The adatrox went still, his gaze blank and unseeing as he bled out on the floor. Whatever darkness had touched his eyes, it was now gone. Or maybe had never been there at all?
She turned and raced after Simon, following the sound of metal on metal down a wide hallway lined with embroidered drapes. She found him in a softly lit bathing room that smelled of jasmine and roses. Three adatrox surrounded him.
She took care of one by opening his throat, then evaded the fists of another before sweeping his feet out from under him and kicking him in the head with the heel of her beaded sandal. A girl fled past her and the bleeding adatrox, then out the door, clutching a shawl to her chest and leaving a trail of red footprints behind her.
Across the room, Simon struggled with another adatrox. A group of girls was backed into the far corner, trapped with her and Simon between them and escape. One of them let out a sharp sob.
Eliana scanned the frightened face of each girl. Which was the one Simon needed to retrieve? And why? What use was a concubine to the second-highest ranking member of Red Crown?
Eliana felt the adatrox in the doorway behind her before she saw him, barely turned in time to dodge his sword. She slipped in a pool of water on the floor and went down hard, banging her knee.
Before Eliana could regain her balance, the adatrox swung his sword in her direction once more—only to stumble back as a string of sapphires and diamonds landed around his neck. The person behind him pulled on the necklace, hard, and the adatrox dropped his sword to claw at his throat, gagging.
Eliana picked up his sword and ran it through his heart. He collapsed.
She looked up and met the gaze of a girl holding the necklace, at the end of which dangled an enormous opal. The girl’s skin was a warm brown, her hair black, her eyes a pale hazel. Though she wore nothing but a blood-spattered sheer blue slip and dark-gold maidensmarks on her wrists, she had the bearing of a queen.
“You’re welcome,” the girl said, breathless.
Simon stormed over. “Good, you’ve met.” He took the girl by the arm and moved toward the door. “This way.”
Eliana sheathed Arabeth and followed them.
“My name is Navi,” the girl said, smiling back at Eliana as Simon hurried her out of the room.
But Eliana did not reply, for when she glanced back at the open windows of the bathing room, she saw a figure drop down from the roof to land on the terrace outside.
Tall and thin, with creamy, pale skin and fair hair tied back in one long braid, dressed all in black save for a bloodred dress cloak that swept the ground:
Rahzavel.
11
Rielle
“Of Aryava’s prophecy, there are many interpretations. Some dismiss his dying words as the nonsense ramblings of a great angelic mind gone to ruin. But all scholars do agree on this: despite the war dividing their people, the blood of both humans and angels that stained their hands, the angel Aryava loved Saint Katell the sunspinner—and that love saved us all.”
—“A Discourse on the Prophecy of Aryava”
As translated by Grand Magister Isabeau Bazinet of the Holdfast
Transcribed on October 6, Year 12 of the Second Age
After two hours, the king declared a recess, and Rielle’s guards escorted her into one of the hall’s antechambers.
She sank into the first chair she saw, so tired she felt ill. The councils had attacked her with questions—what it felt like to manipulate so many elements at once, and all with the same body. If singing the wind felt different than controlling fire or shaking the earth, or was it all the same to her?
What sort of lessons had Tal given her over the years?
Oh, he had tried to kill her, on occasion, to test her restraint?
How had he done that, and how many times?
How had she fought the instinctive desire to save herself? What a marvelous testament to her control. And where, they asked, had that control been, out on the racecourse?
They had let her sit for at least some of the questioning, but she still felt as exhausted as if she had ridden the entire Chase all over again. Twice.
Just as her eyes started drifting shut, the doors flew open, and Audric entered the room.
“Leave us,” he told the guards.
The guards did not move. There was a beat of silence in which everything hung suspended.
“I think if Lady Rielle wanted to kill me,” Audric snapped, “she would have done it years ago. Leave us.”
The guards left at once.
Rielle was now entirely awake. She stood, her heart thundering. Where to even begin with him?
“Audric,” she said, her voice coming out frayed, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”
“I understand why you didn’t. God, Rielle, I… Please, don’t apologize. Are you all right?”
She let out a soft huff of laughter. “Not entirely.”
Audric came to her, cradled her hands in his. His thumb brushed against her wrist like a kiss. “I cannot forgive them for doing this to you.”
Every gentle press of his fingers made Rielle’s stomach twist. “Father and Tal?”
“They should be ashamed of their cowardice.”
“Well, I’m sure Tal is, anyway.”
“Good.”
“They thought they were doing what was best.”
Audric frowned. “For the kingdom.”
“Of course.”
“And for you?”
She hesitated. How many times had she asked this question of her father, only to be shamed into silence? “My happiness is unimportant compared to the safety of those around me.”
“Unimportant!” Audric released her, dragging a hand through his dark curls. “That’s what they’ve been telling you all these years.”
Suddenly the air around them felt charged; Rielle’s fingers prickled from the nearness of magic. The air bloomed with heat. Rielle caught the slightly singed scent of sunspinner magic—a blazing noon sky, a hot summer’s day. Audric’s eyes snapped to hers before he turned away, his shoulders high and tense. He moved to the window, placed his palm against the sun-warmed glass.
When he looked back to her, his face was not quite so furious, and the air had calmed.
“Your happiness is important, Rielle,” he said softly. “And I’m sorry I didn’t see what was happening this entire time, right before my eyes. If I’d known, I would never have let them…”
He trailed off, his jaw clenched. She wanted so badly to touch him.
“I know,” she told him instead.
“You were marvelous out there, during the race. I’ve never seen that kind of power. Rielle, it was beautiful.”
She could not help but flush with pleasure, despite everything. “They were going to kill you. I couldn’t let that happen.”
He raised an eyebrow. “And I cannot take care of myself?”
“You can, and you did. But—” She fell silent, swallowing her voice.
But if you had died, I couldn’t have borne it.
If you had died, I don’t know what would have happened next. What I would have done to avenge you.
Audric cleared his throat. He seemed to choose his words carefully. “When I saw you riding toward me, I didn’t know that the blood was from your horse. I thought it was yours. You were covered in it, and I thought…” He walked toward her, his gaze lingering on her face, and then looked away.
His presence was like a touch hovering just above her skin. Rielle wanted desperately to lean into it. Bask in it. Claim it.
“You could say thank you,” she finally managed to say. “At the very least.”
“If you promise you won’t terrify me like that again. Or at least give me warning so I can prepare myself.”
“Of course,” she agreed, “if you warn me the next time you plan on getting yourself attacked by assassins.”
He grinned at her. “We did fight well together. I wouldn’t mind doing it again.” Then his expression softened. “Thank you, Rielle.”
She hoped he could not read her face. “What happens now?”
“That’s what I’ve come to tell you,” Audric began, and then the door opened, admitting Ludivine and the guards.
“Did you tell her?” she asked, looking troubled.
“What is it?” Rielle said. “What have they decided?”