I lowered my head back down and the water slid into my ears. Another hour passed, and I rolled over and swam again. Paddling, paddling like a child or a mongrel.
Emotions rolled through me like short storms, swelling from anger to rage, breaking into a strange grief, and finally to a clear blue. Again and again, and in the silence, flash after flash reminded me of everything I had crawled and clawed and knifed my way through in two fortnights.
Rhiannon. The maze. Virellan Falls. The ancient Kingdom of the Plains. King Rhodric’s wild eyes under the acid rain. The dagger in my hand, a shard of blue smoke.
Most of all, Dorian. Dorian like a beautiful, cruel villain, those coal eyes dancing in front of me in the darkness. Dorian who’d saved me. Dorian who’d lied to me. Dorian who, even now, Ifeltsomewhere above me in the citadel. My body longed to be near his, but couldn’t be for a thousand reasons.
In the fourth—fifth—sixth?—hour, I went still in the water. My brow lowered. Was that something? Someone?
Not ten feet above me, Faun’s face had materialized like the faintest glowing orb from the darkness. She wasn’t more than fifty paces away, crosslegged on a ledge, hunched over something in her lap.
“Are you reading abook?”
Her face lifted. “Oh, you’re not dead.” She flipped the book shut with a clap. “And not blind. I thought I’d at least make it to the part where they kiss.”
I paddled toward her. “I need to ask you something.”
“No”—she rose with book in hand—“I don’t know where Dorian is. I don’t know where he’s gone, and I don’t know how long he’ll be gone.”
That wasn’t the question I was going to ask. But if I was honest with myself—which I so rarely managed—it was the question in my heart.
CHAPTER FOUR
Dorian
I leftEury and Faun at breakfast and rode from the stables on Rhiannon’s prized stallion under a gray sky. The horse was a Highmark Andalusian, trained to obey the slightest heel-press, to listen for a single click of the tongue. She had acquired him only a week before her death, ridden him just once. Now she was dust, and the horse didn’t know the difference; he obeyed my cues like he belonged to me.
The invitation from Highmark was a taunt—a dare.Come, little queen, the invitation said, beneath the looping script.Come and show me your tiny claws.
We only had weeks until the festival.
I rode hard and fast toward the kingdom’s center.
Deep forest swept by, the horse weaving with ease between trees as wide around as three of him standing nose to ass. Above, betweenthe branches, the tree villages blurred past—lantern light, the creak of rope bridges, a child's voice calling out. Perhaps the horse sensed my urgency, because when I let the reins out he pressed his head forward and straightened his neck into a full gallop.
Eurydice had no idea what she’d invited when she’d declared herself her own champion. She had even less idea how little time we had to obtain that dagger—or how crucial it was.
Her magic was fickle, uncertain. What she’d done in the meadow against Rhiannon was instinct. It might be months, years before she could consciously replicate what she did that night. In Feyreign, children were introduced to magic before they could walk, but years passed before they could reliably wield it.
Changelings learned faster. But not fast enough.
The Festival of the First Light waited on the other side of the green plains. Liora’s invitation had already arrived. It was a smart move; if I were the Dawnmaker, I would have done the same.
We rode for hours. I stopped the horse when he began to hack, and we rested by a pond. He drank deep, and I waited only until his breathing evened before I climbed on and rode again.
By midday we reached the outskirts of the autumn court. The canopy thinned, sunlight streaming through in thicker bands. Here at the forest’s edge the tree villages gave way to ground—proper villages of timber and thatch, smoke rising from chimneys, fae moving between market stalls. A few stopped to watch me pass. Soon the forest gave way entirely, and I rode through the plains under unbroken sun. Only a few trees grew out here, small and scraggly.
In the distance, the white pillar appeared like a terrible mirage, a straight chalky arrow into the sky. There lay the center of Feyreign—a stake the gods had set down to demarcate their territories.
I had hoped never to set eyes on it except in drawings.
The sun beat on my scalp, relentless and angry. We Sylvanwild fae were meant for shade; I lifted my hood and pulled the stallion back to a canter to save his energy.
As the day wore on, the pillar grew, fattened, yet it always seemed beyond reach. Until all at once it loomed so high, we rode in its shadow.
The world chilled. I lowered my hood.
Beneath me, the horse slowed to a walk, then a stop. I pressed my heels into his sides, but he wouldn’t move from the spot, tossing his head and whining a protest. And then the scents came to me—the copper tang of fresh blood and the stink of new death.