Chapter 22
VANN
Flae Sprig was much younger than I had anticipated. When I mentioned Mrath’s name, he immediately took me to a back room and showed me options for a costume. It took several days for him to finish, and I paid him well.
The time gave me an opportunity to scout. The palace was well guarded, but not enough to stop my investigation. I don’t know where Arlet’s rooms are, but I have a good orientation of where the throne room is.
I leave my things in a hiding place I found near the palace gardens. Among my clothes and rations, there are two romance scrolls and a soft, warm dress Arlet can use while flying back to the mountains.
The night of the masquerade, it was easy for me to enter with a crudely forged courtier sigil, mixed in with the hordes of courtiers coming from every corner of the Elven Dominion.
I need to find Arlet and get her out before Mrath moves against Arion. In my last correspondence with Liana, she had said there was a skirmish near the enclave, and Mrath is keen for vengeance.
Patting my pocket, I feel the seed I’d been given, along with the speaking stones. It should be at least a day or two before the sisterhood arrives.
The inside of the palace is elaborately decorated, mirroring the decorations I’d passed in the streets. I’ve only just barely arrived at the ball when I was stopped in my tracks.
Rooted to the spot.
Arlet dances with lord after lord, dressed as a doe. Seeing her for the first time in weeks is a shock and a comfort all at once. My heart pounds, overwhelmed. She is so beautiful…
And frail.
I watch two men brush across the dance floor with her. She looks different. The light and warmth that used to glow within her are cold.
My fingers twitch. Everything that I loved about her seems dull and masked under a wash of decorum. When I see her, my Fuegorra burns painfully under my glamour, and I am frozen in place by the song.
The same one I had heard when they replaced my heart. Perhaps even the same she had heard on the witches’ isle.
While she is dancing, despite being close to me, she does not see me.
She doesn’t even hear the song of the Fuegorra. Our mating song. How? How can she be near me and not hear, not even look? Is something wrong?
That’s when the light shines on her more fully, and I see her gaunt face and pronounced collarbones.
Has she been eating?
I hadn’t planned on talking to her. I didn’t want to approach her. But seeing that…I can’t hold myself back.
The king has already left her side by this point. A part of me considers killing him on the spot and saving Mrath the trouble of doing it, but a deeper part of me knows that I can only choose one thing.
Violence against Arion, or time with Arlet.
The choice is easy from that point. I step into the line of lords waiting for their turn to dance with her. That’s when I see Thorne for thefirst time.
Once again, I see red. But I can’t ruin my chances. I can exact revenge later.
Right now, I just need Arlet.
The next few minutes blur together. I can’t remember what I say—all I know is that she is here, and she is in my arms. I can take her away now.
Everything will be…fine.
And that’s when the first explosion hits like thunder inside a bell.
Shards of glass rain through the vaulted ceiling, scattering light across the marble like a second sky falling. The scent of blood and smoke hits a beat later.
She is thrown away from me. I claw toward her, trying to reach her before the lights come back on fully.