27. Chapter 27
27
Zara
H ours later, I sat on a soft settee beside Ivy in the large room designed to offer us diversions that would weaken our resolve to hate the fae. Sleep had evaded me all day, and my tired eyes drifted as my mind wandered, again and again, over the words and actions of the fae prince since he’d dragged me from that table. In this smaller room—half natural cave, half constructed walls—were bookshelves, a piano, easels and paints, couches for reclining, and even windows that let in the starlight. Of course, we were only allowed to use this room at night, when these fae would accompany us, mixing that which we despised with that which we loved—a brilliant tactic that had likely worked on many a mortal who’d come through these cursed halls.
“Did he hurt you?” Ivy asked, looking up from a sketchbook in her lap. She nodded at my hand. “You keep holding your shoulder.”
My hand slipped down into my lap, where a book sat, unread. I shook my head and said nothing, again feeling Cas’s thumb as it had peeled from my sticky skin. The book sat ignored in my lap, my mind replaying him over and over and over—him leaning against the rock behind my head, him dueling with me, him saving me from that awful humiliation, him whispering that he was changing his mind about mortals.
“Zara,” Ivy said, tearing me from my memories. “Look.” She nodded at the room’s entrance. My eyes traveled toward the door, though my mind remained in a daze. “You said you were waiting to speak to Ariana. There she is.”
“Oh.” I blinked at the closed book in my lap. “Yes.”
I stood and placed the book of poems on the table beside the settee. Ariana noticed me and walked across the cool cave in our direction. Every room here was cold, cooler than my father’s estate in the dead of winter. Stalactites hung from the roof’s highest point, but as the cavern wall sloped down, the fae had hollowed out more space, and the floor was cut to be perfectly flat save for several wide steps that led from the doorway down into this room.
Ariana approached me and offered a stiff nod, her most polite greeting to date. We were making progress.
“Care to join us?” I asked, indicating the sitting area where Ivy sketched. Eudoria occasionally joined us in here as well to pass the night hours, but she’d fallen in our last training session and twisted her ankle. She’d elected to rest in her room this evening. Samuel and Tomas were playing cards at a table in the far corner of the cavern.
Ariana shook her head. “We are not allowed to enjoy this room.”
“Forget what they say,” I said.
Her brow tightened. “Unlike you, I am not safe from their tempers. If I break the rules, I’ll get punished.”
My arms folded as I built a rebuttal that included last night as evidence I was not safe either, but the feeling of Cas pulling me from the table and setting me beside him somewhat nullified my point. I hung my head, wishing I could shake these thoughts of Cas.
“But at least you’re safe now,” I finally said, hoping to get back in her good graces by reminding her of the gift I’d given her.
Ariana sighed and nodded firmly. “Yes. Thank you. You said you wanted to know what I was taught about malditos .” At my nod, she continued, “But what I was taught isn’t important.” I opened my mouth to respond, but she waved my words away. “Last night, I was…” She shivered and started again. “Last night, I was in the hall alone, taking your wine-stained dress to the laundress, and a shadow approached me. It circled me, then moved on.” She exhaled slowly. “I think whoever it was thought I would be a good target for poisoning, but the stone protected me.”
“Oh, Ariana.” I stepped forward, about to wrap my arms around her before remembering she didn’t like me. I tucked my hands at my sides. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“Me too.” She nodded several times, not meeting my gaze. “I—thank you.” She finally looked up at me. “You are meant to be alive, Zara. And without you, I might not be.”
Tears stung my eyes, but I blinked them back.
She stepped closer and, to my shock, reached out to embrace me. When her face was beside mine, she whispered, “The fae are stealing from the dragons.” Then she pulled back and tucked her hair behind her ears.
I swallowed and realized she’d just shared a secret with me. I couldn’t help but glance back at Ivy, realizing too late how suspicious I was acting. I smoothed out my dress, then clamped my hand over my right shoulder again.
Ariana shot a warning glance at Ivy, as if to remind me that someone else was watching us. “Gemstones,” she said so quietly I almost missed it. Then she tilted her head, indicating I should follow her. But when I took a step, she gave a tiny shake of her head. “Wait, then follow.”
A few minutes later, I could wait no longer, and I excused myself from Ivy, declaring how tired I was, and walked calmly from the cavern, only hurrying once I was alone. Ariana was offering me the first real information I’d gathered since Cas asked me to hunt for answers. How the gemstones were related to poisons, I had no idea, but I rushed down the main hallway back to the stairwell that led to the level of the library.
Ariana’s white dress vanished from sight at the bottom of the stairs as she turned onto the lower floor. After a deep breath, I casually descended the stairs, forcing myself to walk slowly. She’d said to wait, then follow—she wanted me to see something without it looking like she was showing me. My blood buzzed with energy as I trailed her at a distance.
I paused at the base of the stairs to let Ariana vanish around the far corner, then I proceeded in her direction, assuming that any dark corner could have eyes watching.
Around the corner was another long, dark hall. The magical lights at this end had faded, but at the opposite end of the hall, a single pale light illuminated Ariana’s white dress and red hair. Then, to my surprise, that light faded as well, plunging her into darkness as the one above my head glowed to life.
Ariana hadn’t turned from the hall, and to my knowledge the only thing at the end of this hall was another stairway to the left and the library, its ornate entrance complete with double doors and an archway that glowed with ancient fae writing whenever anyone approached. The archway hadn’t lit up, which meant Ariana hadn’t entered the library, and she hadn’t turned left to go up the stairs.
I walked forward, heart pounding. At the end of the hall, the light remained bright above my head. There was no sign of Ariana at the top of the stairs and nowhere else she could have gone. To test the library doors, I walked up to them. The letters emblazoned in the stone pulsed with blue light. So, they were still working. Ariana had simply vanished.
As I spun in the empty hallway, I noticed a small sparkle of light in the scene carved in the wall to my right. Set in one of the deep grooves of the artwork—this scene of a fae fighting a dragon in flight—was the tiny ruby I’d given to Ariana.
With the light above me, I didn’t think I could grab the stone without being spotted, even though the hall felt and looked empty. Using the wall for support, I leaned down and pretended to fix my shoe. When I stood up again, in my fingers was the small ruby.
When a knock at my door awoke me the following evening, I was surprised to see a new face.
“I’m Sevienne,” said a willowy woman with elegant dark skin and heavily accented Avencian.
“Where is Ariana?” I asked, dread mounting in my stomach.
Sevienne explained that Ariana had fallen ill with a contagious stomach virus. My chest constricted at the news. Ariana no longer had the gem, and she might have been poisoned. This woman quite possible had been instructed to tell a lie.
Days slipped by without any additional information about Ariana. Sevienne was polite, but her Avencian was choppy and clearly difficult for her. She kept her conversation to a minimum.
I couldn’t help but worry each day that Ariana did not return. I half-considered asking Casimiro if she’d been poisoned and if he’d healed her, but I couldn’t bring myself to speak to him. His words had rattled me, and I feared the weightless feeling that washed over me every time I thought of him. I couldn’t be feeling this way about the prince of shadows. It was wrong. And I’d vowed to never be wrong about a man again.
So, I busied my mind with imaginings about what Ariana had been trying to show me, and where she’d really gone. She’d left the stone for me, that I was certain, and there had been no chatter in the dining cavern about another poisoning. The mortal healer was reserved for the servants alone, as Erik had made clear in training, reminding us that if any of the entertainers were injured and wanted to be healed, our only option was to accept magical healing from the fae. Tomas had accepted this healing more than once, as had Samuel. Eudoria, however, had not, and her twisted ankle still plagued her—while my respect for her increased tenfold.
Since I couldn’t find Ariana, all I could do was focus on uncovering where she’d disappeared to that day in the hall.
Between training, which alternately involved physical tasks like running and weapons training, I found reasons to pass by the library and peer at the etching in the wall, looking for gemstones or hidden door handles. But no matter how many times I checked, I never found anything there. The library had two small windows, leaving no room for the mysterious etching on the wall beside the library to lead anywhere but outside. So, after having no luck with the carving for several days, I took to once again exploring the network of pathways and balconies lacing the mountainside. This time, I wasn’t looking for a way out, but a way in that I hadn’t seen before.
Two weeks had passed since Ariana’s disappearance, and while I wanted to find her, our next trial was upon us. Only as I arrived early for the first meal of the night, putting my back to Casimiro’s table so I could avoid the magnetic way my eyes were drawn to him, did it occur to me that at dawn, I’d once again be facing a deadly trial. Neither Alba nor Casimiro had spoken to me since that day in the weapons room—almost like he was allowing me space to think about what he said. I was grateful for the space. But the next trial was upon us, and part of me wondered if he would again corner me to discover if I’d learned anything about the poisonings.
“It’s been almost two weeks since I’ve seen her,” I told Ivy as we exited the dining cavern. “And given what’s happening in the morning, I can’t wait any longer. I’m going to ask him about her.”
Ivy glanced at Casimiro and his sister, who strode up the steps ahead of us. I’d refrained from telling Ivy what I’d seen in the hallway outside the library, as it involved the ruby Cas had instructed me to keep secret. Also, if Ariana was attempting to reveal a secret of her own to me, I didn’t want to betray her trust by telling anyone, even Ivy.
“If you make them mad, you’ll pay for it tomorrow,” Ivy warned. She didn’t know Cas healed mortals. She still assumed he hated us all.
I swallowed and hurried forward to catch up with Casimiro. As much as I hated to seek him out, he would know if Ariana had been poisoned. And he would also know if she’d survived.
Part of me didn’t want to ask, afraid he would tell me she was dead.
I ground my teeth as I scurried up the steps, wishing Alba wasn’t with Cas, and wishing my heart wasn’t beating so mutinously at the thought of speaking to the heir again. He’d crafted another death trap for me and my friends, proof enough I was a fool to have any feelings for him.
The two royals heard me coming and turned, stepping away from each other in the otherwise empty hall. They said nothing as I approached, their expressions equally confusing. Alba watched me with a bright, close-lipped smile, and Cas stared at me with a flat, shuttered gaze. This place wasn’t private enough, but I was out of time.
“Tell me what happened to Ariana,” I said without pretense.
Alba blinked and looked at her brother.
“I believe she fell ill.”
“Stars above,” I breathed. “Don’t lie.”
“I can’t lie.”
I bit my lip. “She was poisoned, wasn’t she?”
Alba rocked back and forth on her heels, and I tried to ignore her.
“She was not,” he replied.
A tiny moan of relief leaped from my lips, but it was quickly replaced with dread. “Then where is she? Sickness doesn’t last this long.”
Cas shifted his weight forward, just enough to make me uncomfortable. “Do you know she isn’t ill?”
I shook my head. “No, I’m not allowed in the infirmary. Entertainer, remember?” I snapped at him, attempting to remind him he’d planned another trial to kill us.
Cas didn’t respond, but his stern jaw flexed several times, like he was fighting to remain silent. I peered at the two of them, then Cas turned away, one hand raking through his hair.
“Considering what you will face in the morning, I wouldn’t worry about her,” he said to me as he walked away. His words stung, but he glanced up at the ceiling, and my gaze followed his. I saw nothing there but shadow, but perhaps he was telling me we were being watched.
Alba sighed heavily and followed her brother, leaving me standing alone under a glowing orb in what appeared to be an empty hallway.
I had to find Ariana. If she’d been trapped behind that door in the passage below, she couldn’t have survived for two weeks without water. My stomach dropped as I hurried down the steps, not caring at this point if a shadow was watching. I would open the passage, and I would find her.
The hallway outside the library was empty, or at least, it looked empty. The thick shadows at the far end of the hall couldn’t deter me from running my hands over every inch of the artwork carved on the wall. I’d done this countless times already, hunting for a latch or hidden mechanism to no avail.
For what felt like the hundredth time, I pressed my fingers into the small indentation where she’d left the ruby. The cool stone did not respond to my touch.
I dug the stone out of my pocket, tucked it back where she’d placed it, and stepped away, expecting the image to shift or glow or open. Nothing.
A frustrated sigh escaped my lips, and I began tracing the artwork again, faster, my fingers having memorized its sweeping lines.
There.
Along one of the lines in the carved dragon wing was a hole that hadn’t been there before. My heart skipped as I traced over it again. Had I not traced it a dozen times without the stone in place, I wouldn’t have noticed the difference. But I was certain this was a new indentation. I pressed my finger into the small hole.
The entire image sank into the wall as the glowing light above my head blinked out.
I was plunged into darkness and shivered as the icy cold air washed over me.
Using my hands as a guide, I stepped forward. The stone wall swung open at my touch, and I tensed in shock as the wall gave way to a passage that smelled of snow and howled with distant wind.
On either side, rough rock walls formed a narrow tunnel that glowed with a dim light coming from up ahead. The light was so faint, however, that I could only see a jagged line where the tunnel curved to the right. I carefully hurried forward, bracing my hands on the walls, but before I’d taken two steps, I remembered that Ariana hadn’t returned from her last visit to this place.
I backed out of the tunnel and exhaled loudly as my feet met the polished hall floor once again. Pressing one hand to my chest, I tried to calm my breathing as I stared into the darkened tunnel. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I noticed a strange shape at the base of the tunnel wall. I assumed it was the uneven rock, but as I squinted at it, I gasped.
The faintest tint of red hair met my eyes.
“Ariana!”
She was jammed up against the base of the tunnel wall, like she’d been shoved aside to let others pass. She wasn’t moving, and her arm was limp and cold when I grabbed it.
But not as cold as a corpse would be. A faint pulse tapped against my fingers as I held her wrist. She was alive.
I tugged until she was sitting up in my arms and heaved her out of the tunnel as well as I could. She was taller than me, and her limp weight made it difficult to maneuver her out of the narrow space. As soon as we were in the hallway once again, I laid her gently on the smooth floor and stepped back, hands pressed to my head as I pondered where to go, who to tell, and how best to help her.
Only one face came to mind. I grabbed the small ruby from the carving and tucked it back in my pocket. The door quickly closed and solidified into wall once again. And as it did, the light above me glowed to life.
I told her unconscious body that I would be right back with help and raced up the stairs to find Casimiro.