Nightweaver #1

Chapter Sixteen

“Like this,” Jack says, adjusting my grip on Caligo’s reins.

“I’ve got it,” I grumble, going over his surprisingly short list of instructions in the back of my mind. No loud noises, stay calm, sit up straight, pull left to go left, pull right to go right.

I asked him for lessons in riding, and he was happy to oblige, but I think he may have started to regret his decision sometime between teaching me how to saddle Caligo and showing me how to climb up in that saddle.

Jack rolls his eyes, holding his hands up in mock surrender. “If you’ve got it, then by all means,” he says, stepping aside.

I take a deep breath, give Caligo a gentle kick, and we’re off. At first, his pace is slow, steady. It’s different, holding the reins rather than holding on to Will and trusting him to be in control. Trusting him , I think bitterly. What a mistake.

The wind whips at my hair, a cool breeze. I give Caligo another kick, and he breaks into a trot. My plan was to ride past the orchard, to the old windmill near the far side of the property, and back. But—we pass the windmill. Caligo seems to be enjoying the fresh air and freedom as much as I am, and I can’t help urging him to go faster.

Balance , Jack reminded me, is your main asset as a rider . Luckily, I spent seventeen years at sea. I was born with legs meant to weather the waves. Balance is no obstacle. I am in control. I am—

Caligo trumpets, rearing back. I grip the reins, my heart in my throat. Out of the corner of my eye, the source of Caligo’s distress—a bloodhound, its ears flopping—races across the lawn, intent on the horse.

Caligo takes off, headed toward the forest that encroaches on the steep cliff face in the distance.

“Whoa, Caligo!” I shout, but it’s no use.

A second set of thundering hooves rumbles in my chest.

“Easy now, easy.” The admiral appears at my side, his sister’s unicorn, Thea, keeping pace with Caligo. “Easy,” he says, his voice soft but commanding. At the sound of him, Caligo slows.

We come to a complete stop at the edge of the forest. The bloodhound bounds up to us, but the admiral has already dismounted Thea and stands with his arms crossed, a stern look about him.

“Dinah.” He shakes his head disapprovingly, and the bloodhound slides to a halt, her ears pulled back. “What have I told you about chasing after someone your own size?” He kneels, and the dog leaps into his arms, tail wagging. He glances over his shoulder at me, lowering his voice conspiratorially. “I haven’t, actually. Dogs are notoriously deft at sniffing out Underlings, after all.”

My mouth falls open, but no words come out. I relax my grip on Caligo’s reins, my palms stinging.

“How did you do that?” I ask. “How did you make him stop?”

“Simple, really.” He smooths his jacket—dark Bancroft green in place of the League’s dull-olive uniform, a silver wolf rampant embroidered on his chest. “All it takes is a little magic.”

I sigh. “Is that all?”

He stands, extending a hand to me. “Killian.”

I give it a firm shake. “Aster.”

“I know,” he says with a sly wink. “My nephew tells me you’re hunting a Sylk.”

I have to clench my jaw to keep my mouth from flailing open. Will said he told his uncle about us, but I didn’t expect Killian to be so blunt about it.

“Any luck?” he asks casually, stroking Caligo’s muzzle.

“Not quite,” I admit. “Even if I happen to come across the shadow, I don’t have the means to kill it.”

“You mean like this?” Killian hefts a flintlock from his waistband, offers it to me. “Go on, take it.”

I don’t hesitate, eager to feel the cool metal in my grasp. My hand molds to the form of the flintlock, my muscles breathing a sigh of relief.

“On the front, we call them Howlers,” he says, a nostalgic twinkle in his eye. “That being because it’s the sound a Sylk makes when you put a bullet between its eyes.”

“So you can kill them?”

He gives me a puzzled look, scratching his mustache. “Only after they have possessed a host, and only with bullets made of Elysian Iron. But you never actually kill a Sylk—you merely banish them whence they came.” He pauses, furrows his brows. “Will told me you’ve been hunting the Sylk together for over a month. He didn’t think to tell you what would happen once you caught it?”

Shame forms a knot in my stomach. I think back to all the nights Will and I spent in the conservatory, discussing flowers and constellations. Every time I brought him another clue, he insisted he would look into it. But as many times as he detailed ways to capture a Sylk—with cords made from silver thread or traps set with rotten meat—he was always swift to change the subject. I was so caught up in distracting myself from my grief, in wanting to be close to someone who didn’t see my ability as a curse but rather as a valuable gift, that I didn’t want to push too hard.

Stupid.

“I see.” Killian shrugs. “It only makes sense.”

I tuck the flintlock into my apron and hold my chin up high, arming myself against any more painful realizations. “What does?”

“Well,” he says, climbing back into Thea’s saddle. “If my nephew told you everything you needed to know, you wouldn’t need him then, would you?”

He gives Thea a firm kick, and she breaks into a gallop, leaving me alone on a hillside, wondering how different my life would be if I hadn’t followed that Sylk into the captain’s quarters that day. If I hadn’t found Annie hiding there. If I had taken the shot instead of sparing her life. If I hadn’t met Will. If he hadn’t saved Elsie; hadn’t been so kind and generous to my family. If he hadn’t asked me to go with him to the conservatory that night. If I hadn’t stayed.

If.

Killian’s right—if I didn’t think Will could be of any use to me when Jack offered me the knapsack, I would have taken it. I would have run. I wouldn’t be here, thinking about correct saddle posture or Elysian bullets or Will.

I don’t need Will’s help, I remind myself. I never have. And now that I know what it takes to banish the Sylk, I don’t need anyone.

A cool, brisk wind sweeps through me. As if compelled, I twist in the saddle, looking behind. Dinah growls with the sound of low, burgeoning thunder, her teeth bared at the old windmill. But a moment later, she whimpers and chases after Killian, her tail tucked.

Mist unfurls from the nearby tree line, shrouding the hillside in a damp fog. In the blink of an eye, I see him— Owen —blood pooling from a wound in his chest. He reaches out to me, his eyes glowing red. Shadows seep from his body, an all-consuming cloud of darkness.

I reach for the flintlock Killian gave me, ready to take down this Shifter that dares hide behind my brother’s likeness. But I blink again, and Owen is gone.

Still, I hear a voice: a soft, coaxing whisper.

Together, we will bring kings and kingdoms to their knees , it says. You need only ask.