“You ask too many questions, Wing Leader,” the king said.
“I don’t like surprises,” was her only reply. Except this—this had been a surprise.
The weapon wasn’t for winning glory or triumph or the love of battle. It was for extermination. A full-scale slaughter that would involve little fighting at all. Any opposing army—even Aelin and her warriors—would be defenseless.
The king’s face was turning purple with impatience.
But Manon was already taking to the skies, Abraxos beating his wings hard. She watched the prince until he was a speck of black hair.
And wondered what it was like to be trapped within that body.
Elide Lochan waited for the supply wagon. It didn’t come.
A day late; two days late. She hardly slept for fear it would arrive when she was dozing. When she awoke on the third day, her mouth dry, it was already habit to hurry down to help in the kitchen. She worked until her leg nearly gave out.
Then, just before sunset, the whinny of horses and the clatter of wheels and the shouts of men bounced off the dark stones of the long Keep bridge.
Elide slipped from the kitchen before they could notice her, before the cook could conscript her into performing some new task. She hurried up the steps as best she could with her chain, her heart in her throat. She should have kept her things downstairs, should have found some hiding spot.
Up and up, into Manon’s tower. She’d refilled the water skein each morning, and had ama.s.sed a little supply of food in a pouch. Elide threw open the door to Manon’s room, surging for the pallet where she kept her supplies.
But Vernon was inside.
He sat on the edge of Manon’s bed as if it were his own.
“Going somewhere, Elide?”
63
“Where on earth could you be headed?” Vernon said as he stood, smug as a cat.
Panic bleated in her veins. The wagon—the wagon—
“Was that the plan all along? To hide among those witches, and then run?”
Elide backed toward the door. Vernon clicked his tongue.
“We both know there’s no point in running. And the Wing Leader isn’t going to be here anytime soon.”
Elide’s knees wobbled. Oh, G.o.ds.
“But is my beautiful, clever niece human—or witch-kind? Such an important question.” He grabbed her by the elbow, a small knife in his hand. She could do nothing against the stinging slice in her arm, the red blood that welled. “Not a witch at all, it seems.”
“I am a Blackbeak,” Elide breathed. She would not bow to him, would not cower.
Vernon circled her. “Too bad they’re all up north and can’t verify it.”
Fight, fight, fight, her blood sang—do not let him cage you. Your mother went down fighting. She was a witch, and you are a witch, and you do not yield—you do not yield—
Vernon lunged, faster than she could avoid in her chains, one hand gripping her under the arm while the other slammed her head into the wood so hard that her body just—stopped.
That was all he needed—that stupid pause—to pin her other arm, gripping both in his hand while the other now clenched on her neck hard enough to hurt, to make her realize that her uncle had once trained as her father had. “You’re coming with me.”
“No.” The word was a whisper of breath.
His grip tightened, twisting her arms until they barked in pain. “Don’t you know what a prize you are? What you might be able to do?”
He yanked her back, opening the door. No—no, she wouldn’t let him take her, wouldn’t—
But screaming would do her no good. Not in a Keep full of monsters. Not in a world where no one remembered she existed, or bothered to care. She stilled, and he took that as acquiescence. She could feel his smile at the back of her head as he nudged her into the stairwell.
“Blackbeak blood is in your veins—along with our family’s generous line of magic.” He hauled her down the stairs, and bile burned her throat. There was no one coming for her—because she had belonged to no one. “The witches don’t have magic, not like us. But you, a hybrid of both lines …” Vernon gripped her arm harder, right over the cut he’d made, and she cried out. The sound echoed, hollow and small, down the stone stairwell. “You do your house a great honor, Elide.”
Vernon left her in a freezing dungeon cell.
No light.
No sound, save for the dripping of water somewhere.
Shaking, Elide didn’t even have the words to beg as Vernon tossed her inside. “You brought this upon yourself, you know,” he said, “when you allied with that witch and confirmed my suspicions that their blood flows through your veins.” He studied her, but she was gobbling down the details of the cell—anything, anything to get her out. She found nothing. “I’ll leave you here until you’re ready. I doubt anyone will notice your absence, anyway.”
He slammed the door, and darkness swallowed her entirely.
She didn’t bother trying the handle.
Manon was summoned by the duke the moment she set foot in Morath.
The messenger was cowering in the archway to the aerie, and could barely get the words out as he took in the blood and dirt and dust that still covered Manon.
She’d contemplated snapping her teeth at him just for trembling like a spineless fool, but she was drained, her head was pounding, and anything more than basic movement required far too much thought.
None of the Thirteen had dared say anything about her grandmother—that she had approved of the breeding.
Sorrel and Vesta trailing mere steps behind her, Manon flung open the doors to the duke’s council chamber, letting the slamming wood say enough about what she thought of being summoned immediately.
The duke—only Kaltain beside him—flicked his eyes over her. “Explain your … appearance.”
Manon opened her mouth.
If Vernon heard that Aelin Galathynius was alive—if he suspected for one heartbeat the debt that Aelin might feel toward Elide’s mother for saving her life, he might very well decide to end his niece’s life. “Rebels attacked us. I killed them all.”
The duke chucked a file of papers onto the table. They hit the gla.s.s and slid, spreading out in a fan. “For months now, you’ve wanted explanations. Well, here they are. Status reports on our enemies, larger targets for us to strike … His Majesty sends his best wishes.”
Manon approached. “Did he also send that demon prince into my barracks to attack us?” She stared at the duke’s thick neck, wondering how easily the rough skin would tear.
Perrington’s mouth twisted to the side. “Roland had outlived his usefulness. Who better to take care of him than your Thirteen?”
“I hadn’t realized we were to be your executioners.” She should indeed rip out his throat for what he’d tried to do. Beside him, Kaltain was wholly blank, a sh.e.l.l. But that shadowfire … Would she summon it if the duke were attacked?
“Sit and read the files, Wing Leader.”
She didn’t appreciate the command, and let out a snarl to tell him so, but she sat.
And read.
Reports on Eyllwe, on Melisande, on Fenharrow, on the Red Desert, and Wendlyn.
And on Terrasen.
According to the report, Aelin Galathynius—long believed to be dead—had appeared in Wendlyn and bested four of the Valg princes, including a lethal general in the king’s army. Using fire.
Aelin had fire magic, Elide had said. She could have survived the cold.
But—but that meant that magic … Magic still worked in Wendlyn. And not here.
Manon would bet a great deal of the gold h.o.a.rded at Blackbeak Keep that the man in front of her—and the king in Rifthold—was the reason why.
Then a report of Prince Aedion Ashryver, former general of Adarlan, kin to the Ashryvers of Wendlyn, being arrested for treason. For a.s.sociating with rebels. He had been rescued from his execution mere weeks ago by unknown forces.
Possible suspects: Lord Ren Allsbrook of Terrasen …
And Lord Chaol Westfall of Adarlan, who had loyally served the king as his Captain of the Guard until he’d joined forces with Aedion this past spring and fled the castle the day of Aedion’s capture. They suspected the captain hadn’t gone far—and that he would try to free his lifelong friend, the Crown Prince.
Free him.
The prince had taunted her, provoked her—as if trying to get her to kill him. And Roland had begged for death.
If Chaol and Aedion were both now with Aelin Galathynius, all working together …
They hadn’t been in the forest to spy.
But to save the prince. And whoever that female prisoner had been. They’d rescued one friend, at least.
The duke and the king didn’t know. They didn’t know how close they’d been to all their targets, or how close their enemies had come to seizing their prince.
That was why the captain had come running.
He had come to kill the prince—the only mercy he believed he could offer him.
The rebels didn’t know that the man was still inside.
“Well?” the duke demanded. “Any questions?”
“You have yet to explain the necessity of the weapon my grandmother is building. A tool like that could be catastrophic. If there’s no magic, then surely obliterating the Queen of Terrasen can’t be worth the risk of using those towers.”