Chapter 11
Another chamber had been prepared for us to skeld the following evening.
The Great Hall remained crowded with refugees who’d escaped Solmire before the city burned. Some had been healed. Many more had not survived their injuries, the damage left by dragonfire too catastrophic to mend.
The hearth in this chamber was smaller than the others, and plainer, though still large enough to accommodate the four of us: Aedric, Hamish, Veylan, and me.
Veylan had been bound in iron. A thick collar encircled his throat, heavy cuffs biting into his wrists as Hamish stood behind him, chains wound tightly through one hand.
Veylan slumped where he knelt at Hamish’s feet, shoulders bowed, his breath shallow and uneven.
Standing so close, I could smell the faint, sickening char of his flesh beneath the iron.
Each breath pulled memory with it. My own skin sizzling beneath those same cuffs. The helplessness. The pain.
“He’s dangerous,” Aedric said coldly when I’d timidly suggested removing the restraints. “Clever. If we give him even the smallest opening, he’ll take it. His shadows could call to Rìan if he’s left unbound.”
But the shadows were gone now. Dragged inward. Buried beneath his skin.
Even the shifting tattoos that marked him had dulled, the restless ink faded to something faint and strangely lifeless. I found I could barely look at them anymore. Not now that I knew mine—like his—marked a bargain struck with the enemy.
At least mine was merciful—appearing only rarely, fading almost as quickly as it came.
Across the chamber, Aedric stood silently beneath the large clock mounted to the wall, his gaze fixed upon it.
I couldn’t read the symbols upon the clockface, but Aedric had told me we would arrive at the edge of the Dusklands long after sunset.
At last, he stepped away and crossed toward the hearth.
It roared to life at his approach, flames blazing so bright that for a moment I had to squint against the sudden light after the dimness of the chamber.
He glanced back at me, half his face swallowed by shadow, firelight cutting across it in shifting slashes of gold and dark. He held out a hand. I laced my fingers through his, the heat of his palm startling against mine, almost uncomfortably warm with the magic banked inside him.
“There should be no issues skelding this time,” Calantha said from behind us, her brisk tone carrying easily through the chamber. “The gateway remains open between our Courts. But I’ll refrain from snuffing the flames here for a few minutes, just in case.”
“I’ll send word at dawn that we arrived safely,” Aedric said over his shoulder.
Calantha gave a curt nod.
The clock struck the hour.
Aedric’s grip tightened around mine. He caught hold of Hamish’s forearm, and at once Hamish hauled Veylan roughly to his feet and shoved him ahead of us. A shield. Though with Rìan absent from the Court of Dusk, I wasn’t entirely certain what danger Aedric expected.
Veylan stiffened as Hamish pushed him toward the hearth, the rest of us falling into step behind him.
The flames towered high, wild and ravenous, their heat so intense it kissed my skin almost painfully.
And suddenly I was back beneath dragonfire, trapped beneath blistering light and impossible agony, the smell of my own burning flesh choking the air as pain swallowed everything whole.
My pulse stumbled hard. Every nerve in my body seemed to remember.
Fear gripped me so suddenly I almost stopped walking.
Aedric’s thumb swept once along the back of my hand.
“You’ll be alright,” he said quietly, the corner of his mouth lifting in the faintest approximation of a smile. “My fire won’t harm you.” His fingers tightened around mine. “I’ve got you.”
Somehow, impossibly, the panic eased enough for me to keep moving.
But Veylan faltered. His feet scrabbled weakly against the stone as he instinctively tried to recoil from the heat and light. Sweat beaded across his forehead, dampening the white strands at his temples as Hamish forced him closer.
“Don’t worry, dog. Nothing to fear.” Aedric grinned wolfishly. “Unless Hamish lets go.”
A strangled sound tore from Veylan as his feet crossed into the hearth.
In one smooth movement, we stepped through the flames and skelded to the Court of Dusk.
We emerged into darkness.
The fire behind us dwindled almost immediately, collapsing from a raging inferno to little more than a modest flicker, casting the chamber into shadow.
It was colder here than in Solmire, enough to raise gooseflesh across my arms. The air carried a clean, briny scent I didn’t recognize.
Then came the sound.
It drifted in through the closed windows, as constant as breathing, distant and softened by the glass. A low rush, followed by a muted break and a long, whispering retreat, only for the rhythm to begin again.
Waves?
Despite myself, a thrill stirred in me. I turned toward the windows, trying to peer beyond them. But the darkness kept its secrets, swallowing moon and stars alike, revealing nothing of what waited beyond the glass.
The only waves I’d ever known belonged to the half-dead lakes of the mortal realm — shallow things caked in mud, their waters pulled thin by drought, fish bloated and rotting along the banks. Their waves had been pitiful little things, barely more than ripples when the wind turned cruel.
This was different. This sounded… alive.
Where in the gods’ names were we?
Calming my racing heart, I forced my attention from the windows and looked around the chamber instead. Graceful arches swept high overhead, carved from veined stone, ghostly in the dimness. Tall windows and terrace doors lined the outer wall, curtains hanging limp around them.
At the far end of the chamber sat a raised dais, and upon it, barely visible in the dimness, loomed the shape of a throne. I could make out almost nothing of it from here beyond its silhouette, all jagged edges and impossible height.
But it was the absolute quiet that unnerved me most. The chamber was empty. No servants rushing to greet us. No guards standing waiting. No sign that anyone expected our arrival at all, despite the message we’d sent ahead.
In front of me, Veylan collapsed. He dropped hard to his knees as his legs gave way beneath him. He quaked with the effort of remaining upright, breath coming in harsh, rattling pulls as the iron fed greedily upon his magic.
Hamish merely tightened his grip on the chains and said nothing.
Aedric’s gaze swept the chamber slowly, his expression darkening.
“This is strange,” he murmured.
Before anyone could answer, the click of a latch echoed somewhere to our left.
Sparks skipped from Aedric’s fingers. Hamish’s hand flashed to the hilt of his sword.
A door creaked open. Footsteps—quick and light, hurried toward us with unmistakable urgency. A young woman appeared, the darkness sliding across her skin as she approached, the firelight slowly revealing her.
At first glance, she seemed no older than me, though I knew better than to trust such things with the Fae.
Her straight black hair, cut bluntly at her jaw, had been pinned half back from a sweet, heart-shaped face, revealing almond-shaped eyes tilted faintly upward at the corners.
She was pretty in a quiet, almost timid sort of way.
Though it was difficult to notice much beyond her nerves.
She looked thoroughly, painfully anxious.
Her gaze darted between us, widening faintly at the sight of Aedric before dropping immediately—only to snag on Veylan, wheezing at Hamish’s feet. Whatever color she possessed seemed to drain from her face, yet she said nothing of it.
Instead, she hurried forward and bowed.
Once. Twice. Then a third time, deeper than before.
“W-Welcome to the Court of Dusk, High Lord,” she said quickly.
Aedric frowned. His gaze swept past her toward the empty throne before returning to her again.
“Where is Levinica?”
Something almost like a squeak escaped the female’s throat before she quickly lowered her head.
“High Lord,” she said, her voice thin and trembling, “Lady Levinica will not be taking an audience this evening.”
Silence settled over the chamber. It pressed in from all sides, thick and heavy, until even the distant crash of the sea seemed to recede beneath it.
Then came the heat. It rolled from Aedric in sudden waves, so abrupt and fierce that I knew immediately it was not my imagination. His anger bled into the room, into the air around us, pressing uncomfortably against my skin.
“Oh?” he asked softly, though the threat beneath the single word was unmistakable.
The young woman swallowed hard. “I—I apologize, High Lord, but she—”
“We travelled halfway across the continent,” Aedric cut in sharply, “to return her defecting hound to her side—and she does not even deign to thank us in person?”
The young woman looked as though she might faint. Her hands twisted tightly together in front of her, nails pressing so hard into her skin that small crescents bloomed on her palms.
“The Lady is… unwell, High Lord.”
“I am aware her health has declined,” Aedric said tightly.
“It’s more than that.” Her voice wavered. “There are days now that she cannot… she cannot…”
“Spit it out.”
The words broke from her in a rush. “She cannot tell the difference anymore!” she cried. “What is real and what is not. And on days like today…” Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. “Her mind is not here. There is no use speaking to her.”
Aedric stilled. “When will she be fit to receive me?”
“I—I do not know,” she admitted shakily. “It could be days…”
“Days?” His voice lowered, dangerous.
She nodded, panicked. “And even then, the window is narrow. When she returns to herself, she slips away again almost immediately. She searches, High Lord. She has never stopped searching. Not in three hundred years. Lord Dannis—”
“Enough.”