Chapter 16
Trystan
“You need not tell me if it’s too painful to think of, Edwin.
Sage is sending a raven for Lionel,” Trystan told the ogre the next morning, taking the cauldron brew gratefully.
As he seated himself at the table, he allowed the aroma and warmth to soothe the gripping terror he’d felt last night watching Sage nearly walk over the parapet’s edge.
He’d been reluctant to leave her side, but they needed information on the supposed curse. And Lionel was the leading Curse Consultant in the kingdom.
And also—so fucking annoying.
But he’d relented when Evie had insisted.
His stomach still lurched at the image of her blank expression. One more step forward—and the destiny monster’s silver light would have enveloped her. Gods.
Being in love was making him sick.
Edwin shifted uncomfortably, pulling him back to the present. “It isn’t that, Mr. Trystan. I don’t mind thinking of Joseph very much. We were dear friends before he left the kingdom to continue his research.”
Ah, yes. The ogre Edwin had lived with for five years was a mere friend.
Trystan had never asked what had happened between them that would make Joseph leave in such haste, never returning to their small fishing village.
The man was a brilliant scholar on all magics, a Core Healer in his own right, but he didn’t practice and was impossible to nail down. Always on the move. Never settling.
In a way, Edwin hadn’t, either.
Yes. Friends. Trystan was beginning to despise the falsity of that word, but he wouldn’t be the one to correct Edwin.
And he could hardly judge. He had the love of his life within his grasp and could think of no feasible way forward, no way to convince her that he wasn’t going anywhere, curse or no curse, save gluing his shoes to the ground.
“Let me see.” Edwin tapped his chin as he took the seat across from him, bringing with him a delicious-smelling pecan pie.
“I suppose it was fifteen years ago or so. Hard to recount when they come and leave so quickly.” He smiled kindly at Trystan, cutting him a large slice, placing it onto the small plate in front of him.
A light rain pattered against the window as Edwin said, “Joseph was the first ogre I’d seen since leaving culinary school, and he was brilliant.
A scholar of all things relating to Rennedawn and the magical continent.
Handsome as the king of the deadlands himself—”
Edwin cut himself off, blue cheeks deepening to indigo. “I apologize, Mr. Trystan. That’s hardly pertinent.”
“Not at all. It’s very pertinent to my visualization of events. Continue,” Trystan responded sternly, fighting for his life not to allow his lips to tip up.
Edwin spoke through bites of his own slice of pie.
“He was delightfully shrewd in his theories of Rennedawn’s story.
There were so many skeptics back then. You’ll recall none took the impending magical reckoning seriously before the Mystic Illness began to sweep the land, and then the waves of fading magic hit different areas of the kingdom…
” Edwin shook his head, folding his large hands.
“You know this, of course. Where was I?”
“His theories,” Trystan offered, taking a bracing sip of the brew with none of Sage’s usual sweetness added in.
“I don’t recall him ever speaking of land curses, but he did often say that when Rennedawn’s storybook prophecy nears its end, a wave of magic would come from the Lilac Sea.”
When the tides turn, all will be as it was, the prophecy had declared.
Wonderful. This was needed. He’d nearly relaxed.
“Might we opt for a seashell from the Lilac instead?” Gideon Sage’s voice carried in, along with the man himself. “You summoned?”
“Sit down, Gideon,” Trystan murmured with irrational anger. “I have a job for you.”
“A terrifying prospect, Maverine.” Gideon winced when Trystan stood, clasped a hand on the man’s shoulder, and shoved him down into the chair. “What’s this about?”
“Your sister.”
Gideon chuckled into his hand. “Your predictability is very prince-like—well done.”
Edwin rubbed a hand over his eyes, while Trystan casually kicked the leg of Gideon’s chair, sending the man knocking into the table. “In the morning, Becky and Blade will be setting a trap to capture the guvres, and when they’re successful, we will need to expedite enacting the prophecy before—”
He paused. The curse was a threat, not an absolute, and in that vein, he’d have to share it with as few people as possible. Lest it cause a surge of panic.
But urgency was sorely needed. “Before Benedict does something reckless,” he finished vaguely.
Gideon had righted himself, and he was now frowning as he walked over to the cauldron brew, lifting the ladle and dumping it into one of the spare mugs.
Blowing out a breath, he stared down at the mixture, then swallowed it with wincing gulps.
“All well and good. Only one problem. We don’t know how to enact the prophecy. ”
Lyssa chose that moment to enter the kitchens. “Might you just put all the ingredients of the prophecy in a bowl and stir them up like cake batter?”
Trystan believed this little girl was a genius. Regardless of the unlikely suggestion. “I’m afraid that wouldn’t work, Little Villain.”
“Whisking, then.” Lyssa nodded succinctly, heading for a drawer. “I usually do it with a fork.”
Trystan’s pulse jumped, prophecies forgotten. “Not when you’re making pastry, I hope.”
Lyssa ignored him, reaching for the utensil drawer, and Trystan stood, sputtering, “Y-You cannot get the same airiness in a pastry with a fork, Lyssa! That is outrageous.”
“Were we not just speaking of the end of Rennedawn?” Gideon asked with a half grin, then sobered when Lyssa came up beside him. “You don’t find that outrageous?”
Of course he did. Trystan could be effectively outraged at all ranges of injustices and threats to common decency. It didn’t make him any less villainous.
“I find you treading on my last nerve,” Trystan grumbled, wordlessly replacing the fork in Lyssa’s hand with a whisk, ignoring her pout. “I need you to figure out how we activate the prophecy—or end it, I suppose. I’m—I’m not certain how it happens.”
“First time breaking a prophecy?” Gideon clucked sympathetically.
“It won’t be my first time breaking a skull,” Trystan growled, then remembered Lyssa staring at him with widened eyes, her mouth forming a tiny circle.
“Can you do it with your fists?” Lyssa whispered almost immediately, sounding far too awed for comfort. “Or must you use a blunt object?”
“Real nice, Maverine.” Gideon patted him on the back, and he had a daydream of breaking that hand. It was a tranquil thought. Peaceful, even. “It’s a ‘storybook prophecy.’ It would be enacted on a day that holds some sort of significance to the kingdom.”
“Hallows’ Eve? It’s two months from now,” Trystan whispered. The destiny monster’s decree. Benedict and the destiny monster wanted to give them every reason to hope. They were that sure they’d succeed.
It was just as well. Trystan was just as sure his enemies would fail.
Trystan might be made to be Evangelina’s undoing, but there would never be an undoing of them. Over Benedict’s rotting corpse. A tranquil thought.
“A holiday? You don’t believe that’s too obvious?” Gideon’s brows rose.
“The date already holds significance and matches with the destiny monster’s timeline,” Trystan said dismissively, knowing in his gut this was the correct course.
“My Joseph always said the times of day when magic is at its most powerful in Rennedawn come in threes. The early-morning sunrise, when the sun strikes highest at noon, and when it turns Rennedawn to gold at sunset.” Edwin patted Lyssa’s head, hoisting her up onto the low stool so she could whisk the vibrant purple cookie batter she had just concocted.
“You’re all missing the most important question,” Lyssa said lightly, her full attention on the bowl in front of her. “Where sunlight beams unvarnished. Do any of you know where that is?”
“I don’t suppose you do?” Trystan asked lowly, with just a smidgen of hope.
Lyssa rolled her eyes. “I apparently don’t even know how to stir properly.” She went twice the speed against the bowl, and Trystan took a step away for his own safety.
He’d be paying for that later.
“Every answer lies in Rennedawn’s storybook,” Edwin pointed out after a moment of collective silence, all knowing what must be done. And quickly. “It will be within the pages.”
Gideon winced, likely knowing what was coming for him. “We can’t get by without the book any longer.”
No. They couldn’t.
“I’m afraid your shielding magic might be necessary.
You can block any wards the king may have put to guard it, and you know the ins and outs of the palace.
I cannot send any more Malevolent Guards.
The risk is too great.” Trystan shut his eyes tightly, resolved not to feel worry or remorse for putting Evie’s brother in such a dangerous situation.
“I’ll leave at first light.” Gideon’s shoulders were stiff, his chin high for a man about to go on a mission that was just as likely to fail as it was to succeed.
“You need not travel there alone,” Trystan offered with little behind it. They both knew Gideon had to be the one to do this. “We could send a few of the Malevolent Guards.”
“I’m the only one who knows where Benedict’s office is,” Gideon reminded him. “And I’m the one who owes this…to her.”
There needn’t be clarification on who he was speaking of.
Rain beat harder against the windows now. The reconstructed stained glass of Rennedawn’s book mocked them with its closeness. A round of thunder unleashed against the glass, and Lyssa leaped into Trystan’s side. “It feels…spooky in here, Lord Trystan.”
“It’s just a storm, Lyssa,” Trystan reassured her.
But there was that feeling of unease, which slithered along his spine in unwelcome warning that something was afoot.
Another strike of lightning, then booming thunder, so strong the manor shook. “Deadlands!” The candles blew out, sending the room into complete and total darkness.
Trystan’s hands shook, blood rushing in his ears, the feeling of a thousand tiny needles climbing to the top of his head at the paralyzing fear he thought he’d conquered.
But when he heard Lyssa’s small scream, he forgot all about the fear—about anything but finding her. “Lyssa! Edwin!” he called. “Lyssa!”
A scratching sound, then the glow of a match that caught on a torch in Edwin’s hands, lighting the room to reveal a frazzled Gideon and a frantic blue ogre’s face.
But to Trystan’s alarm, as he scanned the kitchen, he found no one else.
Just a discarded whisk, still rocking back and forth on the ground.
“Deadlands,” Trystan breathed, then sprinted out of the kitchens and down the hall. But it was empty.
Lyssa was gone.