The nightmare started as it always did, with Kell standing in the middle of a public place—sometimes the Stone’s Throw, or the statue garden in front of the Danes’ fortress, or the London Sanctuary—at once surrounded and alone.
Tonight, he was in the middle of the Night Market.
It was crowded, more crowded than Kell had ever seen it, the people pressed shoulder to shoulder along the riverbank. He thought he saw Rhy at the other end, but by the time he called his brother’s name, the prince had vanished into the crowd.
Nearby he glimpsed a girl with dark hair cut short along her jaw, and called out—“Lila?”—but as soon as he took a step toward her, the crowd rippled and swallowed her again. Everyone was familiar, and everyone was a stranger in the shifting mass of bodies.
And then a shock of white hair caught his eye, the pale figure of Athos Dane sliding like a serpent through the crowd. Kell growled and reached for his knife, only to be interrupted by cold fingers closing over his.
“Flower boy,” cooed a voice in his ear, and he spun to find Astrid, covered in cracks as if someone had pieced her shattered body back together. Kell staggered back, but the crowd was getting even thicker now, and someone shoved him from behind. By the time he regained his balance, both the Danes were gone.
Rhy flickered again in the distance. He was looking around as if searching for someone, mouthing a word, a name Kell couldn’t hear.
Another stranger bumped into Kell hard. “Sorry,” he murmured. “Sorry …” But the words echoed and the people kept pushing past him as if they didn’t see him, as if he wasn’t there. And then, as soon as he thought it, everybody stopped midstride and every face turned toward him, features resolving into gruesome masks of anger and fear and disgust.
“I’m sorry,” he said again, holding up his hands, only to see his veins turning black.
“No,” he whispered, as the magic traced lines up his arms. “No, please, no.” He could feel the darkness humming in his blood as it spread. The crowd began to move again, but instead of walking away, they were all coming toward him. “Get back,” he said, and when they didn’t he tried to run, only to discover that his legs wouldn’t move.
“Too late,” came Holland’s voice from nowhere. Everywhere. “Once you let it in, you’ve already lost.”
The magic forced its way through him with every beat of his heart. Kell tried to fight it back, but it was in his head now, whispering in Vitari’s voice.
Let me in.
Pain shot jaggedly through Kell’s chest as the darkness hit his heart, and in the distance, Rhy collapsed.
“No!” Kell shouted, reaching toward his brother, uselessly, desperately, but as his hand brushed the nearest person, the darkness leaped like fire from his fingers to the man’s chest. He shuddered, and then collapsed, crumbling to ash as his body struck the street stones. Before he hit the ground, the people on either side of him began to fall as well, death rippling in a wave through the crowd, silently consuming everyone. Beyond them, the buildings began to crumble too, and the bridges, and the palace, until Kell was standing alone in an empty world.
And then in the silence, he heard a sound: not a sob, or a scream, but a laugh.
And it took him a moment to recognize the voice.
It was his.
*
Kell gasped, lurching forward out of sleep.
Light was filtering through the patio doors, glinting off a fresh dusting of snow. The shards of sun made him cringe and look away as he pressed his palm to his chest and waited for his heart to slow.
He’d fallen asleep in his chair, fully clothed, his skull aching from his brother’s indulgences.
“Dammit, Rhy,” he muttered, pushing himself to his feet. His head was pounding, a sound matched by whatever was going on outside his window. The blows he—well, Rhy—had sustained the night before were a memory, but the aftereffect of the drinks was compounding, and Kell decided then and there that he vastly preferred the sharp, short pain of a wound to the dull, protracted ache of a hangover. He felt like death, and as he splashed cold water on his face and throat and got dressed, he could only hope that the prince felt worse.
Outside his door, a stiff-looking man with greying temples stood watch. Kell winced. He always hoped for Hastra. Instead he usually got Staff. The one who hated him.
“Morning,” said Kell, walking past.