
Living, living, they seemed to shriek at her. Breath and living. But there was a second refrain too, from new souls—younger and sharper, with Severed Threads still pulsing with hope. Threads that heal, Threads that thrive.
“I can’t help you,” she wanted to say, but all that came out was choking and ice. Claws stabbed and her spine cracked. Living, living, breath and living. Threads that heal, Threads that thrive. On and on they carried her. Over and over they broke her. Punishment for all her sins. For the Void that lived inside her.
But then she heard something—a voice she knew. A voice she loved. “Weasels piss on you. You’re not supposed to be here.”
Instantly, Iseult’s mind sharpened, homing in on that sound. On the certainty that filled her as soon as she heard it. And like anchors dropping overboard, Iseult’s limbs solidified. Her body, her soul—they stopped their free-fall tumble through the tidal wave of souls.
She found her feet. “Safi?” She imagined the timbre of what she’d just heard. The emotion behind it—Weasels piss on you!—and the sideways grin attached. She imagined how it sounded when Safi spoke in real life, cavalier and crass; she imagined how it felt when Safi spoke across the Threadstones, more reticent, more exposed.
Then Safi was there. Before Iseult with Threads so familiar that dream-tears ached in Iseult’s throat. So much depth, so much dimension. Even the Hell-Bard Loom could not replace all those folds and filaments, all those colors and smiles. Shadows might course in her severed soul, but it was still her. Right here, close enough to touch.
“Safi,” Iseult said to the Threads, and she reached out to stroke them. They were frozen to the touch.
“Good,” Corlant crooned, words oozing into Iseult’s ears.