Chapter 38 – Isolde
ISOLDE
Sweat poured down my back as we raced through the streets of Grindavik, and bells—alarms—began to sound.
I stumbled, and a stream of curses flew from my lips as I caught the queen before dropping her. A group of pixies fluttering in a doorway nearby watched us with interest.
“Unbelievable!” Geiravor hissed. “That’s the alarm that tells us to get to our homes. Anyone still on the street in a few minutes’ time will be a target.”
We picked up the pace as Yrsa and Geiravor led us around the harbor. The channel exit had been clear on the other side of the harbor, as far away from the brothel as it could have been while still being near the water.
Within a few more blocks, it became clear how effective the alarm was. The crowds, which had been dense despite the late hour, had halved.
“You seven! The females!” a voice called out.
Seemed pretty unlikely that whoever that person was, they were talking to a different group of seven females.
“Stop right there!” the voice commanded when we kept going. “In the name of House Ithamai, I demand that you stop!”
I located the person shouting. Three faerie soldiers staring right at us from down the street, one pointed, as if his fellows could fail to see our group rushing along the streets.
If the size of our group hadn’t raised a red flag, Inga’s attire likely had.
Her clothes were dirty, but still of fine quality. Queen’s clothing.
“Turn here!” At Yrsa’s command we pivoted down a street, away from the soldiers.
Yrsa sent up a blaze of light that exploded high in the sky.
Startled screams rang out, followed by sighs of pleasure and admiration.
Yrsa flung another beam of light into the sky, and it transformed into a dragon that opened its mouth in a silent roar just as the trio of soldiers appeared above us. They’d taken wing and caught up easily.
“I said stop!” the same voice bellowed, but we had no intention of doing so.
Scattered on city rooftops waited Vidar, Sayyida, Livia, and the third Riis sister, Sváva. We’d just told them our location, and that we needed help.
Above, fire erupted and shifted into a whip.
The flame began to move and slither snake-like through the sky.
Sváva was a fire wielder, and the flames she tossed about were as vibrant as they were deadly.
A rope of flame snatched one of the three soldiers who had taken to the skies and almost caught up with us. He screamed and disappeared.
But there were two more, and one was gaining. About to attack with his magic. He’d likely strike my sister and me to get three for the price of one.
Swallowing, I made an insane choice and called my shadow magic. The dark power rose and swept out of me, but this time, no tendrils emerged. Instead, a figure with the body of a fae stared back at me with black eyes.
I nearly tripped from the shock. An equally startled Astril swiped a blade at the shadow, but it remained. Unbothered. Simply moving at our speed but doing nothing else.
“It’s like the sword. Waiting for a command,” Thyra hissed. “Give it one.”
Right. I knew that. It had just taken me by surprise that I’d finally succeeded in making a true shadow person.
“Take down the soldiers behind us. And any others that come.” I drew in a breath. “Otherwise keep out of sight and disappear when you feel my glamour break.”
It soared away, and I felt a tether that connected to the shadow stretch and stretch and stretch. Behind us, a scream rang through the street. Thyra let out a breathy whoop.
“No time to celebrate yet.” Geiravor’s words came out fast with her breaths. “And you’d better believe we’re going to want an explanation as to what that thing was, but for now, save your breath and run!”
And we did. We ran as if we were being chased by a pack of direwolves, muscles burning hotter with each step.
It took great control not to look back at the vast threads of fire swooping and looping and slashing and twisting through the sky. There would be no way to determine their origins, and I imagined Sváva’s fire threads snatching soldiers from the sky.
On other rooftops, the Virtoris siblings were supposed to be creating spectacles of their own, hoping to catch the castle guards’ attention.
And last of all, Livia flew above. Cloaked in the darkness of the night, the third vampire was tasked with looking out for those who were providing us a distraction.
She was the goddess of death to any who might get too close to those on our side.
My arms and back ached from carrying Inga, and a tightness filled my chest as a result of my tether to the shadow form, but my legs never stopped, and my senses remained on high alert as Yrsa wove us through the streets and alleys.
We burst onto another street, this one busier.
Recognizable. I cast a wild glance about and spotted a Nava-themed brothel I’d found amusing when we’d left Lord Riis’s establishment.
“Ready?” Yrsa asked.
My wings threaded through the tunic, into position.
The Riis sisters leapt into the air first, catching the sea wind.
Thyra and I followed, and the vampires took up the rear, always watching our backs, ready to drain an enemy dry.
A few fae watched us rise through their windows, but when a new blast of fire rose from somewhere behind us, the combination of the alarm and the flames proved effective on more than one score.
Yrsa landed on a rooftop five away from the brothel, and taking more care, we leapt from roof to roof, back where we needed to be.
The trapdoor was open when we arrived, Lord Riis peeking out. Thank the gods Sváva’s fire was keeping most of the winged fae out of the sky. If other fae soared this way, they would not fail to see his red hair glinting in the moonlight.
“Down, Father!” Yrsa hissed. “We need to get the gateway up!”
“What happened to her? What happened to Inga?” he didn’t move.
“We’re not sure,” Geiravor answered. “Perhaps they haven’t been feeding her. She’s weak and was passed out for much of the time.”
Lord Riis swallowed. I could tell it took great self-control for him to turn away from his love.
We dropped into the office, and our glamours broke one by one.
It was the oddest sensation, especially when paired with the thread of connection with my shadow form.
I shuddered, glad to be rid of the shadow form.
Lord Riis shut the trapdoor, swept over, took Inga in his arms. Tears streaked his face.
“Take her to Ramshold,” Yrsa said. “Geiravor, help him.”
The Riis sister eased her father toward the gateway, moving tenderly and slowly. Before she got there, however, the trapdoor lifted again. Vidar dropped inside, followed by Sayyida and Livia. Sváva would not come. She would divert until she could no longer do so.
“Thantrel, Caelo, Qildor, and Vale had to stay behind. Did you see them on the streets?” I asked no one in particular.
“No, but we need to move out.” Sayyida swallowed. “Most fae have gone into their homes and soldiers are swarming the streets. Hundreds of them.”
Knocking came at the office door, and my stomach dropped to my knees.
Upon our arrival, Lord Riis had made an appearance downstairs because Yrsa and her sisters had entered the brothel through the front door.
A father coming to speak with his daughters bothered no one, but the high lord had made it clear that he was not to be interrupted.
Also that no one in the city was to know he was present in Grindavik.
No one loyal to him would defy an order like that unless they had to.
Or unless they wanted to warn us.
“Who is it?” Geiravor asked.
“Minthe.”
“I’ll get it.” Yrsa pivoted towards the door, for Lord Riis was still staring at Inga, his face pale, as if in a trance. “Everyone, stay out of sight.”
I squinted. Did the queen look grayer than before, or was that the dim lighting in the office? I didn’t have time to decide before Thyra pulled me out of sight.
Yrsa answered the caller, and Geiravor moved that way too, the pair of them doing their best to block our side of the room from sight. “Yes?”
“Miss Yrsa, I know your father wishes not to be disturbed, or for anyone to know he’s here, but there are soldiers here.
From House Ithamai. They want to search the establishment.
” She inhaled. “We told them that was inappropriate, and our clients deserve privacy, but they’re insisting.
I owe Lord Riis a lot, but I don’t wish to be jailed. ”
“Of course not.” Yrsa exhaled long and low. “I will come to speak with them.”
“And the brothel?”
“Give our clients a fair warning, and then let the guards search.”
“They wish to see his office too.”
“Stall as long as you can.”
“Very well.” The brothel worker shifted, as if to leave.
“Thank you.” Yrsa shut the door. “You must leave.”
She rushed to the spot in the wall where Luccan had hidden a gateway. With a poke of a dagger to her finger, blood welled. Yrsa applied the blood, and the gateway opened, the light flooding the dark office. “Go, Father. They cannot find you or the queen here.”
Lord Riis strode to the gateway, Inga hanging from his arms. One step through, and he disappeared.
Geiravor followed the spymaster. Then the Virtoris siblings and Livia. But Thyra and I stayed put, staring at the trapdoor in the ceiling, willing our mates and friends to join us.
Where were they? Sváva was causing a ruckus out there, and they’d understand what it meant. Maybe they were holed up somewhere until it was safe to come here?
“You have to go,” Yrsa said to me and Thyra.
My heart squeezed. “Can you find them? Hide them?”
“I’ll do my best.”
I looked to Thyra, then the Valkyrja waiting for us to make the call.
“We can’t be caught,” Thyra said. “And they’re smart and strong enough to get themselves out of binds. Have done so a hundred times.”
She was trying to convince herself.
Outside the door, heavy footsteps sounded. Yrsa waved for us to move. “Go! I need to close the gateway after you!”
Torn between seeing my mate and friends and not wanting to harm Yrsa, I made a choice that didn’t sit right with me, and tugged on Thyra’s hand, leading her through the gateway.
Light blinded me before I stepped out of the portal and into Lord Riis’s office in Myrr.
Astril and Freyia followed, and the gateway closed.
I swallowed, hoping that Yrsa would find the others.
“Nooooo!” A howl shattered my own worries and sent a shot of fire through me. Had someone followed us?
“Inga! Come back to me! Inga, please!” Lord Riis’s voice sounded little like him. Too desperate. Too agonized.
“What’s going on?” I asked Geiravor. She stood over her father, her stance stiff.
A cry of despair that would haunt me to my dying day rang out from Lord Riis as he clutched the queen to his chest, rocked her.
“What’s going on?” I asked again.
Geiravor raised her gaze to mine. “The queen stopped breathing.”