Chapter 7
The marble was unforgiving beneath my bare feet, like everything else in this gods-damned palace of pretty lies.
I moved like smoke down the corridor, back pressed to the wall, ears straining for the whisper of fabric or the tread of patrol boots. Nothing. Just the distant hum of magic thrumming through the stones, that same cursed melody that had been clawing at my consciousness since I’d arrived.
Behind me, two doors down, my children slept. Mireth had finally stopped crying an hour ago. Eryx had fallen asleep clutching a wooden horse someone had carved for him—probably Fenric, the bastard was too kind for his own good. I’d left a small dagger beneath Mireth’s pillow. Not much, but enough.
If someone comes for them before I get back.
If I don’t make it back.
The thought carved through me like glass, but I shoved it down. Deep. Where it could bleed quietly without making noise.
I had a list burning in my head.
Food. Travel rations. Something that wouldn’t rot in three days.
Maps. Any maps. Even if they were written in fae script I couldn’t read.
A cloak. Hooded. Large enough to hide three fugitives stumbling through foreign wilderness.
A satchel. Strong enough to carry supplies and light enough not to slow us down.
Anything remotely useful for keeping small children alive in hostile territory.
He says I’m safer here, I thought, sliding past a tapestry that depicted some long-dead fae lord slaying a beast with too many teeth. He said that before the wolf came.
No more trusting men who speak like gods. No more waiting for someone else to hold the blade.
The hallway branched, and I chose left, toward what looked like a service wing. The kind of place where servants stored linens and nobles forgot supplies existed. The stones here were rougher, the magic-light dimmer.
Perfect.
I found the door I wanted three turns down. Thick oak, iron hinges, and a lock that looked complicated enough to hide items worth stealing. I pressed my ear to the wood. Silence.
The lock was trickier than I’d hoped, but not impossible. I’d learned to pick locks in desperate moments, crouched in the ruins of our old estate while soldiers searched room by room. Muscle memory guided my hands now, the tension wire bending just so—
Click.
The door swung open to reveal exactly what I’d hoped for, a supply vault.
Shelves lined the walls, packed with everything from bandages to bottles of wine, travel packs to wheels of preserved cheese. My heart hammered with relief and fury in equal measure.
“Within the walls, you are safe,” I whispered, mocking Varyth’s smooth, confident voice as I stuffed dried meat into a canvas satchel. “Trust me, Isara. I have no interest in killing you.”
A wheel of hard cheese vanished into the satchel. Then a pouch of what looked like travel bread. My hands moved efficiently, desperately, grabbing anything that might keep us alive for a few days on the road.
“Eat a star, you pompous, secret-hoarding bastard.”
My fingers closed around a small glass vial filled with amber liquid. The label was written in fae script, flowing, elegant letters that meant nothing to me. But the bottle was perfectly sized for poison. Or healing draught. Or liquid fire.
I didn’t care. I took it anyway.
Another vial, this one filled with a substance that glowed faintly blue. Into the pocket it went.
A third bottle, filled with what looked like crushed silver leaves suspended in clear oil.
“The wards will be reinforced,” I hissed under my breath, snatching a coil of thin rope from a shelf. “This won’t happen again.”
“Right. Because your track record is so fucking stellar.”
I found a leather water skin and three more travel packs, smaller ones, sized for children. My throat tightened as I imagined Mireth and Eryx wearing them, trudging through unknown forests while I led them toward gods-knew-what.
But it was better than staying here. Better than waiting for the next monster to find us while Varyth played his political games and hoarded his precious secrets.
A soft sound from the corridor made me freeze.
Footsteps. Measured. Deliberate.
Shit.
I crammed the last of the supplies into the satchel and eased toward the door, listening. The footsteps were coming closer, unhurried, but purposeful. Someone making rounds. Or someone who knew exactly where they were going.
I pressed myself against the wall beside the door frame and waited.
The footsteps paused just outside.
Breathe, I told myself. Slow. Quiet. Like you’re not here.
A shadow moved across the gap beneath the door.
Then the footsteps continued down the hall, fading into distance.
I counted to thirty before I moved.
Slipping out of the vault, I eased the door closed behind me and turned the lock with fingers that barely trembled. The hallway stretched empty in both directions, moonlight spilling through tall windows to paint everything in silver and shadow.
Three more items to find. A map, decent daggers, and a cloak.
But as I moved deeper into the castle’s heart, a sliver of golden light caught my attention, spilling from beneath a door that stood slightly ajar.
Voices. Low, urgent, male.
I pressed myself against the wall and crept closer, pulse hammering in my throat.
“—growing bolder.” Varyth’s voice, tight with something that might have been worry. “The attack today proves it. Ashterion isn’t content to wait in Nyxaria any longer.”
“He’s testing us,” Darian replied, and I could hear the exhaustion bleeding through his usual swagger. “Seeing how far he can push before we push back.”
“No.” Fenric’s was quieter, more controlled. “This wasn’t a test. It was reconnaissance. That thing wasn’t trying to kill her, it was trying to take her.”
Her. My blood turned to ice.
“He cannot learn of what we have,” Varyth said, and there was steel in those words. Final. Absolute. “Not until we understand it ourselves.”
I pressed closer to the crack in the door, straining to hear more.
“The humans are settling in Edrithas well enough,” Darian was saying. “The children seem—”
“The children are not the concern.” Varyth snapped. “It’s the mother. She’s... volatile. Unpredictable. And if Ashterion gets his hands on her before we can properly assess what she’s capable of...”
My stomach dropped. They were talking about me. About my capabilities.
About whatever the hell was wrong with me that made monsters want to steal me in broad daylight.
“We move the military outposts closer to the western border,” Varyth continued. “Double the patrols between here and Nyxaria. And someone needs to keep a closer eye on our guests.”
“I’ll handle it,” Fenric said quietly.
“See that you do.”
Footsteps. They were moving.
I scrambled backward, pressing myself into the shadows of an alcove as the door swung wider. Three figures emerged. Varyth leading, shoulders tense with authority; Darian favouring his wounded arm; Fenric bringing up the rear, those red wings tucked tight against his back.
They moved down the corridor away from me, their voices fading to murmurs.
I waited until I couldn’t hear them anymore. Then I waited another thirty seconds.
I slipped through the door they’d left behind.
The room was clearly Varyth’s study—all dark wood and expensive leather, papers scattered across a massive desk, maps pinned to the walls.
I moved quickly, quietly, scanning the desk for anything useful.
Letters. Several of them, written in a flowing fae script I couldn’t understand. But one caught my attention, a map spread beneath a crystal paperweight, marked with what had to be military positions. Red pins scattered along borders, concentrated heavily to the west.
Nyxaria. Where the Lord of Murder Wolves lived.
I memorised the layout as best I could, then carefully folded the map and slipped it inside my cloak. West was definitely not the direction to run.
Another letter lay half-finished on the desk, this one written in script I could actually read.
Lord Ryleth,
Your reputation for crafting weapons precedes you. I have need of your services for a project of the utmost discretion
The letter cut off there, ink still wet on the final word.
I turned to rifle through the other papers scattered across the desk, searching for anything else that might tell me what I was truly dealing with—
A throat cleared behind me.
Every muscle in my body went rigid.
Slowly, I turned.
Brynelle stood in the doorframe, arms crossed, those iridescent wings folded neatly behind her back. Her expression was unreadable in the moonlight.
“Looking for something specific?” she asked, voice silk-smooth and deadly calm. “Or just practicing your burglary skills?”
I straightened, forcing my shoulders back, trying to look like I belonged here. “Maybe I’m just organising.”
Brynelle’s lips twitched, not quite a smile, but close. “Maybe you’re terrible at lying.”
The bluff crumbled. I let it.
“I’m not waiting for another monster to walk through the walls,” I said flatly. “Your precious lord made promises about safety, and this morning my children nearly became wolf food in his secure garden.”
Brynelle’s expression shifted. “Varyth doesn’t make promises lightly,” she said quietly, stepping into the room. “When he says he’ll protect someone, he means it. He just won’t say why or how.”
“And if his silence gets my children killed?” The words came out sharper than I intended, edged with all the fear I’d been swallowing since dawn. “What then?”
For a long moment, she stared at me. As though she was looking at something she recognised.
“He keeps people’s secrets to protect them,” Brynelle said, finally meeting my eyes. “Even when it makes him look like a bastard. Even when it makes them hate him. He’d rather bear that weight than watch them burn from knowledge they’re not ready for.”
“But I heard him,” I said desperately. “Just now. He was talking about me like a weapon. Like something to be contained.”