Chapter 49
Elsedora
I’d left a sleeping King in my bed. He’d looked so tranquilly mussed, flushed from the warmth of the fire, and nothing like when he’d slept under the curse.
Falling asleep beside him, finding him still there in the morning—it all overwhelmed me. Instead of waking him, I’d scribbled him a simple note.
“I will see you tonight, puppy.”
Then I’d sent a hawk to a few dear friends and brought an invitation to a florist in Luz. Self-preservation, or self-sabotage? To be determined.
I lingered at the gate of the Faulkers’ cottage, readying myself to enter when Sybilla and Lark exited, carrying an empty basket. Lark spotted me first.
“Aunt El!” She bounded up to the gate. “We were just dropping off some bread and meat. Are you going inside?” she asked hopefully.
I smiled and shook my head. “No, no. I was looking for your mother to see if she needed any help in Helos this afternoon.”
Sybilla trailed her daughter and glanced between us with a furrowed brow. “All settled there. Leave that to me—but we received some startling news this morning. Bringham is doubling his men at the border. You were my next stop.”
Glad to find an excuse for avoiding going into the cottage with my apologies, I said, “Then, you leave that to me.”
As we walked back to the palace, she gave me my next mission.
The wind guided me west at dusk. Mayra gleefully squawked as we descended through a rain cloud and the West Corridor came into view.
Great—my riding leathers were soaked through, and my braided hair clung to my shoulder. It would make cleaning up for tonight’s celebrations more difficult.
Yet something was amiss. I was good at one thing: sniffing out information by whatever means necessary. Even if it meant slipping behind enemy walls.
Bringham’s foolish games needed to end. What did that horrid man have up his sleeve?
Soaring over the camps, I didn’t worry about the men who pointed and shouted. I’d be out of the West before word could reach the castle—Bringham’s insistence on no Egresses meant his men traveled slowly, and we flew faster than any hawk.
Sybilla and I had agreed that if I were seen, it would send a warning to Haag. The West Corridor lay vulnerable from the sky; we had the flyers on our side. The Southern Corridor’s naval fleets would aid us, and the Sahlms’ Warhorses would ride for us.
Bringham needed to back down or risk unrest that his land was not armed or prepared for.
As we approached the capital, I whispered a Brennac cloaking charm to conceal my menace. Cassidee had taught me it; the charm would only hold for a few minutes. Just long enough to get Mayra out of sight.
Reaching into my coat pocket, I dug around for the purple vial of invisibility tonic that I’d taken from Wyeth’s apothecary. With a bracing wince, I popped the cork and drank the sour mixture. It never got better.
At my direction, Mayra dove and landed on a low curtain wall. I dismounted as quietly as one could, being sopping wet.
My boots squeaked. My coat and tunic dripped onto the stone path—I may be invisible, but that wasn’t.
I glanced down the walkway in each direction—luckily, we were alone. Ringing out what I could of the fabric, I plotted how to remain unseen as I gained access to the inside.
Surely, I could find something of value in the King’s study.
“Listen for my whistle. I’ll call you back when I’ve reached somewhere out of sight,” I whispered to Mayra. “And be quiet!”
Sybilla and I had only told Asterie and Lark where I intended to go, knowing neither of them would throw a fit, like Krait, or try to talk me out of it, like Fen.
Mayra, seeming to understand the need for stealth, suppressed her usual screech of glee when her wings beat the air. I breathed a sigh of relief. At least the menace of a creature could tuck herself away somewhere safe.
Unlike me, wandering into who knows what. It’d never bothered me before.
Guilt ached in my chest for not telling Emmerick.
You owe him no explanation of your whereabouts, I justified to myself. Staying in motion typically settled most of my internal aches. Why would it not work with him? He stuck in my mind; every thought circled back to the warmth of his brawny arms winding around me tightly.
On light feet, I made my way across the wall and toward the east side of the castle. The sky opened, and rain fell onto the cobblestones, causing patches on them until no dry spots remained. Thunder rolled in the distance.
My wet footprints would go undetected. The patter grew into a downpour, and the storm made a good blanket of sound.
The portcullis was raised to allow a mule-drawn cart with produce through. Two guards stood watch on either side. I slid down the wall and scurried up behind the cart, following it through, thankful that the clopping of hooves covered the continuous squeak of my boots.
After entering the bailey, I slipped into a long, arched hall. At the end, a worn wooden door greeted me. It looked like a servant’s entrance.
Luckily, no guards passed as I opened the door and stepped inside. Despite the dreadful gray stones that protected from the icy rain, somehow, the air felt colder. I fought the urge to shiver.
I made my way into the main hallway—worn rugs dampened my footsteps. Halting, I held my breath. Two maids, who carried heaping trays of food, passed me. They hurried down the corridor, chattering.
“He’s talking to himself in that mirror again,” one whispered.
“He is too young to lose his sense yet, no? Maybe Prince Regon is poisoning him,” the other answered.
A scoff sounded. “It would serve him right.”
“Don’t say such things! That’s treasonous!” the meeker voice whisper-shouted. “But I do not disagree. I quite like the Prince. He’s so kind!”
The other jabbed back, “Say what you really mean—he’s easy on the eyes!” They giggled and stepped through a doorway that led to the dining room.
I carried on down the hall.
The conversation struck me as peculiar, but I didn’t put it past Bringham to have lengthy, self-inflated conversations with himself in a mirror. That seemed exactly his idea of a good time.
My mind drifted to conversations through a mirror of a different nature. Glancing up at the horrid paintings, I ground my teeth. I really should have told him where I’d gone.
Too wrapped up in my thoughts, I stifled a gasp, pulling up short just before slamming into King Bringham himself as he rushed toward the dining room.
An amateur mistake—to not look where you were going. Maybe I’d lost my touch with this. I ruthlessly teased Fen about his being rusty. I had no excuse.
Bringham stopped abruptly and stared through me. I glanced over my shoulder and found another gruesome painting. It depicted Phynnic soldiers pushing Source-wielders off the cliff at the Plateau.
The King’s eyes were bloodshot, and dark circles had grown below them; a thin, bloodied bandage covered his cheek. His brow pinched as though he sensed something amiss.
I slowly backed away, but my boot squeaked, drawing his attention to where a puddle collected around me.
“Who is there?” he shouted, stepping into my space. Fuck.
He reached out, intent on grabbing me.
After spinning on my heel, I ran down the hall.
“Guards! There is someone here!”
The thud of falling boots rounded the corner. I dodged the three men, racing for the bailey where my prints would not betray me.
“Where, sir?” they called out, seeming skeptical. “We see nothing.”
“There, there!” the King shouted as I pushed open the door. Only then did I hear their footsteps quicken behind me, the guards believing their King’s cry.
I blew the whistle, and for seconds that felt like hours, I heard no wings beating the air.
Please don’t be frolicking in the roses, menace, I prayed.
This could not be my last adventure… That note had not been an adequate goodbye.
Finally, a Griffith cry sounded above me as Mayra swooped down.
Guards at the gate charged with spears.
If she landed there, the guards would take her down. “Stay!” I shouted.
Think. Think. Think.
Before Mayra’s talons could touch the ground, I leapt and willed the wind to carry me. It worked just enough to get my torso up over the saddle.
“Go, menace, fly!” I commanded, precariously holding on to whatever saddle straps I could reach.
We narrowly avoided the arrows that showered us from the ground before taking cover in the clouds.