Chapter Seven
“I’ll bar the door after you go,” Elianna says, more alert now.
“No, you won’t,” the prince says grimly. “The king ordered you to come with us.”
I grab Kaelen’s arm. “The princess. Is your sister safe?”
His eyes soften, and he puts his hand over mine. A sizzle of awareness jumps from my skin to his, and my breath catches in my throat. “Yes. She’s with the queen in the most defensible part of the palace.”
The sorcerer stares at us and then seems to wake up out of a daze. “Now. We’re leaving now. Yes. I need to pack essentials.”
“You have five minutes.”
My back to Kaelen, I yank off my nightshirt, and pull on my new clothes. When I turn around, he’s staring at me, his face carved into hard lines of fury.
“The scars on your back,” he grinds out from between clenched teeth. “Who did that?”
“No time.” I shake my head and dodge past him, snatching up my valise and, after a moment’s hesitation, the scarlet cloak. While Elianna packs her leather satchels, I carefully fit the case of poisons into the valise, self-consciously pull the cloak over my shoulders, and pull on my new boots.
Four minutes later, arms filled with our gear, we’re racing down the halls to the dungeon, where Kaelen says we’ll find a passageway to escape the castle. Already, though, we can hear the triumphant yells of Pallanhold’s soldiers that let us know they’re defeating the intruders.
I breathe out a sigh of relief. I don’t want anything to happen to Kaelen’s sister, or to Neville or Bern or Maisie … not to anyone I’ve met in the castle.
Well. Maybe Flack. Or the king.
The small party that waits for us in the dungeon bristles with weapons.
Sergeant Neville and two other guards, dressed in nondescript traveling clothes now instead of their fancy uniforms, each hold a naked sword in one hand and a dagger in the other.
The Sylvan, still all in black, carries a bow, while a quiver of steel-tipped arrows rises over one shoulder.
The pale-haired desert woman from the throne room is here, too.
She wears daggers strapped to every limb, more in a belt around her waist, and carries one in each hand.
When she sees me noticing, she grins at me. “Exciting days ahead, riverlander.”
“I’ve had enough excitement to last me a lifetime,” I mutter, but it only makes her laugh.
Bern races into the room, still pulling on his jacket. “You sent for me, Sergeant Neville?”
“Yes, lad,” the sergeant says gruffly. “You’re coming with us. Nothing is better for coping with loss than hard work. And we’ve got a very hard journey ahead.”
Bern clamps his mouth shut and closes his eyes for an instant, then salutes Sergeant Neville. “Yes, sir.”
When he walks farther into the room, I catch sight of Trick, standing a few paces down a corridor with his back to the bars of a cell. He’s not holding or wearing any weapons that I can see, and he’s hunched over, as if his ribs hurt. No surprise, given the way the guards treated him.
Despite everything we’re facing, I’m filled with a wave of relief and joy at seeing him alive. No matter what the servant reported, I didn’t fully believe the king would let him live.
Pallan doesn’t seem the type for pity.
I rush over, arms out to hug him, but he recoils and backs away from me.
“Trick?” I stumble to a stop and wrap my arms around myself, suddenly so very cold.
He holds his hands up, palms facing me, and shakes his head. His dark-brown eyes widen in his lean face. “No, Soli. I’m sorry, but don’t come any closer with that goddess-cursed amulet around your neck.”
“But it’s safe now. The sorcerer warded it, so it’s contained.” I pull the locket out to show him.
He flinches away, his tawny hair shielding his eyes from me. He ducks his head to whisper, “We’ll get out of this. We’ll get that amulet off you and escape. Just trust me.”
“Soli,” Kaelen says, a harsh note of something I don’t understand in his voice. But when I turn to face him, his glare is aimed at Trick, not me. “We need to move.”
Already, the soldiers are pulling a wooden table away from the wall and pushing on one section of the stone. With a loud groaning sound, a panel slides open to reveal a dark space.
“A secret tunnel,” I murmur, caught between anxiety and a glimmer of childlike anticipation. So many of the tales I’ve read feature secret tunnels, lost princesses, and hoarded treasure. None ever centered on a library servant with Gray Mind, though.
Maybe one will, after this adventure.
Two of the guards flank Trick, who flinches at the sight of the dark tunnel but moves forward. Kaelen takes my arm, breaking me out of my ridiculous thoughts. I glance up at him and tighten my grip on my leather valise.
“Now?”
“Now,” he says grimly. We follow Neville, Bern, the Sylvan, the unknown woman, and Elianna into the tunnel, with Trick and the remaining two soldiers bringing up the rear.
The dark space has rough-hewn walls of dirt and stone, and it smells dank and musty.
Cobwebs hang down all around us. The ground beneath us is broken rock and mud from the rivulets of water trickling down the walls.
We move quickly after Neville and Bern and their torches.
Elianna stumbles once and bites off a sharp word.
Then a shimmering ball of light appears in the space over her head and illuminates the way more brightly than the torches.
I catch my breath, startled by this casual display of her magic, despite all I’ve seen.
Beside me, Kaelen’s teeth gleam in a quick grin. “Think of it as a party trick, and it’s less unsettling.”
“What’s happening? I mean, I know we’re being attacked, but how? How did they get in? Is it just coincidence that they’re attacking now, when we’re about to leave with the amulet? What—”
“The enemy has almost certainly been watching Pallanhold for any signs of the amulet for years,” Kaelen says, his smile fading. “If we’re lucky, they haven’t infiltrated high enough into the ranks that they know about you. Now, we should prepare for what we may face outside. Neville!”
The sergeant glances back over his shoulder at the command in the prince’s tone. “Prince?”
“You know we’re likely to run into an ambush. The Zhagarn are nothing if not thorough when mapping out possible exits.” His voice is so grim, I’m reminded of how he knows this.
His parents are said to have defended the exit through which trusted guards spirited Kaelen and Karrina away.
Not until their children were safely away did the Valourian king and queen fall, overwhelmed by the sheer mass of the attacking force.
I wonder if this memory underlies Kaelen’s urgency, or if the danger in our current situation is more than enough to drive him.
“We’re prepared,” Neville says. “I’ve a troop of ten outside with our horses and provisions in the back stable. Heavily armed, all proven fighters.”
For the first time, I hear the Sylvan’s cold voice. “Proven fighters often fall before the Zhagarn. One could wish for thrice that number or more.”
“If I’d had them to spare, they’d be out there, Andras Al’Sylvan,” Neville says curtly. “We were woefully unprepared for this attack, and it looks like collaborators inside the castle may have assisted them.”
The woman hisses out a word I don’t recognize. “Collaborators have no honor and should be put to death slowly.”
“Chitai speaks truth,” Andras says harshly.
“The king said the two of you … wanted to go on this quest?” I ask.
“It’s our right to be part of the mission to free the goddess. I’ll fight beside anyone who battles the Zhagarn,” Chitai growls. “Anyone, anytime, anywhere.”
“Agreed. I will not rest until the enemy is dust,” Andras says, pulling an arrow from his quiver and holding it ready by his side.
Bern looks back at us, his worried gaze bouncing between Kaelen and me. “Prince Kaelen, Lady Soli, please hang back out of harm’s way. We’ll protect you.”
Neville snorts. “You’re new, Bern. You’ve never seen the prince on the training grounds.”
One guard behind me barks out a laugh. “The man fights like a snow leopard. Took on five of us the other day and never broke a sweat.”
“Were there only five?” The prince’s grin is a white slash of teeth in the darkness. “Seemed like more when you were all lying on the ground groaning.”
This man is not what I would have expected from a pampered royal prince, if I’d ever had the time or energy to consider the subject.
His body language and tone project a man in complete control of himself and his surroundings, and he’s sure-footed through the tunnel as though he’s been here before—even though the cobwebs and unmarked mud make it clear nobody has used this passage in a very long time.
When I almost bang my head on a hanging projection, he moves me to one side with a hand on my waist, and I inhale sharply at the contact, heat searing my skin even through my shirt. I swallow my gasp and concentrate on watching the path in front of me more carefully.
“We’re almost there.” Neville’s quiet voice floats back to us. “Torches out, and your light, please, Lady Elianna.”
Those holding torches extinguish them in the mud. The sorcerer’s light vanishes. One of the soldiers in the back with Trick runs up to join Bern and the sergeant at the front. We follow them to the end of the tunnel, where moonlit darkness waits for us.
Prince Kaelen’s hand tightens on my waist for a quick moment, then he releases me and draws a dagger. “I’m sorry you’re in this situation. If … No. Later.”
“Yes. Later.”
He takes me at my word, evidently, because he changes the subject. “If we’re lucky, there’s nobody here.”
“Oh, Nobody’s here,” I say grimly. “And I’m scared out of my new boots.”
He opens his mouth to respond, but I never learn what he meant to say, because two daggers whistle through the air from the end of the tunnel. Neville yanks Bern aside, but both blades strike the soldier just next to them, who screams and falls to the ground.