“Does it have to be a blade?” he asked. “Do you have a needle? Maybe we could just drag a needle through the outline, mar the edges a bit …”
It was Gemma’s turn to burst into laughter. “Oh, sure … let me just dig through my sewing basket, here …” She withdrew a stiletto blade, a garrote and a vial of near-toxic sleeping powder from her waist pouch. “Hmm.” She grinned broadly. “I’m afraid I left all my good embroidery at home.” She shoved the tools of her trade back into her pouch. “There’s not much I know how to do that isn’t at the back end of a weapon. But I’d be happy to do the cutting, if you’d rather not.”
He shook his head. Gemma was impressed that he hadn’t balked at her little display.
“If it’s going to cause him pain, then let it be me.” He drew a dagger from his waist and tested the blade along his thumb. “Thank you, though.”
When his eyes met hers, she ignored his tears. She’d let him have his silly Above masculinity.
She put her knees atop Tollan’s shoulders in an awkward position, the king’s head cupped between her thighs. But by putting her weight on his shoulders she could keep his upper body mostly immobile, despite the muscle tremors that continued to rack his frame.
Wince sat astride Tollan’s ass, holding his lower half still. “How deep, do you think?” he asked.
“I don’t know. A quarter of an inch, maybe? Not so deep that you cut through muscle but all the way through the mark.”
He nodded, holding his blade over the center of Tollan’s back. “I’m going to cut through the middle of this line, here,” he said, gesturing with the tip of his blade, “and then maybe cut through the outside circle, just in case.”
She nodded, trying to reassure him.
His breath gushed out of him, and then, not wasting any more time, he sliced through the center of the mark.
Tollan’s skin separated and Gemma felt the tingling that accompanied mage work, but instead of blood seeping from the broken skin, light erupted.
The last thing Gemma remembered was the floor shaking beneath her.
There was pain, somewhere distant. There was warmth and light and something was tugging at his mind, but Tollan clung to the darkness, to the freedom of dreams that kept him afloat.
Waves tipped the ship gently as a light breeze tugged at Tollan’s hair. He closed his eyes to the bright sun reflecting off the Hadriak Sea. He was alone in the place that made him happiest—on the deck of a ship. Free from the politics and pressures of home. Free to think thoughts that back home were forbidden and shameful. He stood straighter here on the boat, relieved of the usual weight on his shoulders.
Footsteps approached, and he opened his eyes. The captain was older than he remembered—wisps of silver touched her temples and made the black of her hair stand out all the more. She wore a cheaply carved talisman on a leather thong near her heart.
“Mother,” he whispered.
“Get to work on those lines, sailor,” she groused as she moved past him, checking knots and shouting orders to the men and women who bustled about the ship.
The salt air turned to ash in his lungs. She’d forgotten her own son. He meant nothing to Isbit Daghan, former Queen of Above and wife of Abram, his father.
The weight of stone and water pressed upon him, and he clawed for the surface. Dream turned to memory.
The seas began to heave. A man was in the water clinging to a piece of flotsam. He wore a carved wooden talisman at his neck, like the one Isbit wore. Deep in the corners of his mind, Tollan felt the overwhelming urge to let him drown.
There was pain. A fire in his chest. The blackness pulled him back under.
Time passed and the sailor woke. Tollan steeled himself to the pounding in his chest. He was nearly a man, and he was brave enough to speak to the sailor who watched Tollan’s mother with a gaze that made Tollan’s belly twist. He stood tall and announced in a quavering voice, “I am Tollan.” He took a step forward and held out his hand in formal greeting. “Crown Prince of Yigris and heir to the throne. Son of Abram Daghan and Isbit, his wife.” His chest swelled at his official-sounding introduction. He almost wished his father could have seen him.
The sailor’s eyes darted back toward Tollan’s mother who slept in a chair, unwilling to leave the nearly drowned sailor’s side, then back to Tollan. “Are you really?” he asked. He sniffed, ran a hand over his forehead and through his greasy hair, then stuck out his hand to accept Tollan’s. “It’s good to meet you, Prince Tollan. I’m Jamis. Captain of the now defunct Siren’s Call and the luckiest man in the Four Winds.”
Tollan nodded. “I’m sorry about your ship.”
Again, the sailor’s gaze flicked to Tollan’s mother, then back again. “Well, Your Highness. That makes one of us.”
Then the waves tossed and turned again, time passed and Tollan stood before his father’s desk. His hands grew clammy with fear as he clutched the letter that his mother had written. Her goodbye echoing in his ears so loudly that he couldn’t understand why the king didn’t look up.
“You’re back, then?” King Abram grumbled, his gaze never rising from the papers before him.
“Mother sent this.” Tollan pushed the envelope across the desk and fled.
Tollan could still hear the crystal shattering within his father’s rooms. He was falling. He could no longer be sure if he even had a body. Memories and dreams tangled him, the lines snapped at him, dragging him under. He gasped for air and found nothing but salt and storm.
He was back on the Hadriak. The sky was black as pitch, and the ship began to come apart on the wind. Bits of wood and crimson sail, hemp rope and tar, flaked off into the air around him. The once grand sloop disappeared, and in its place was the throne room of the Yigrisian Palace.
Tollan sat on the throne, his hands and feet manacled to it with gold chains. Beside him sat his brother, also bound. Iven looked back at him with their mother’s eyes.
CHAPTER SEVEN
UNDER
Tollan opened his eyes. The ground trembled beneath him, and for an instant he prayed for death. He didn’t know where he was. The flame of a candle fluttered nearby, casting eerie shadows. He rolled over and saw a large chunk of stone crash to the ground just a few feet away. The roots of some sort of plant pushed their way into the tunnel and continued to grow, winding along the ceiling and then down the wall like a vine. In the distance, Tollan could hear more stones falling. “Aegos!” he shouted, leaping to his feet.
He remembered. He was in Under—wearing pants and boots that were not his own. He picked up the candle and searched his surroundings for something familiar. “Aw, prick,” he snapped and dove toward the prone figure of Wince, who was sprawled on the floor nearby, a knife clutched in his hand.
“Wince, wake up!” he shouted, slapping his friend’s face and shaking him. “Come on, mate.”
The cavern continued to tremble and shake, and a fist-size piece of stone fell from the ceiling and smashed to bits a foot from Wince’s head. Tendrils of thorny branches unfurled all around them.
“Come on, Wince, you mother-prickling half-wit!” He slapped his friend as hard as he could and prayed to Aegos.
Wince’s eyes flew open. “What? Oh, shit. Shit!” He scrambled to his feet. “Toll? Oh, goddess. Tollan, is that you?”
Tollan grabbed hold of Wince’s face. “It’s me. What’s wrong with you?”
“I can’t see, Toll, I-” Another tremor shook the cavern and Wince screamed. “What is happening? What is that sound?”
“I don’t know,” he said, grabbing his friend by the arm, “but we’ve got to get out of here.”
“Right. All right.” Wince took a step and stumbled over a small pile of stones. “I’m … all right,” he said, trying to regain his footing. “Where’s Gemma? Gemma?” he called out.
Tollan finally spotted her twenty feet away, crumpled awkwardly against the wall.