Chapter 63
Chapter Sixty-Three
Emmeline
Emmeline spent her limited free time in the days following their meeting with Valyrie in her dressing chamber compiling theories. Why was Dryvius killing? What had Anphrosia done to make him target her Fate ties? What did Serchus know to make him the key?
Was Dryvius planning to kill again?
Who was he?
All they knew was he was out there, somewhere. He could be anyone, and based on the note he’d left Roremar and his attack on Emmeline, he was enjoying toying with them.
Lola and Myrella had gone to the Archives today to look into the Fate Bound Seekers and Points of Constellation, but Emmeline stayed at the manor to put everyone at ease.
With them gone, she found a rare moment of self-appointed privacy rather than being locked in her suite. Even Graves and Eston were patrolling the wing, so she could pretend she wasn’t constantly watched.
Seated in front of her evidence wall, Emmeline curled her fingers around her notes. She had to focus on the trial tomorrow. After Valyrie had revealed the truth about Dryvius and Nico, Emmeline showed the Angel the scroll. Valyrie hadn’t seemed surprised to see it.
She’d confirmed Emmeline’s and Myrella’s theories about the first and second trials. The duel was to strip the potential Fates of humanity, and the second was a bonding, to build an understanding of each competitor’s deeper nature and decipher their magic. But the third…
“Fear,” Valyrie had said. “They each gave me a fear when we became bound. I wanted to use those fears in determining their eternity, but first they had to conquer them.”
Problem was, Rocarri could interpret conquering your fear any number of ways while crafting his own trial. And if he was trying to create his own Fate…
She was pacing circles around her suite when a knock sounded at the door. She stiffened, knowing the Fate of Chaos and Revelry was in the city somewhere. Would Dryvius try to throw her off with pleasantries?
Silently, scroll still pinched between her fingers, Emmeline rose and slid a dagger behind her back. She crept toward the door, placing the scroll on the table beside it. She cracked the door an inch, shoulders unwinding when she saw a familiar face.
“Cyren,” she exhaled, fingers still tight on the weapon behind her back.
“Emmeline.” They tapped a leather file sticking out of their satchel. “May I come in?”
Emmeline hesitated, wary of anyone in her space right now, but then she remembered the favor she’d asked of the General. “Yes, please.”
She opened the door wider but tucked her dagger into her belt.
Cyren didn’t impose, only taking a few steps into the room. They wore finery befitting of the grand party Rocarri required they all attend tonight to mark the eve of the final trial.
Emmeline’s stomach turned.
“Am I late? I’ve gotten distracted.”
“No, I’m early. I have some business to take care of before tonight.
” Cyren removed that aged ledger, Property of City Accords embossed across the front.
“Forgive me that this took so long, with everyone taking time off for the tournament, official procedurals have been moving much slower than usual. But here you have it. Records about the temple trading, straight from our private files.”
Emmeline’s heart inflated. Eagerly, she took the ledger, flicking through the crinkled pages. The Averian’s moniker was all over them, as were some of the trade routes she’d already uncovered.
But there was more.
The Temple of Selene had been excavated ages ago. There was no evidence of it ever being inhabited before or after the Averian’s time, yet the concrete timetables put him there at least once each year.
Why was this high-ranking man in an illegal operation visiting an abandoned temple?
Though there was verifiable evidence that nothing remained at the sight, it stood out to Emmeline. Especially with her curiosity over the three-pronged being, Selene.
These files also had specific dates the Averian was suspected of relocating children from one temple to the next. Much like the Temple of Selene, they put him in Lumin at least once a year.
Lumin. The city she was born near. The place her sister was originally taken from.
What had the Averian returning when the rest of the routes didn’t dictate anything as repetitive?
When she’d asked Metrina about her sister a few weeks ago, the Fate had said seek the riches of nine for truths about her family.
Emmeline had followed the hint, expecting to find information about Addie, but instead ended up in tunnels beneath the ground, eavesdropping on Rocarri about the tournament and his rituals.
But what if Metrina had been trying to show her something about her sister? The Warders, the Temple, the Averian being in Lumin, the goings on in the capital…what if it was all entwined?
Her heart pattered faster. “How far back do these go?”
“I hazarded a guess,” Cyren began, wariness clear in their voice, “and asked for records within the past two decades.”
Emmeline froze, only her gaze lifting. “Why?”
“It’s clear you’re looking for something personal. Being thirty years old, with the age typical Fate ties reveal themselves I guessed you wouldn’t need to go back further.”
Emmeline considered, twirling her opal ring. Her Fate ties had revealed themselves earlier than most. And that fateful day when she imploded, when a sudden burst of magic led to her family’s discovery and her sister’s kidnapping, thinking it had been her…
Two decades may not be enough.
Was that something she was willing to tell Cyren, though?
She wasn’t sure. Her gaze dropped back to the pages. This file may not tell her exactly where Addie had been taken, but if Emmeline could go back a few more years, maybe she could build out the path.
The General hummed as Emmeline considered. “Has it been helpful?”
Her attention snapped up. “What?”
“The scroll.” Cyren ducked their chin at the table beside the door, the silver gems in their braided coronet glinting like a crown. “I’d hoped it would be.”
Emmeline’s heart stuttered, hand gently landing atop the worn parchment. “It was you?”
Cyren nodded, a friendly smile playing on their lips.
“It was. I could tell from our first interaction that you didn’t trust me, and I don’t blame you given your arrival here, but I saw how Rocarri treated you during the first trial and thought it might give you a leg up.
” They leaned forward. “Plus, I recognized your curious nature. I hoped if I gave it to you anonymously, you may be intrigued enough to use it.”
Emmeline swallowed thickly, eyes stinging. “Why tell me now, though? And why give it to me at all?”
“Because you can trust me, Emmeline.” Cyren’s lips pressed together. “And because I’ve seen enough battles in my day to recognize a good cause. I wanted you to have a chance.”
“Where did you get the scroll from?”
Cyren smiled. “A friend.”
Something bloomed behind Emmeline’s ribs. She wasn’t entirely sure what to call it, but it almost felt like kinship.
Heartbeat pounding, Emmeline tucked the ledger against her chest.
“I may need to go a little further than two decades,” she admitted.
“Is there someone specific you’re looking for?” Cyren asked.
The words stuck in her throat. She desperately didn’t want to bring anyone else into this, but Cyren had been helping her for weeks without her even knowing. If she was selective, perhaps this could work.
“My sister,” Emmeline breathed. Cyren waited quietly, as if they could tell how difficult every word was, how many stitches she had to rip up for each.
“She was taken when we were young. I don’t know what happened to her.
Truthfully, I doubt I should try to find her with all the threats surrounding me, but I want to know if she’s okay. ”
If she’s alive.
There was a frightfully high chance she wasn’t, but if that was the case, Emmeline would find out. Visit her grave with their mother’s ring and set it atop an unmarked tombstone.
“Your sister,” Cyren said, studying her. “No name?”
Emmeline shook her head. “No name.”
That was too much. If Cyren was swayed easily to give up information, a name was too direct of a link.
“City?”
“Near Lumin,” Emmeline said.
“Lumin,” they repeated, blinking a few times. “I’ll see what I can find.”
They swept around her toward the door, cloak flaring behind them. Hand on the knob, Cyren paused and looked at Emmeline, brow creasing.
“Have you been to the east wing?”
Emmeline mapped out the manor in her memory. A few times from what she recalled, as well as when she’d broken into Rocarri’s office, but she didn’t need to give the General details.
She nodded.
“I suggest you pay it another visit.” Cyren looked toward the balcony doors, the setting sun beyond. “There are hours yet until tonight’s event. If you go soon you’ll have plenty of time.”
“And what will I find there?”
“I don’t know,” Cyren admitted. “Perhaps nothing. But perhaps something revelatory.” With a wave, they left, the door thudding softly shut in their wake.
Emmeline’s skin prickled like starfire crackled beneath it.
She clutched the ledger to her chest and studied the scroll on the table.
Pressure constricted her throat, time ticking down to help Roremar, to uncover some sort of answer about her sister, to find Dryvius somewhere in this damned city before he killed again.
The weight of it all balanced with the sensation of freedom that came with revealing one tiny piece to Cyren, like wings unfurled in her chest.
It was so frustrating what this city had done to her. How they’d kept her from her personal goals. Ever since Wisteria Falls with Roremar, after pouring out their secrets, her patience was running thin.
And as much as she hated the idea, Emmeline knew there was someone else she could ask. At least for one piece of information. Someone who had made it very clear to her and Roremar that he knew something about the Averian.
Her vision drifted to the Mystique ink on the writing desk, its deep onyx jar a beacon. A sheen of slime coated her skin. Her scars twinged, cries lodging in her throat.
But it was time. Time to stop hiding from men like Rocarri, from the strength of her magic, from her past. Emboldened by the step she’d taken with Cyren, Emmeline strode to the writing desk and grabbed a piece of parchment.
What do you know of the Averian? she wrote. She didn’t sign it. It wouldn’t need a signature.
Folding the note, she tossed it over the nearest mystlight before she could reconsider. Her stomach twisted with self-loathing as it swooshed away above the flame.
An answer came almost too quickly. What’s in it for me?
Emmeline considered. Too much. She’d already given up too much, what more did she even have to offer? But those five words—they implied that he knew something. That there was a potential to trade for information she needed so desperately.
Before she could second guess it, Emmeline wrote, What do you want? And she tossed it over the mystlight.