Chapter 21
Elsedora
Twenty years into the Sethe Curse…
Agiant tiered cake decorated the table in the center of the Luz ballroom. Eighteen silver-foiled candles stuck from its top. The cake’s piped red roses looked so decadent they could only be the work of Angeline. The current baker was good, but my friend’s detail work remained unmatched.
The string quartet played lively tunes for partygoers to dance about the room like sprites. Someone had definitely spiked the bowl of berry punch.
That someone may have been me.
Deep-crimson silk draped the grand staircase’s rails. The fabric matched the table linens.
Sybilla stood beside me. She winced as she sipped her punch. “Blech. That’s vile. Did you do that?”
A Sahlms-red wrap dress hugged her curves, and her silver-streaked honey-toned hair had been piled atop her head in pins. Sybilla’s face seemed to never age.
“We must always celebrate when times are good,” I teased and clinked my glass to hers.
My friend’s lips drew into a flat line. “You sound like Emmerick,” she griped.
I smirked, though my desire to change the topic mounted. For five years, he’d slept on.
Every year that drew us closer to the end of the curse’s timeframe dwindled my hope.
“Who pissed in your oats this morning?” I chided, hoping she could distract me.
Sybilla sighed and waved her hand toward her daughter, who looked dazzling in a cream brocade gown. She stood speaking with a group of nobles from the South Corridor. “That dress had a gorgeous matching stay. She refused to wear it!”
I shrugged. “Stays are going out of style. And are quite constrictive.”
She rolled her eyes. “For once, I’d love if you took my side on something,” she huffed out. Her words, no matter how cutting, held no venom.
“I will always have your side, my Queen. Or your front, or your back… whatever you prefer.” I bumped my hip against hers playfully, with a wink.
Sybilla laughed, uninhibited by her former annoyance. “At what age will you stop making faux passes at me?”
“Never,” I answered. “You are fine wine. Your husband should watch out.”
As though summoned, Krait wandered over, leading Lark our way. “What am I watching out for?”
“Nothing,” Sybilla and I said in unison.
I grinned as he scowled at our collective evasion.
“Happy birthday, trouble,” I said, greeting my niece.
Lark left her father’s side to wrap one arm around each of us, pulling Sybilla and I in too tightly. “It’s a wonderful party, Mama.”
I watched Sybilla melt as her daughter released us, their spat forgotten; she could be stubborn, and sometimes cruel, but she loved with ferocity.
“You look beautiful, love,” Sybilla said. “Stay or not…”
“And the best accessory,” Lark said and covertly lifted the skirt of the heavy brocade, showing off the throwing daggers, which I’d left for her that morning, holstered on her thigh. “Thank you, Aunty.”
Krait raised a brow before asking Sybilla, “Are you ready?”
“For what?” Lark glanced between them.
“Let us steal you away for a moment,” Sybilla said, guiding her toward the hall.
I clapped and said, “Oh, I won’t miss this.”
Krait’s arm wrapped around Sybilla’s hip as they walked. Their affection wasn’t something they often flaunted—only on special occasions.
It left my side feeling cold and empty.
The iron doors to the armory vault groaned open, and Krait stepped inside, retrieving the powerful artifacts hidden within. I resisted bouncing in place in anticipation.
“Much to my dismay, you’re no longer a girl. Soon, you’ll have all of your father’s Shadows,” Sybilla said. “And you’ve mastered Isleen’s art of compulsion. But there are a couple more things we’d like to give you before you begin scouring tombs and ruins.”
Lark’s hands slapped her cheeks. “You’re finally letting me go?” She balked and glanced my way. I offered her a conspiratorial wink.
Krait approached with a flat, velvet box and a sword holstered at his hip. “It’s hardly our choice any longer.”
The box clicked open, revealing a familiar necklace within that glowed iridescent blue. The beads formed two tiers with a delicate lattice between them.
It had been my idea to give her the relics, to let her help search. She’d begged to come along for years.
“Maybe it needs to be her,” I’d argued with Krait. “There may be a reason I cannot find it. The power within the relics could call to one another.”
Krait had initially scoffed at me. But then he’d come around.
“This is Isolde’s carcanet,” Sybilla explained. “She wore it to amplify her strength and crafted it from her own tears to be indestructible.”
Krait plucked the necklace from the box’s plush lining. I rocked from foot to foot as Lark pulled her hair to the side so her father could secure the clasp.
My niece reached up to touch the smoothed stones. “What do I do with it?” she asked with a tone of reverence.
“We hope it will guide us to the third relic,” I chimed in. “It’s a hunch. But Isolde’s weapons were crafted to be wielded by you.”
Sybilla pulled the sword from Krait’s side holster. Its ruby-encrusted pommel caught the low lamplight.
Seeing it again brought back memories of a newly crowned King cleaning the blade at a desk in Helos and scolding me for breaking in. Those early conversations with Emmerick felt like they’d happened centuries ago. Before the curse, or the mirror, or our friendship...
“This sword once came to me in a time of great need. Now it will be yours to wield.”
Necklaces, swords, duty, impending doom.
I watched Lark’s expression closely, searching for any sign of doubt; if she felt it, she didn’t show it. Blood pumped in my ears as she held out her hands to take the Sword of Isolde—a weapon destined to destroy the Death Origin.
When the blade touched her fingertips, the metal glowed a brilliant shade of gold as the rubies blazed red. “Suits your color preferences,” I noted, which elicited a smile from Lark and a pointed stare from Sybilla.
There was still one more relic to find.
Still a curse to break.
We celebrated in peace today, but the prophecy was clear—Caym would rise again, whether my dear niece was ready to face him or not.
She would not do so alone.