Chapter 48 #2
Derren grunted. “I assume for power.”
Wasn’t that always the way? No one was ever satisfied with what they had. They always wanted more.
“They may have thought they could control them,” Lexie said. “They’re a lethal threat. What better way to make everyone behave? Do as I say, or I’ll send my Skathes into your kingdom.”
Derren shuddered. “I’d capitulate myself. ‘Better to live and fight another day than burn in a pyre,’ my father always said.”
Lexie shifted, her face pale. “So who’s controlling them?”
I flipped to another page, this one covered in writing that must’ve been scrawled fast, because I could only make out parts of it. “Pattern confirmed… Attacks too coordinated for random beasts. Someone directs them, but who and from where?”
My hands trembled as I turned the pages, finding increasingly disturbing theories. One passage described rituals for binding Skathes to a master’s will, though this could be mere supposition. Velacross couldn’t actually know.
Could they?
Another section detailed the strategic advantages of an army that required no rest, one with no moral considerations.
I reached the end, where I found nothing but more drawings and a line I couldn’t quite make out.
Velacross had experimented with the ashes left after the Skathe died, but he hadn’t drawn any conclusions.
And on the final page, a sketch of a young girl.
She seemed vaguely familiar, though I wasn’t sure why.
Shaking my head, I closed the book and studied my friends. We were tired, but I doubted any of us would sleep easy tonight. “Thoughts?”
“Kill all the Skathes,” Derren said.
“Reseal the veil.”
“Sure, with this.” Derren made a muscle in his upper arm.
Kerralyn looked up from where she was taking notes in her journal. “That or destroy whoever’s controlling them.”
“Anyone have suggestions for how we’re going to do any of those things?” I asked.
From the expression on my friends’ faces, they felt as bleak about this as I did.
“We’ll find a way,” Derren said. “Good always triumphs over evil, right?”
In my fantasy stories, yes. But in the real world? That might be up to the fates.
I set the book aside. I’d study it later to see if there was anything else I’d missed. And think about that drawing of the girl…
“We’ve got two things to address,” I said, focusing on what we could work on now. “Do all of you know who I really am?”
“Welcome to Syllavar, Princess,” Kerralyn said with a grin. “I knew you were royal, right from the start.”
“Sure you did.” Lexie smirked. “That’s why you kept bowing.”
Kerralyn frowned. “I don’t recall bowing.”
Lexie’s smirk deepened. “Exactly.”
“We also know about your sister,” Derren said, completely serious. “I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.”
“I told them everything,” Lexie said.
“Then you know I came here to find her murderer and make them pay,” I said.
Derren growled. “I’d do the same. We’re with you, Isi. Your vengeance is ours.”
The others nodded, and my heart swelled with gratitude for my friends.
“There’s something else,” I said. “I found my sister’s journal in Trew’s study. She was here, inside this room, and she went through the Rite.”
“A book?” Kerralyn’s eyes lit up like the fairy orbs that must still be bobbing around in the library.
“It’s written in code. So far, I haven’t been able to figure it out.”
“Where is it?” she said. “I love breaking codes. If you let me see it, I might be able to help.”
I settled deeper into the bed, pulling my legs beneath me as I reached for the journal I’d tucked under my pillow. It felt heavier tonight, as if the secrets inside had multiplied during our library adventure.
I passed it to Kerralyn. “It’s all I have left of her.” There was no hiding the croak in my voice.
She traced a fingertip across the cover with the care of someone who understood that some objects held more than words. They held souls. “What was her name?”
“Adelaide. Addie.” Her name tasted like honey and heartbreak on my tongue. “She was younger than me. Sweet and kind and ruthless and conniving.”
“My kind of woman,” Lexie said, though softly.
“You would’ve loved her as much as me.”
Kerralyn opened the journal. “The cipher appears to be… Oh, this is clever. She’s used a substitution based on—” Her eyes lit up like. “I think she’s using courtly dance steps as her key. Look, these symbols correspond to—”
“You figured that out with one look?” I asked, incredulous.
“Of course.” Kerralyn’s grin was pure smugness wrapped in false modesty. “Really, Isi, I’d expect more from your royal education. Didn’t they teach you basic cryptography?”
Lexie snorted from her perch on Derren’s lap. “Ouch.”
“They taught me seventeen different ways to poison someone with garden herbs and how to negotiate trade agreements while being seductive but not falling into bed,” I shot back. “Apparently, they missed the decoding secret journals lesson.”
“Tragic oversight,” Derren said. “Though the poisoning bit sounds useful.”
Kerralyn was already scribbling translations in her own journal, her pencil moving quickly across the page. “Your sister had an amazing mind for this. Most people use predictable patterns, like birth dates, lover’s names. But dance steps? That’s brilliant.”
I watched her work, marveling at the ease with which she untangled Addie’s carefully crafted secrets. My sister had always been clever. Too clever, Father used to say. He’d scorned what he should’ve been proud of.
While I’d been learning statecraft and strategy, Addie had been collecting languages like other girls collected ribbons, reading philosophy texts for pleasure, and asking questions that made our tutors uncomfortable.
“Here,” Kerralyn said, pointing to a decoded passage. “She mentions being rescued but look at the context. She says, ‘the golden cage didn’t open by force, but by choice. This court offers truth where others offer only pretty lies’.”
My chest tightened.
“It gets more interesting.” Kerralyn’s finger traced down the page. “She writes about staying with us—the rebels.” Her lips quirked up before smoothing. “I believe that’s what your court calls us, am I right?”
I nodded.
I remembered Addie at fourteen, standing on our balcony and pointing toward the south. “Something’s wrong out there, Isi. Can’t you feel it? Like the land itself is screaming.”
“There’s more.” Kerralyn’s voice dropped. “She mentions falling in love with the king’s cousin, Fenmark.”
“He’s gorgeous,” Lexie said. “I think half the women and some of the men in this court are in love with him themselves.”
“Agreed,” Derren said.
Kerralyn continued to read. “I wrote to Isi, telling her I was safe.”
“I never received her letter. Why?”
The room fell silent except for the shuffle of footsteps in the hall. Addie had tried to contact me. Tried to tell me she was alive, safe, happy even. And I’d never known.
“What else?” I whispered.
“As you said, she went through the Rite of Bonds,” Kerralyn said. “Then was claimed by a ruby red dragon.”
“A dragon like me,” Lexie said. “Not many of them bond.”
Kerralyn’s brow furrowed as she flipped through the pages. “It ends with her stating she and Fenmark were being sent on a mission, that she’d opted to leave her journal with Trew in case…”
My belly dropped out. “She didn’t come back.”
Dead. So dead. I could still see the blood matting her hair. Dripping…
Kerralyn pointed. “She says here she volunteered for the mission with Fenmark.”
Confirming that Trew had been honest with me.
My entire world was floundering, and I wasn’t sure what was up, what was down, and what might lie in between.
And I couldn’t stop thinking about that drawing in the back of the book…