When she left, I sat down on the edge of the building to watch the sunrise, tracing my thumb across the wound on my hand. You trekked among the beasts and briars, Petra had said, and once I returned the crown, I wouldn’t even do that. I would be no one again—no one spectacular, anyway, and the last bit of my mother would be gone.
Fox would be gone, too.
He had said he didn’t want to become a fox again—but I didn’t see another choice. We were almost there, almost at the end. We just had to return the crown to the heart of the wood and break the curse and save the kingdom. But things were so much more complicated than that.
There wasn’t another way to break the curse on the wood without both Fox and me giving up what we wanted. Without my power, Fox couldn’t be human—as far as I knew—and without the curse in the wood, would have my power. If only I could cure every bone-eater like I had Fox—
That’s when I noticed a shadow at the gates of the city. It was tall and spindly, and although it was so far away, I knew the shape of it too well.
An ancient had broken through the fog, and it stood at the gates of Voryn.
34
The Cowardly Truth
Fox
I WOKE UP with a pillow curled to my chest and Daisy nowhere in sight—which immediately catapulted me into full-on panic. I quickly sat up, wondering where she’d gone, when I realized I wasn’t alone in the room. A figure riffled through the wardrobe. I tensed, curling my fingers into fists. I no longer had claws, and I couldn’t make out the person’s face.
I rose swiftly into a crouch, flicking my wrist. It was second nature, like breathing. A spark of fire bloomed onto my fingers. I threw it at the intruder, who ducked. It burst into sparks on the wall behind them. “You better have a good reason to be—wait!” I called as the shadow darted out of the room.
I tried to go after them, but my legs tangled in the sheets. I pried them off and lurched for the door, but by the time I got into the hallway, whoever it was had vanished.
I snapped my teeth together agitatedly. Who was that? And where was Daisy?
Returning to the room, I nosed into the wardrobe the intruder had been riffling through and found Daisy’s old sash that she had tied the crown to, along with our old clothes. It didn’t take a mastermind to figure out what they were looking for—the crown. Too bad they wouldn’t find it.
I glanced up at the burn mark on the wall.
And that made me think of a question that I wanted an answer to—one that Daisy couldn’t provide, but luckily I knew someone else who could, and I knew exactly where he’d be.
Seren looked up when I came within a few feet of his cell. His hands were bound, and he sat cross-legged in the middle of the damp stones. The flowers had bloomed again over his shoulder, mostly lavender from the Sundermount, and they were striking against his torn dark tunic. He didn’t seem all that surprised to see me.
“Let me guess,” the corpse said with a tired sigh. “You have questions.”
There was a handful of guards patrolling the area, so we had to be quiet if I wanted to ask him what I needed to know. I crouched down by the cell bars and curled my finger, silently mouthing, Come here.
With a roll of his eyes, he shimmied toward me. Closer, a little closer—when he was within arm’s reach, I grabbed him by the collar of his tunic and forced him against the cell bars. He hissed in discomfort. I didn’t care; he’d almost killed Daisy.
But the moment I grabbed him, I knew something was . . . off. It wasn’t the way he smelled, or the pallor of his face. It was something I couldn’t place. A strange energy or magnetism. And what was more . . . “Kingsteeth, you aren’t woodcursed anymore.”
“I’m so glad you have eyes,” he replied calmly.
“How?”
“Same way she cured you, I’d imagine.”
“I wasn’t dead for eight years.”
“Oh, I assure you I am still very much dead—”
I shook him one good time, and a flower broke off his shoulder and fell between us.
“Fine! Fine,” he relented. “Her magic, I would assume, is keeping me alive now, just like it’s keeping you human. But I can’t be sure because I’m no longer connected to the wood, and once you break the curse, I am going to die and you’ll be a fox again. Just like you wanted. You always liked running away from things.”
“You don’t know me.”
To that, he smiled, flashing sharp shark-like teeth. “Don’t I, Lorne?”
Lorne?
Where had I heard that name bef—
A needle of pain flared to life behind my eyes. Not again. With a wince, I let go of him and pressed my palm against my eye, watching the colors bloom under my eyelid, wishing that this wouldn’t happen now, of all times—
“You’re not supposed to be in here!” someone said from the entrance to the prison. The guards? Not now.
I could barely hear them over the high-pitched screech in my head.
Seren leaned against the cell bars. “I would suggest you run. They’re coming, you know. And everyone’s going to blame you.” Even his voice sounded too loud, knocking against the inside of my brain like a sledgehammer.
“Blame me—f-for what?”
As the guards came closer, the corpse repeated, “I honestly suggest you run.”
I didn’t know what he was talking about, but I fought to push myself to my feet. I could barely see straight anymore. I doubled over, my hand covering my face. It felt like a hot poker had been shoved into my eyes. My head hurt so much I wanted to vomit.
Then there were images again. Memories, I now knew. They folded together like Daisy braiding her hair in the mornings, tastes and sounds and smells. A castle—the Sundermount? The tallest spire. A girl with golden hair—Anwen.
My—
My sister.
My father, gray beard and swept-back hair, handing me my first sword. A town—no, the village. The Village-in-the-Valley. Pressing my face against the flower shop window, seeing a girl with honey-colored hair and freckles across the bridge of her nose, smiling at me with a gap where she’s lost three teeth. Daisy. A lanky young man behind me—black hair and dark eyes, always smelling of horses and complaining of boredom. Playing in the wheat fields, studying with a gray-haired seneschal, an itchy purple uniform and a heavy circlet, looking into the mirror at—
At me.
I was—
I was back in the wood, hiding in a hollowed-out log. Thick, heavy mist hung in the forest. I was trembling. My trousers were dirty from crawling through the underbrush, my fingernails caked in mud.
“Where are you?” I heard Seren cry. He tore through the wood, his footsteps crinkling the fall leaves. “Princeling! You’re going to get me in so much trouble! Come out!”
I began to shout back—when I saw it again. The ancient. Moss-covered limbs and vine-strewn horns, creeping through the wood, hunting. I knew I should’ve told Seren to run, but I was too scared to move. If I warned him, then the ancient would find me—and I didn’t want it to find me.
“Hey! C’mon, where are you? We should leave before . . .”
I watched as his boots turned around and slowed to a stop to face the ancient. Then I couldn’t watch anymore. I buried my head in my arms, but I couldn’t block out Seren’s screams. I heard him fight and beg, and I stayed safely in my hiding hole, cowering. I didn’t even try to help. I just lay there, praying to every old god I knew, hoping the ancient wouldn’t find me, trying to block out my best friend’s voice.