Chapter 10 Stellen #2
Reaching for the pouch of coins I confiscated from him, I’m frustrated to discover that a section of my robes is singed, and the bag must have split in the battle because only half of the coins remain.
Many of those are blackened. The handwritten note he gave me crumbles to ash when I try to retrieve it.
Maxim’s fire must have reached me in the explosion, although my own power must have shielded me from feeling it at the time.
I mutter a curse beneath my breath, regretting now that I let that villager go so easily. I should have seized him and interrogated him.
There’s no point in searching for him now. If he were a trained assassin, he’d be long gone.
I have no doubt the little girl was his daughter. The best assassins are those who blend in. They have families and undertake ordinary work like other lowborn.
Damn. I didn’t realize, when I held his daughter in my arms, that I held enormous leverage over him.
I recall the scene on the beach, running it through my mind.
The assassin must have come back for his family, only to find me holding his daughter, at which he decided to use a version of the truth to his advantage, confessing to a crime.
Given that I now suspect the Oracle’s father was killed from a distance, the assassin probably cut his own hand, possibly using a second, concealed blade, to produce the blood that had washed into the water and supported his supposed remorse.
I lean back on my heels, a renewed flood of ice filling my cold heart.
I showed him mercy. I even rationalized it. And now I’ve let him escape.
That is what mercy gets me.
No more.
At that moment, Lilis reappears from within the smoke, bringing with her the acrid scent of doused flames. Behind her, the village is quieter than before, the calm broken only by the sizzles and pops of cooling wood.
While the other two Frost Fae stay close on her heels, Lilis pushes a villager ahead of her.
I take a quick note of his tan skin and long, dull-black hair, the strands tied back with leather strings. He’s clean-shaven, tall, and muscular but lean, wearing a simple tunic and long pants. A necklace of pale blue shells sits around his neck, his only adornment.
Lilis shoves him to his knees in front of me.
“Their leader,” she announces.
Since I’m also still kneeling, the villager is at eye level with me, and it’s easy to read his hatred before he pales and quickly averts his eyes.
I’m indifferent to the shock my features inspire. My pointed ears, paler-than-pale gray eyes, and sharp cheekbones, somehow made more spine-chilling by my long, ghostly-white hair.
It’s in my interest to use his sudden fear to my advantage.
I rise slowly to my feet, where I tower over him. He may be lofty for a lowborn, but I’m taller even than Antony and Maxim.
“My people have put out the fires caused by the Ember Fae,” I say to him. “You will repay this kindness with honesty.”
His lips compress as if he would defy me, but then he squeezes his eyes closed. A sign of capitulation before he asks, “What do you want to know?”
“There was a man among you. He had pale skin, a beard, and a birthmark on the left side of his neck. Tell me everything you know about that man, and I will let you live.”
To his credit, the villager looks up, his voice betraying not a hint of the fear I detected moments ago.
“I will tell you what I know, but it isn’t much.
His name is Stanimir. He came to us only three days ago with his wife and child.
He said he needed work, so we gave him work.
We accept all travelers here and don’t ask questions. ”
“A traveler?” I keep my tone casual. “Where do you think he was traveling from?”
The man’s brow furrows. “I didn’t recognize his accent, but I believe he was from Frost because of his pale skin.”
I keep my expression clear, even though this is another unwanted tie to my kingdom.
“You made an assumption,” I say, casually examining my fingertips. “Just as you assumed you would get away with harboring the Oracle.”
The man startles. He glances up at Lilis before he leans back from me. “The Oracle?”
“Yes,” I say, chewing the inside of my lip. “The Oracle you harbored.”
The color drains further from his cheeks, and now he’s deathly pale. “We would never protect the Oracle. We aren’t that foolish. If the Oracle was here, we were unaware.” Then his eyes fly wide. “Was Stanimir the Oracle?”
If he’s trying to misdirect, he’s doing a terrible job of it.
I lean forward, a sudden movement, my icy power flaring, but the man’s wide eyes and clear expression betray no hint of a lie.
It looks as if he had no idea the Oracle was living here in his village.
But then, I’ve been fooled once today.
I vow never to underestimate a lowborn again.
I raise my hand, ready to strike him down, but my wolf chooses that moment to make her presence known, padding quietly to my side and nudging her head against my arm in an unusually insistent action, and I’m not sure why.
It’s only a momentary distraction, but it gives the villager the chance to close his eyes, bow his head, and start praying. “Goddess of Sea and Stars, protect me,” he whispers. “Protect me as you protect the waves. Goddess of Sea and Stars, protect me as you protect the night sky—”
Suddenly, the Oracle’s voice returns to me. Come for me when the stars go out.
With a frustrated hiss, I lower my hand. “Return to your people. Make sure they understand that what happened here today was their own fault.”
The man rises to his feet, eyeing Lilis and the other two fae as he backs away. No doubt he won’t risk turning his back on any of us until he’s a safe distance away.
My wolf nudges my chest again before she swings in the direction of the dead man and pads over to him, sniffing around the dagger impaled in his chest.
She gives a sharp growl, the kind she only makes when predators dare emerge from the northern wilds, and she smells them on the wind.
Her nose must be telling her something about the weapon that I can’t detect.
Whatever it is, I need to find out.
I fight a sudden trickle of unsettling ice at the base of my spine. Not the cold I’m used to. If I didn’t know better, I’d say this is what a shiver feels like.
Someone is playing a game with my fate, sending notes, luring all three kings here, hiring an assassin to kill the previous Oracle, and, most importantly, triggering the new Oracle’s power. All on the same day.
Someone who, to do all of those things, must have knowledge and possibly even power that could be a real threat to me.
To Lilis, I say, “Preserve this man’s body with ice. Do not touch the dagger or remove it. I want him brought with us just as he is.”
Her forehead puckers. “Who was he?”
I shrug and lie. “Probably nobody.” Then speak a truth: “But I’m not taking any chances.”
While I need to find out as much as I can about whatever power is behind the assassin, I also need to figure out how to retrieve the Oracle.
I’m certain Antony and Maxim would have made the same assumptions I did before today: that the Oracle has been in full control of her power for years, possibly even from her childhood.
If so, they will overestimate her power.
They may even inadvertently harm her, believing her stronger or more skillful than she is.
As I step back to let Lilis work, the Oracle’s command once again revolves within my mind.
When the stars go out…
I jolt as a possibility occurs to me: the bloodlands are starless.
Surely, Antony wouldn’t be so reckless as to take the Oracle there?
My focus rakes across the sky once more, but there’s no way to determine which direction he went after he passed the mountains.
And anyway, he would not dare travel through the bloodlands. It’s well known among the Frost Fae that his family’s power to repel that cursed land’s dark creatures did not pass to him with enough strength to ensure his safety.
Not even Maxim, with all his volatile fire, would venture into that dark landscape.
Besides, the Oracle specifically spoke of the stars going out.
That implies the stars would be shining first. The bloodlands are so completely covered in black clouds that stars haven’t shone there since the Kingdom of Serulia broke into three.
The stars had blazed when this female Oracle was born. Some texts even suggest new stars were born that night. If I follow that logic, it could stand to reason that the stars could go out when this Oracle—
I jolt at another shocking possibility.
Nearby, Lilis and the men have covered the dead man in a film of transparent ice and are preparing him for transport on one of the wolves.
Lilis doesn’t miss my sudden movement. “My lord?”
I dismiss the question in her voice, my expression tightly controlled and coldly calm again. “Bring him to the Sacred Stone Temple and place him in a crystal coffin. I will be studying the texts in the catacombs.”
With that, I launch myself toward my wolf, alighting on her back and urging her into a run.
Leaning low, I fight every impulse in my body to turn my wolf in the other direction and go after the Oracle.
Experience has taught me that preparation is essential. I can’t rush into another ambush or be lured into another battle. My next fight with Antony or Maxim must be on my terms.
For that, I need knowledge.
If the stars blazed when this female Oracle was born, they might go out if she dies.