IN THE HOUR FOLLOWING MY FORCED RETURN TO my room, I lie splayed out in a near-paralyzed state on the floor where the Mortisfaire tossed me. My attempts to yell through the wall to Rasha get me nowhere. Either she’s ignoring me or the water pipes are flowing too loud because there is no reply, and after a while I give up and focus on breathing through the heaviness in my lungs. And the awareness that even if I could move enough to get around the wraiths to reach Rasha and Myles, we’d still have to find Lady Isobel and Draewulf.
And then what?
I close my eyes and curse myself for not focusing my ability more when I had Isobel in hand.
Eventually the breathing eases, bringing relief that whatever injury she did to my heart and veins is waning. The aching following it keeps me near doubled up the rest of the night though. As does the utter fury that I have no idea how to prevent what’s about to come.
It’s almost dawn when another shuffle outside my door alerts me just before Bron soldiers bust it down. They drag me out to join Myles and Rasha, who’ve obviously been freshly pulled from their quarters as well, and proceed to confiscate our knives before shoving us down the hallway.
Sir Gowon leads the way with a stony expression and refuses to answer any of Rasha’s questions or Myles’s demands, while I glare straight ahead and feel my hatred pound through my chest. It’s like a drumbeat from one of the refrains the Faelen minstrels used to sing. Slow. Steady. Hammering in the thought that as much as I try to figure out what anything means anymore, the chill in my veins might as well be screaming that I don’t know.
Or maybe I don’t want to know.
“Are they bleeding jesting?” Myles grumbles as they force us through the doors leading to the giant loading area we landed on four days ago. It’s holding the same airship we flew in on. The balloon’s been reinflated. “Couldn’t they have waited until a less hellish hour? Especially since, from the looks of it, the wraiths have barely got their blasted army assembled.”
The guard closest to us doesn’t answer.
Rasha wraps her arm through mine. “How are you?”
“Fine.”
“Liar.”
Myles peers over at us. Clearly anything to do with one of us lying is of interest to him.
Five, six, seven steps I wait before dipping away from their stares. “Draewulf and Lady Isobel had the Mortisfaire bring me to them a few hours ago. They know about the power I consumed.”
They stop to look at me.
“He wanted Isobel to ‘assess’ me to see if I was ready.”
The Bron soldiers ram into us, shoving us forward—accidentally at first, then purposefully. “Keep moving,” the large one barks. His dark eyes flicker menacingly against his smooth black cheeks and short hair that’s trimmed clean. He lifts an arm cloaked in its red-and-black soldier’s sleeve, and for the first time I notice the number of medals sewn into the material. He points to the ship as Sir Gowon strides up beside him.
“You are not coming with us?” the large guard says to Gowon.
“My duty is here to protect our people, just as yours is to protect our king. We will meet again, my son.”
My brow goes up as the two men lock forearms briefly. Son? Then we’re moving forward.
“Are you certain?” Rasha is asking, and her voice has its airy tone.
“Lady Isobel was assessing to see if you were ready for what?” Myles says.
I peer away from Gowon and the guard and up at the lantern-lit airship as we stop at the loading plank. I can still feel Lady Isobel’s hand on my heart. Chilling it. Beginning to harden it. I rub over my chest where the ache is so raw.
“I’ve no idea, but it felt like a test.” My mind flicks back to Draewulf and the wraith’s conversation on the roof. “Is your vessel prepared?” the wraith had asked. “She performed as I said she would . . . Either way, it won’t be long.”
That word vessel keeps crawling beneath my skin, making me shiver. “I think he was assessing my abilities because he’s going to use me for something,” I whisper. “He said ‘she performed as expected.’ As if he was expecting it to . . . mature.”
Rasha flips around. “What?”
“That assumes they were talking about you.” Myles keeps his tone low and his gaze cool, but something in both tells me he’s suddenly worried too. It makes me want to argue with him. But I don’t say anything because the very thought that Draewulf could’ve known, could’ve been waiting for this thing in me to alter somehow, makes my blood curdle. Because it begs a new harrowing question:
What if “ready” meant I’d reached a point where he knew I could no longer stop him?
“It’s not just that.” I study Myles. “You heard him on the roof. They asked if his vessel was ready.”
“But how could he have known you’d go after the new abilities?” Rasha says.