Salt and Smoke #2
“Excellent. The smaller avian vey will survey from above while Naci and Bernitha head toward the castle. You’ll bring the glythyr Kaelor imbued to keep the light bent around you and hide you from upward-facing eyes, but you’ll need to survey the wards quickly, since Kaelor can only keep the glythyr powered for so long before depletion.
Naci finds a weak spot, conveys her findings to Noxie, who will tell Aerie.
The information she shares from Noxie and the rest of her aerial crew will dictate our path to and into the castle.
Naci and Bernitha will camp out in the woods to the west of the castle where the infiltration team will join them. ”
“What happens if Naci can’t find any weak points in the wards?” This was Kellan.
“Then the aerial units return to the ship, and we make a plan B with what we know. Questions on phase one?”
The room remained deathly quiet.
“Phase two is castle entry. Naci will unravel the ward’s weak point enough for us to slip through.
From here, Kellan will station a few soldiers to direct any mortal servants to safety at our rendezvous point.
Sevrin will glamour himself, Naci, me, Aerie, Kellan, Bernitha, Elene, and Bramick.
We need to keep the infiltration team small for Sevrin’s sake.
He’ll glamour us to appear as royal guards if we have to go through the main castle.
The ideal scenario is that we pass no one on the way to the closest entrance to the servants’ corridor.
If we do, Sevrin is the only one to speak.
He’ll convince anyone we meet that we’re legitimate.
” The way Drayce said “convince” made me shudder.
Sevrin’s deception magic still made me queasy, and I wondered if he’d ever used it on me.
“Phase three is getting the king alone, or as close to as possible. We may be in for a fight here with his guards or court. Noxie will search the castle to find the king’s whereabouts and convey it back to Naci once he’s found.”
“The prince once told me that the king hears petitions from townsfolk and nobles in the throne room each morning after breakfast,” I said. “He’ll likely have Malvina and some of his council with him, but that might be the best we can hope for.”
“That’s perfect, we should aim to time it where we can join the queue disguised as petitioning townsfolk.”
“You’re asking quite a lot of my magic, sir,” came Sevrin’s oily voice.
Drayce turned to him. “If your magic weakens, you keep the glamour on Naci no matter what. The king and guards will undoubtedly recognize the rest of us from Naci’s extraction, but they absolutely cannot find out that Naci is in their midst. Clear?”
“Crystal,” Sevrin said with a slight bow of his head.
“Once we’re in the throne room, we prepare for a fight.
We come at them with everything we have.
Bramick will seal the door to the throne room with his magic, and I’ll keep a water shield up to protect us from the king’s fire.
Sevrin will have to combat the Umbrathren if they’re present and deter them as much as possible.
With any luck, we’ll get Caedryn by himself in the fight, and a couple of us combined can overpower and kill him.
We kill them all with no mercy. Every guard, royal, and court member.
Everyone who tries to stop us. Questions? ”
He looked around the room at every single person. “Good. Make ready to leave, we head to Fallorian within the hour.”
Everyone left quickly except us, Aerie, Kellan, and Bramick.
“Drayce, I’ve been able to fix wards and glythyrs but not unravel them.” I couldn’t help but voice my fears.
“You can do it, Naci, I know you can. And if you can’t? Then we find another way in. I hear undercarriages are effective too.” He gave me a quick smile.
“You’ve got two weeks to practice on the ship, so no pressure,” Bramick added with a wink. “There’s a lot of what-ifs and unknowns, Dray. You up for this?”
“Wouldn’t oppose some shadows joining us. That might just even the odds.” He looked at me with a wry grin.
“Why do I feel like you nutheads aren’t taking this seriously?” Aerie said with a roll of her eyes.
“Just trying to defuse the tension,” Bramick replied.
“How many soldiers do you want me to bring?” Kellan asked.
“As few as possible, but as many as you need to get the mortals to safety and protect them.”
Kellan nodded. He was generally a man of few words, but when he spoke, everyone listened.
We all left, Kellan breaking off for his soldiers’ barracks and the rest of us headed toward the captain’s row, splitting off when we arrived at Drayce’s.
“You know now would be a great time to find out that your vey is extremely powerful,” he said to me.
“Same could be said for you, sir.”
“I’ll let mine out to play if you do,” he teased.
“Tell me how, and I will.”
He thought for a minute. “The first time usually happens under duress, so it could happen in the fight.”
“How do you transform?”
“Your vey form is a part of you, as easy to command as your elemental magic. It lives in your heart, too, just a different power to find and use. Once you’ve felt it, it becomes as instinctual as commanding your element.”
We walked into the house, and he started packing his bag with clothes, coats, and small weapons. I watched him strap two swords across his back and a dagger to each thigh, plus a small blade inside his boot. He was terrifyingly, devastatingly gorgeous.
“I had these made for you,” he said, pulling me out of my trance.
He opened a box containing two daggers similar to his, but shorter, all silver with intricate tooling on the handles in a fire pattern.
I removed one from the box. The metal was cold to the touch but heated instantly in my palm.
“They will respond to your fire if you imbue them. Just a small amount of magic once will fuel them like an extension of your magic.”
“They’re beautiful, Drayce, thank you.” They truly were, and they made me feel as dangerous as Drayce looked. I slid them into their sheaths and attached each to one thigh with a leather strap over my pants. I could feel their comforting heat at my sides.
“And this.” He handed me a much larger leather scabbard.
I grabbed the black hilt and pulled, revealing a dazzling black metal blade.
“Your daggers can carry your fire, but this? Sevrin and I have been working with the blacksmiths on this for weeks. It can be imbued with your shadows to a devastating effect.”
Weeks? That would have been long before we knew this fight was around the corner. Maybe he really had felt for me as long as he’d said last night. I wanted so badly to dive deep into those thoughts, but the present reality called for my complete attention.
I removed the sword entirely and laid the blade across my palm, the hilt in my other hand.
It was lighter and colder than I’d expected.
It contrasted with the daggers. Where they were sleek, warm, and beautiful, this sword was terrifying, cold, and cruel, like I had to be if we were going to succeed.
“Thank you. Let’s hope I don’t have to use the shadows, though.” I appreciated it so much, but I couldn’t bear to tell him I was still scared of my shadows.
We finished packing in silence and left the house, taking one last look around. Gods, I hoped we’d see it again, I thought with a pang of sadness.
After a few minutes, we joined the rest of the team at the stables, each saddling their own horse except me—I rode with Drayce once more.
There was no slow and leisurely pace. We pushed the horses hard and rode fast all the way to Fallorian, barely anyone speaking on the ride.
The trip to the base when I’d first arrived took nearly a day, but this time we made it to the port city in just over half a day, arriving at our ship just after nightfall.
One young girl who rode with us, a stable hand, took the reins of the rest of our horses and turned back for base, leaving us to board the same ship I’d arrived on when all of this was new to me—being fae, Elyndor, sailing the seas.
I felt as though I’d lived an entire lifetime since I’d marched to my death in the courtyard at Ashthorn.
I took a deep breath of salty ocean air and realized the scent I smelled on Drayce was the ocean mixed with smoky, smoldering wood. I wouldn’t admit it to him, or anyone except myself, but I loved the smell.