CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR ISI
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
ISI
“Kira?” The name came out strangled. “She would’ve been too young when my mother died.”
“About thirteen,” Trew said, his voice steady despite the impossible thing he’d just suggested. “But I know what I saw, Isi. The build. The red hair. The way she moved. This woman had that particular predatory grace I’ve only seen in her.”
I pulled away from him, needing space to process this. Pherin launched from my shoulder and circled the room, her agitation mirroring my own thoughts.
Had Kira murdered my mother?
The pieces wouldn’t fit together properly. I tried to force them, to make sense of what Trew was saying, but they kept sliding apart. Kira was one of Trew’s trusted advisors, well vetted. If she’d betrayed us, hiding something this dark, it cracked everything.
“Tell me what you know about her,” I said. “Everything.”
Trew ran a hand through his hair, and I recognized the gesture as one he made when sorting through difficult information.
“She came through the Rite of Bonds about a year ago. Bonded with her death adder immediately after. Her combat abilities were exceptional, far beyond what most warriors display even with years of training. And she’s incredibly smart, strategic.
I promoted her to my advisory team seven months ago. ”
“Where did she come from?”
“A village a few hours from Syllavar’s castle. She has two brothers, both younger. Her parents are still alive.” He frowned, remembering. “I met them after her promotion. Her father has red hair, her mother’s is dark. They seemed ordinary enough. Proud of their daughter’s achievements.”
“So if it wasn’t Kira,” I said slowly. “Then who could it be? Is there a relative or an older sister no one knows about?”
“You only saw her for a moment. Her back was turned as she fled, so I didn’t see her face.”
Pherin landed on the windowsill, peering out as if searching for answers in the courtyard below. Her tiny body remained tense, ready to transform and fight threats before they could reach me.
“It doesn’t make sense,” I said. “Why would a thirteen-year-old girl be involved in my mother’s death? And she’s from Syllavar. How would she even get into this castle? That shimmer. Her disappearing. Can she travel like Velacross?”
“I don’t know.” Frustration bled through Trew’s words. “But I’m certain about what I saw. The same red hair, build, and movement. It was distinctive.”
We sat in silence, the impossible puzzle between us.
“We’ll keep it in mind,” I said finally. “But for now, it isn’t something we can act on without more information.”
Trew nodded.
“We need to question the woman in the dungeon as soon as possible,” I said. “That’s our biggest priority. She met with my mother multiple times and in secret. Whatever they discussed, it was important enough to hide it from my father.”
“She might know about Velacross and the veil. About what your mother could do.” Trew moved closer, his hand finding mine.
“There was magical residue at the top of those stairs. If someone traveled through the veil at that moment, there could’ve been others on the landing when your mother fell. People young Isi couldn’t see.”
“Mae didn’t see anyone else at the top of the stairs when she arrived,” I said. “You verified that in her memory.”
“Whoever else might’ve been there could’ve already traveled through the veil.”
The implications made my head spin. My mother, practicing veil-travel on the landing at the top of the stairs. Others present, leaving before they could be seen. A push or a disturbance or an accident that sent her falling to her death.
And the one woman who’d witnessed it all had been locked away for years. As punishment or to keep her silent.
“You said the woman in the dungeon looked weak,” Trew said. “Sick. Fates know what years in those conditions have done to her.”
I thought of the woman’s gaunt face, her sunken eyes. The way she’d moved with the careful slowness of someone whose body had failed long ago.
“Even if we reach her, she might not talk,” I said. “She helped me escape, but that doesn’t mean she’ll trust us enough to share what she knows.”
“Or she might be too broken.” Trew’s voice gentled. “Years of isolation can destroy a person’s mind. She may not be capable of coherent conversation anymore.”
Pherin swooped down and landed on my shoulder. Brave woman. Help.
“We will,” I said.
But the obstacles stacked between us and that goal felt insurmountable. My father watching me closely. Guards were stationed at my door at all times. The castle was on high alert, and everyone was suspicious, anticipating the next threat.
“The dungeon has regular patrols,” Trew said, following the same line of thought. “Getting down there without being seen will be a challenge but reaching her cell without raising an alarm will be nearly impossible.”
“And we’re running out of time.” I moved to the window, staring out at the grounds.
“The Day of Mercy is coming. Lord Alfred’s circling closer, getting more suspicious.
My father’s war machine will leave soon for Syllavar.
We still need to search the west tower. Still need to plan how to rescue all the prisoners before they die. ”
“Multiple fronts, all of them critical. All of them competing for the same limited time we have.”
I pressed my forehead against the cool window glass. “We can’t do everything at once.”
“No, but we can prioritize.” He came to stand behind me, his warmth a steadying presence at my back. “We’ll question the woman in the dungeon tonight. The information she may have could change everything else.”
I turned in his embrace, looking up at him. “I’ll send Pherin to gather the others. We need to plan this properly.”
Understand, she said. With a peep, she flew through the cracked-open window.
“I appreciate you looking at the memory and for telling me the truth about my father,” I said. “Even though it complicated everything.”
“I’ll always tell you the truth, Minx. You deserve nothing less.”
I rose on my toes and kissed him, pouring everything I had into the contact.
He kissed me back with the same intensity, his fingers tightening on my waist.
We lingered there, my hands on his chest, feeling his steady heartbeat beneath my palms, waiting for our friends to arrive.
A knock rang out on the outer door, and we hurried into the sitting area.
Trew strode over to let them in while I smoothed my skirts and tried to look like I hadn’t just been thoroughly kissed by a rebel king disguised as my bodyguard.
Kerralyn slipped inside first, her face flushed from rushing. Lexie followed a short time later, then Derren dressed in a guard uniform. He glanced back at the corridor before closing the door.
“Pherin fluttered around my face, and I had a feeling you needed us,” Lexie said.
“I only have a short time before someone notices I’m not at my assigned post,” Derren said.
“We’ll speak quickly,” I said.
Trew wove fresh wards, and he and I sat on the sofa. Kerralyn took the place on my other side while Derren claimed a chair beside the fireplace. Lexie settled into his lap, wrapping her arms around his shoulders.
Pherin returned through the window and landed on the back of the sofa.
“We need to update you on what we’ve learned,” I said, speaking low and fast.
While Trew toyed with the tips of my hair, I hurried through the abbreviated version.
“One of the two women at the top of the stairs might be the woman in the dungeon,” I said. “Eva, she was called. She helped me escape when I searched the cells. She may have been imprisoned since my mother’s death.”
“Fates,” Lexie breathed. “For sixteen years?”
“She might know everything,” Kerralyn said. “About your mother, what happened, and the veil.”
“Which is why we want to question her tonight,” Trew said, tightening his arm around my shoulders.
Derren shifted, stroking Lexie’s back. “Your father’s paranoia has accelerated since the assassination attempt. Security has been doubled everywhere. From what I heard, he acts…”
“How?” I asked.
“As if he’s… Well, a few think he’s losing his mind. He’s talking to himself, whispering things, and he sleeps with the torches lit and four guards in his bedroom.”
“Really?” I couldn’t fathom this. I had no idea what it meant, but I couldn’t analyze it now. I leaned forward, placing my elbows on my knees. “We needed to come up with a plan to get Trew and I to the dungeon, and it needs to be clever.”
“I could drug the guards,” Lexie said. “Slip something into their evening meal.”
Trew shook his head. “Too many variables. If even one guard doesn’t eat or notices something wrong, they’ll figure out what happened and then we’ll never get inside that dungeon. I could overpower them with magic, though. Quick and quiet.”
“And risk exposing your abilities?” I shook my head.
“If anyone suspects you’re more than a hired bodyguard, my father will imprison you and the next thing you know, you’ll be handed a mug of ashwine.
If he suspects we’re close, he’ll use you to get to me.
Torture you for information. Keep you alive as leverage. My father’s not above any of that.”
Trew’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t argue.
“Let’s come up with a simple plan, then,” Derren said, glancing toward the door, his fingers drumming on the arm of the chair. “We need a distraction big enough to pull guards away from the dungeon, but not so obvious it seems intentional.”
We fell silent, each of us thinking.
“An emergency in the village could call guards away,” I said.
Trew and I shared a long look. “Such as?”
“I wouldn’t want anyone hurt but a natural disaster of some kind?”
“That wouldn’t draw guards from the dungeon, though, would it?” Kerralyn said. “Though I like the idea. It’s making me think…”
Pherin hopped along the back of the sofa, her tiny head swiveling between us.
“Eva’s in an isolated cell, down the hall from the others,” I said.
“Which means there are fewer guards in her area. But it also means we have to go deeper into the dungeon to reach her. There’s a greater chance we’ll be seen.
I escaped through a grate in the closet rather than return the way I arrived.
It would be risky to take the same route twice, though I don’t believe anyone saw me slip through the kitchen. ”
“Someone’s kept her silent for a long time,” Lexie said. “That takes powerful motivation. Either fierce loyalty or fear.”
“Or both,” Kerralyn said, her brow furrowed.
I thought of the desperate hope mixed with resignation I’d seen in the woman’s eyes when she’d helped me escape. She’d taken a risk for me, but would she take an even bigger one by speaking about what happened sixteen years ago?
“We’re assuming she’ll help us,” I said. “But we don’t know that she will. She doesn’t know any of us. For all she knows, we’re working with my father.”
“Then we’ll have to convince her otherwise,” Trew said.
“The kitchen staff sleeps in servants’ quarters near the dungeon level,” Kerralyn said. “I’m quite familiar with that area now.”
We all looked at her.
She straightened, her violet eyes bright with the kind of determination I’d seen during the Rite. “I could create a diversion, something that would pull the guards away from their posts without raising suspicion about the dungeon specifically.”
“What do you have in mind?” Lexie asked.
Kerralyn’s smile turned wicked. “I’ll burn the castle down.”