48. Isla
48
ISLA
“ R ot in agony,” I whisper into Ivan’s ear at the same time as I slash his neck with my talons.
When I straighten, blood is gushing from his neck in crimson ropes, eyes already milky with the sheen of death.
Elio gags, cheeks puffing as though he were holding back a mouthful of vomit. In spite of his waterboarding threat, my friend’s heart is too tender for all of this.
Unlike mine.
“I had a vine at the ready,” Sofiya grumbles as though miffed I beat her to the punch. “In other news, I’m really glad we’re friends now.”
A smile flickers across my lips, brief as a dying ember.
“Help me up. Let’s go off more rebels. I’m feeling very vindictive right now.” Sofiya bears down on Elio’s hand, struggling to sit. She doesn’t succeed. “Stupid iron,” she huffs, hiking up her skirt.
Her breath catches, along with mine and Elio’s, because her leg is…
“Holy Cauldron, is it me or is my leg gray?”
As she props herself up for a better look, I shapeshift into my shadows. Dádhi, the powder in those human bullets… How do you extract it from a Faerie’s bloodstream?
Why? Who was shot? my father’s tone is so sharp it feels like a talon to my eardrums.
Sofiya Patchenkov, I manage to say before shifting back to skin.
And you want to heal her why ?
I snort, then transform back to smoke. Because she’s been helpful. Give me instructions.
It’s my grandfather who answers: You’ll have to sever the infected limb to stop the iron from spreading. If you wish her to regrow it, use a blade that isn’t iron. Otherwise, you’ll get a cleaner cut with your shadows. Alternatively, you could try the saw sigil, but since you’re a Crow, Behach Batee, your blood might hinder regrowth.
I’m so horrified by what I must do that, when I snap back into flesh, I lose my balance and bump into the wall.
Elio glances in my general direction, his eyes dark with concern. “Isla?”
“Sorry.” A non-iron blade…
I take stock of what I have on hand: two iron daggers (useless), glass shards from the shattered mirror and carafe (can’t cut bone with glass). There was a butter knife on the dining table! I can elongate the blade and shar?—
“I can’t feel my leg,” Sofiya whispers hoarsely.
The gray tinge of iron has crept past her kneecap. I make a split-second decision—one the vain Fae will probably hold against me for the rest of her life, but at least she’ll have a life.
As I approach her, I use my talons to split the calluses on my thumbs. “Forgive me for what I’m about to do, but it’s the only way to keep the iron in your blood from reaching your heart.”
Hopefully.
“What are you about to—” She quiets when I tear off the rest of her stocking.
“El, can you ice her thigh with your magic so it goes numb?”
“Why?” Sofiya’s alarm sears the stuffy air.
“To get the iron out,” I say, keeping it vague.
Elio molds her thigh with his hands. “Sorry for touching you…inappropriately.”
“Please. This is the most action I’ve gotten in a decade,” she reassures him, her pitch steadier, her breathing more even.
Elio’s icy palms must have rid her of the pain.
Once he lets go, I prod a few places on her leg, making her flicker in and out of sight. “Did you feel that?”
“No.”
I press my damp thumbs above her knee, making us both fade from sight and then I begin the harrowing process of amputation. Sofiya holds still—because she’s too drained to fight, or because she trusts I have her best interest at heart?
“Tell us about your future husband,” I say, to keep her mind off her leg. “Maybe Elio knows him. He spends lots of time in Nebba.”
Her answer is so slow to come that I think she might have passed out. But then her voice rises like a wisp of smoke, “His name is Amaury Acron. He makes artistic glass sculptures. He sent me a vase. It’s quite pretty. Ever heard of him?”
“Yes,” Elio tells her, clutching his elbows. “My aunts have many pieces from him. He’s very famous in Nebba.”
Speak to me, Isla, my father calls through the bond.
But I can’t speak to him. Not yet. I need to concentrate. And hurry. I need to hurry. Like wet clay, I feel Sofiya’s flesh crack apart, the furrow deepening with each new ring of blood I add.
“Is he as handsome as you are?” she asks Elio.
“Um. He’s, um?—”
Another ring of blood detaches muscles and ligaments.
She winces, whimpers. “Fuck. It feels like you’re chopping off my leg, Isla.”
My stomach curdles from the pungent aroma of what I’m doing. Cauldron, I’m glad I can’t see it. “Is Amaury hot, El?”
“I think so?” he replies.
“Ugh,” Sofiya mutters. “That so means he’s not. Ugh .”
“Describe him,” I tell Elio, as I start on the bone.
“Oh my Gods. Tell me it’s almost over. Tell me you extracted the powder,” she says through harsh pants.
“El…” I prompt him gently. “Describe Amaury.”
“He’s brown-haired! Very talented.”
“Brown-haired and very talented?” she repeats. “Definitely means he’s ugly.”
“No, he’s, um…” As Elio searches for better descriptors, her bone snaps.
She screams. And then she goes so quiet that I draw back my hands. Her lids are clasped. Her lips parted. Her head dangling off the edge of the pouf.
Elio stares, throat bobbing.
“I had no choice,” I whisper.
He kneels, cradling her face. “I know.”
After easing her head back onto the pouf, he sweeps a fiery lock from her damp forehead. Sweetness personified, that one.
One glance at the infected part of Sofiya’s leg increases my queasiness so briskly that my vision fragments. I concentrate on my breathing until my stomach settles anew.
Get yourself together, Isla. The carnival of horror has just started spinning. I’m not sure why I’m expecting my pep talk to ease my stomach’s revolt. If anything, anticipating there will be more to come causes it to riot further.
My fingers tremble as I attempt a healing sigil on Sofiya’s stump. Like always, I fail. Anger and frustration make the tremors in my hands turn so brisk that I don’t even attempt a second sigil.
“Ice her stump,” I instruct Elio as I wipe my hands on my dress before digging two fingers into her neck. When I feel her pulse flutter, I breathe a sigh of relief.
Speak to me, mo khráach. My father’s voice is soft, as though he senses my heart requires gentleness.
I stand, then drag open a drawer and grab a leather belt with which I strangle the top of her thigh like Shoshair taught me. Tourniquet in place, I check her pulse again. Still beating. Still alive.
“I’m going to go find Konstantin. Please, please, please stay here with her.”
He nods.
“The combination to the safe is eleven, sixty, fourteen. Take note of any mutinous chatter. Also…take this. It’s iron.” I lay Ksenia’s dagger beside him. “I’m so sorry to leave you.”
“Go save your man.”
Moisture pinches my eyes. “I love you, Elio Riccio Genovese.”
“Love you more.” He must sense my hesitation to abandon him, because he adds, “Go! I’ve got everything under control.”
With a swallow, I dissolve and whoosh down my corridor and into my bedchamber. After pocketing my new dagger, I consider the skylight—the most direct path to the Throne Room—but the raised voices in the hallway redirect my trajectory. The rebels might not be able to cross the wards. Nevertheless, they’re too near Elio for comfort.
Holding on tight to my ghostly form, I funnel through one of the bullet holes in my door and arrow toward the vaulted ceiling before toughening into my Crow.
Four males are clustered around my doorway, gun in hand, speaking with the rough accent of townsfolk. I drop low, talons spread. I cage two heads and pluck them off with a hushed squelch. The other two meet the same fate.
Lightning lattices the hallway, matching the vengeful blaze enflaming my heart.
Apparently, Konstantin is being kept in the Throne Room. I’m headed there, I tell the inbound murder of Crows.
Fucking finally, ínon, my father growls in time with the sky beyond.
I’ve just decapitated four people with my talons and ripped out a man’s carotid, I feel the need to confess as I glide down the hallway, hunting for more mutineers in need of beheading.
I find only dead bodies—most have pointed ears, but a few have round ears. Are the rebel deaths the work of Konstantin’s guards? Aodhan? Vance?
Tonight has turned me into a monster. The low murmur coils from my throat like bitter smoke.
Do not confuse warriors and monsters, mo khráach. My father…
Always endeavoring to alleviate my guilt and horror.
As I shapeshift to shadow in order to traverse the game room and library, he asks, How’s the Patchenkov girl?
Alive, but short a leg. Elio’s with her. He’s safe. I don’t know if Zia Syb and Mattia know what’s going on, but if they do, tell them their son is in my warded suite, which he swore not to leave until this…
A shudder bolts up my spine because the floor and walls of the Great Hall are splattered with blood and ashen corpses.
Until this is over.
If only most of the dead had round ears and ill-fitting uniforms. But that’s not the case.
As my father informs me that the storm has abated in the north, that Colm and Fionn are flying and making good time, I curve toward the vestibule and land in skin. Since I’m still invisible, I assume Vance and Mestyla must be as well. Are they waiting for me on the sleigh? I was gone for so long; I can’t imagine they’re still out there. Still, before heading downstairs, I paint a sigil and step through the glass.
I call out Vance’s name. Only the sky replies—with a growl and a volley of hailstones. I whip my fist up, catching one before it collides with my thorax, then crush it between my raw, sticky fingers. The icy snow crumbles at my feet, as pink as the sands of Shabbe. I consider recalling Vance’s sigil, so that Ksenia sees me coming, festooned as I must be in blood.
Would that frighten the callous wretch? Probably not.
Is Vance with you? Dádhi asks as I slip back into the castle with a sigil.
Since he’ll hate my answer, the instant I take my winged form, I circumvent his question with one of my own. How’s Imogen?
She’s— Aoife starts.
Cataloguing weapons, my grandfather interjects.
You were saying, Aoife?
My sister’s unresponsive. So are Lach and Aodhan.
My marrow turns to ice that spreads to my wings.
I’m sorry, Mórrgaht —it’s Reid who speaks now— but Isla should have all the facts. We think they must’ve been struck with obsidian in the heart.
Yes. Colm’s voice suddenly booms through the pack bond. They developed pellets they fit into their guns that are filled with ? —
A mix of obsidian and iron, I say rapidly.
Exactly. They’ve nicknamed them Crow Tranquilizers.
That means the paralysis is only temporary, right? I ask. Like Aoife’s was?
I’m so focused on his answer that I don’t swerve fast enough to avoid the crystal chandelier. My wing collides with its strands, which crackle and shatter before cascading down in a plume of twinkling dust.
They’ll awaken, my father says. There’s no reason ? —
We don’t know that! We don’t know a fucking thing! The agony vibrating Reid’s voice now dots the skin beneath my feathers with goosebumps.
The last time the male had been so fretful was when the Cauldron had beckoned his son inside at puberty to receive his shifter magic. Lachlano hadn’t resurfaced for so long that Reid had taken it out on everyone in attendance—save for the children.
His expression when Lachlano had flown out was still seared into my heart. It was the look of the purest form of love. Agrippina, too, had been emotive, but that day, she’d somehow remained stoic.
Until Lachlano announced the Cauldron had given him a choice, and he’d picked Crow. How she’d fumed then—not because her son had picked Crow, but because Reid had spent the rest of the evening gloating about it.
We no longer turn to stone, so a Shabbin will be able to extract the tranquilizers—even if they’re lodged inside our heart, my father is saying as my shadows slick down the stairs, primed to split spleens and sever throats.
I’m met with darkness and a silence that is so complete that my wrath vibrates my bones and ripples my skin.
Ivan duped me.