Chapter Thirty-Seven #2
“I had the chance,” said Kai. “We were together, unguarded, and I wrapped my hand around her throat. And when I saw the life draining from her eyes, I couldn’t do it. I can’t do it.”
Nobody spoke for a long moment; Adeline watched Ger look away, jaw tight.
She watched Imogen glance at Marry, whose expression softened only minutely.
Adeline’s stomach hiccupped. She didn’t think she’d realised how ready her sister was to end the queen’s life.
Her soft sister, who had never wielded anything sharper than a practice blade before this Winter.
Who had honoured the playbook even when it saw her on her back with her leg in two pieces.
The thought that Avette’s cruelty had done that to her—warped Marry like that cursed pendant had warped her own mind—made it all too easy to see this struggle from every angle.
“Then we aim to neutralise her power,” said Mareda finally. “Remove and destroy the pendant. By whatever means.”
They all heard the implication, but Kai only nodded. A compromise he could live with; that they wouldn’t set out to kill her, but—
But.
The silence was so heavy it weighed on Adeline’s ears, and she swallowed to relieve the pressure.
“So,” she said tightly. “We move at the ceremony.”
Marry nodded, eager to move past her own reluctant promise.
“At the ceremony. We can guarantee that all five of us will be in close proximity. Kai at her side, Ger with the Queen’s Gard and the three of us,” she pursed her lips, distaste plain in the tense set of her jaw, “as bridesmaids.”
Adeline wrinkled her nose, and her sister’s lips twitched briefly up.
Swift as it was, the silent conversation still came so easily.
The thought that their bond remained intact despite all they’d both done to sever it made something flicker in her chest, another little chamber of her heart that beat for her broken, beloved family.
Perhaps the same pulse had kicked to life in Marry’s chest, too; it was with renewed determination that she reached for a furl of parchment from the stack on the table and splayed it out before her, jotting out a cluster of dots around a thick, foreboding cross, neat little initials to label each of their positions.
She tapped at the dots labelled I, A and K.
“When the moment is right, Imogen will channel through Adeline and Kai. The Queen’s Gard will presumably be somewhere here—” She sketched out a circle and added another little dot labelled G.
“Nearby, but separated from Avette by her bridesmaids. When Kai and Ade call their power, Gerard will be ready to hold the other gards back.”
Ger blew out a breath; Adeline wondered if the others could hear the shudder in his sigh, but he went on with a fair imitation of his usual jovial lilt.
“I mean, I’ll do my best, but I’m one against six.”
“Two against six,” Marry said mildly, still poring over her makeshift battle plan. “I’ll be armed as well.”
“You?”
At that, she did look up, one golden brow arching neatly. “Yes, me.”
“But you, er—” Ger gave a somewhat apologetic wince. “Aren’t you a bit rusty?”
Adeline echoed his wince, and even Kai shifted awkwardly beside her. Imogen peered up at them from the cradle of her own hands, but Marry only watched him coolly.
“Aren’t you?”
“I still train several times a week.”
“And I’ve been training since I was six years old. You’ll recall I had the advantage in the tourney until you broke my leg.”
“That was an accident.” He rolled his lips in, quite literally biting back a smile that said he just couldn’t help himself. “But you’ll recall I won.”
Marry bristled visibly, colour in her gaunt cheeks and her hands flattening over the parchment.
“And you will recall I very graciously didn’t shove my crutch up your—”
“Marry,” Adeline gasped.
Kai gave a stifled cough into his elbow that did not quite cover the snort of his laughter. Adeline gave his arm a terse flick, fighting to keep her own face schooled and stern.
“Pick it up later,” she reminded her sister.
Mareda scowled, but Gerard, for his part, looked delighted at having broken her famous composure after many, many years of trying. Adeline would be lying if she said she wasn’t just the tiniest bit amused by his success, but it had come at the absolute worst time.
“Behave,” she warned him.
“Boring,” he sighed.
“Will there be a signal of some kind?” Kai asked, drawing them abruptly back to the matter at hand even as a slight curve still clung to his lips. “Or will we have to call?”
“I think I can induce Wielding without a call, if needs be.” Imogen lifted her head, gaze bouncing weakly between them. “May I?”
They both nodded, and Imogen’s breath of relief was palpable as a gust of wind.
And then, when Adeline’s hair stirred around her, she realised it was not her friend’s sigh at all but a physical charge crackling through the air, racing around them all, seeking a conduit.
It found its way beneath Adeline’s skin, and in the matter of a moment, unfathomable power surged through her.
Its song was the same rush and creak of the windswept forest that had stormed her blood on that first night with Kai, though she did not lose her vision as the magic spun itself through her veins, pressing at her pores for escape.
She fumbled at the table for balance and grasped for that wild power, guiding it as best she could to the escape it sought.
Her hold on it was tenuous at best, but she freed it clumsily from her hands until the wood beneath her palms began to groan and crack.
Marry snatched up the parchment just as a tangle of roots split the surface in two, and a spill of brambles and vines tumbled free like veins from a mortal wound.
She felt the moment Imogen pulled back, punctuated by a long, sharp inhale from her left.
“That’s going to take some getting used to,” said Ger.
“You have about eighteen hours,” Adeline panted.