Chapter 26 Reyla
Reyla
Iclimbed the stairs to the second floor with Farris trotting at my side, eyeing everyone we passed and those crowding around behind me.
With so many looking, the odds of us finding the right key were slim, but I wasn’t giving up yet.
With luck, we’d find it and hand it over to Queen Naveer.
Then we could meet with Dorion and see if there was a way to steal the pendant from Laphira.
On the second floor, I strode along the hall, finding no doors marked with a red mark. Perhaps guest suites were only located on the upper levels.
“Out of the way,” a woman in a teal gown with a high white collar and enough jewelry to drown her if she fell into a lake shoved past me. She opened the first door on the left and stomped inside. Lord Tyrrius followed her, sending me a look that suggested he’d walk over me if I got in his way.
Other competitors rushed to different doors and hurried inside.
I opted to take the hall to the end, turn left, and continue down three more hallways, leaving everyone else behind. I’d happily fight for the key if it was in my hand and someone challenged me for it, but it could be anywhere.
At the end of the third hall, I opened an unmarked door, determined to make my way backward until I came across the others. I’d still search in the rooms they had just in case they missed the key, but there was no need to scramble along with them.
The room I entered appeared to be a little-used sitting room.
The silence felt heavy, expectant, as if the room held its breath.
Square-shaped, the sitting room had high-backed chairs arranged in a half-moon near a fireplace of pale stone.
No fire burned there, but blue embers pulsed in the grate, someone’s magic still lingering.
The walls had been papered in a faded pattern of silver swirls and green leaves, and tall arched windows had been shuttered on the other side, though slivers of light cut through the cracks.
A tea set rested on a low table, the cups untouched, the pot lid ajar.
Farris trotted in ahead of me, his nose to the ground and his fluffy tail high.
I shut the door, blocking out the sounds of people rushing along the carpeted hall, shouting this or that to each other.
With my hand on one of my blades, I walked around the perimeter of the room, peering underneath furniture and lifting cushions on the chairs.
I found one key that was as cold as a crypt, but not much of anything else outside of dust clumps.
I stopped in front of the mantel, eyeing the crystal figurines lined up across the top in a neat row.
Birds, I thought at first, until I saw they were winged women with sharp teeth and clawed feet.
Harpies? Each one had been carved in a different pose, from arms splayed wide, head tilted back to take in the sun or moonlight, to one curled in a ball, lying on her side.
A tiny key had been placed near each one, and I touched them one by one, not finding any with heat.
Farris padded beside me around the room, stopping when I did to search or touch a random key. Someone had been busy, hiding them here and there. When I was passing a tall-backed chair and a table, I paused. A gilded-framed portrait hung crooked on the wall behind the chair.
Crooked pictures could mean trouble, but this one…
A small boy stared out from it, maybe eight or nine years old, standing, and dressed in a stiff navy tunic and proper black shoes.
Something about his eyes made my skin crawl.
They tracked my movement as I stepped closer, too aware for painted features.
He held a wooden toy soldier in one hand, and the other hung limply at his side.
I stepped around the chair to examine the picture closer, finding a key resting on the top of the frame.
As I reached up to grab it, my palm hit the frame, and the right edge eased away from the wall.
I brushed my fingers along the seam and tugged.
The portrait swung toward me, revealing a round panel mounted in the wall.
A hidden compartment? This was looking good. I snagged the lip of the circle with my nails and pulled, but it didn’t budge. Irritated, I shoved it. A click echoed and the wooden door eased open.
Inside, I found a shallow recess lined with what looked like black velvet.
But the surface shimmered. No, it wasn’t shimmering.
Squirming. Grimacing, I leaned closer, studying the cluster of tiny, pale worms writhing in hypnotic patterns across the black surface.
A few burrowed under the velvet and vanished.
A key lay among the mass on top.
“Could be it,” I whispered. Farris growled from beside me. “I’ll be careful.” He yipped.
I drew my dagger and carefully hooked its tip under the key, taking care not to touch anything else.
The instant the steel touched a worm, a bolt of magic ripped up the blade.
Pain ripped up my arm and exploded from the back of my elbow.
I dropped the dagger with a choked cry, clutching my arm while the bolt harmlessly smacked into the wall on the opposite side of the room and disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Farris leaped up toward the compartment, snarling.
I patted his head, trying to soothe him while huffing about the pain in my elbow. “It’s alright.” A twist of my arm showed a circular burn mark on my sleeve and blistered skin below. Farris paced around me in tight circles.
The worms writhed faster, agitated.
A chill swept through the room that had nothing to do with drafts, and the image of Prager’s misty head appeared above the worms. If my elbow wasn’t screaming at me, I might find the energy to tell her that she appeared rather wormy right now, but that on her, it was a good look.
Her lips moved but no sound came out. I understood the words quite clearly, however. You’ll die soon, little queen. Very soon.
The image rippled, and she was gone, leaving only the worms thrashing around inside the small compartment.
Picking up my dagger, I sheathed it. Not touching the worms with my blade again.
I forced a breath past my teeth and flicked lightning toward the writhing mass. When it hit them, they devoured it. Sucked it in. And grew bigger, about twice the size they were before.
I released the lightning, worried if I didn’t, the worms would soon be larger than me.
They weren’t only guarding the key, they were feeding off anyone who tried to take it.
I tried nullification magic, but the worms weren't hiding anything to reveal. They were just hungry little guardians.
Alright, then. Shadows? I gathered magic, letting it build within me, and called to a few of the shadows I spied lurking in the room. They perked up and glided across the walls to hover below the compartment in an inky black mass.
“I need you,” I said softly. “Would any of you be willing to retrieve the key inside the compartment?”
Every shadow retreated except one. The final one whispered what it wanted.
My fear.
Well, I had plenty of that to share, and I quickly poured it out with the power.
How I’d felt watching Lore bleed on the cobblestones during the borgon attack.
The terror that I wouldn’t choose the right Farris inside the labyrinth.
My horror that there wasn’t time to grab the last talisman. Or if we did, that we wouldn’t be able to figure out how to fuse the three into one.
The shadow thickened, drawn to the taste, and I gave it more before it slithered up the wall and reached into the compartment, its tendrils slipping between worms without disturbing them.
It lifted the key and brought it out, laying it gently in my outstretched hand before slithering away.
Cold.
I clenched my jaw. When I dropped the key, it snapped back inside the compartment, nestling among the worms that picked up their dance again. The portrait door snapped closed and the boy in the image stared blandly my way.
I turned, my arm throbbing and my mouth dry.
Farris glanced up at me, and I gave a nod. “Let’s keep moving.”
The hall was empty and silent, which could be a good or a bad thing. Would they tell me if someone found the right key? Or would I still be searching when the sun went down and the moon started to rise?
Have you found anything? I asked Lore.
Not so far. I assume you haven’t either.
No. Keeping my breathing even and telling my damn heart to stop pounding, I opted not to tell him about my arm that throbbed and stung.
What aren’t you telling me? he barked.
How did he know when something was wrong?
A blink, and he stood in front of me, scowling, his gaze drifting up and down my body. “You’re holding something back, pretty little bride. Tell me now.”
“It’s nothing, but I’ve got a suggestion for you. Don’t poke a nest of writhing worms with a blade.”
His scowl only deepened. “Where are you hurt?”
“Who says I’m hurt?”
Rage simmered under my skin. This should have been simple.
Explain the situation, get the pendant, save Lore's life.
Instead, we were rats in another maze. His life was at stake here.
Every moment we wasted brought him closer to death.
The curse didn't care about games or politics, it only counted down. We should be able to tell them we needed the pendant, and they’d hand it over.
Instead, we were trapped again, subjected again to the whim of someone who enjoyed torturous games.
He took my hands and squeezed them, staring into my eyes. “Let me carry what you hide behind your eyes. I want to stand beside you, shoulder to shoulder, until the hurt goes away.”
I stepped into his arms, hugging him. “I’m sorry. I’m irritated, and I don’t want to take it out on you.”
He leaned back in my embrace, giving me a crooked smile. “Then tell me where you’re hurt so I can help you. Love you, give you everything inside me to make you feel better.”
He didn’t let go of my hands. He didn’t push, didn’t give an order, just waited.
My heart in my throat, I nodded and showed him my wounded elbow.