“After what happened with Daniel I think we can afford some caution.” Lavender frowned. She was scared.
I yawned. We’d been debating for hours. Alistair had gone to check our perimeter, Willow returned to Carrandell to check the city for any sign of Roan, or any of them, and Ethan wouldn’t let the damn issue sit. He brought up the same question again and again like a drunk man asking for directions, and I’d run out of patience.
Ethan opened his mouth and I held a hand up. “Before you start off again I’m going to get some sleep while I can. We’re not getting anywhere and the next few days are going to be dreadful if this proves to be something worth listening to.”
I bid them all goodnight and walked from the room. I wasn’t tired; not even remotely. Yet, the way my locket throbbed around my neck and weighed me forward made it clear I wouldn’t be getting a peaceful sleep. If it was going to happen I needed to see if my dreams had anything useful to show me. Slowly, so slowly, I took a breath in and loosed it, then walked back to my room for whatever awaited me.
ROAN HELD ME in his arms, though not in a way I liked. His arms criss-crossed over my chest and pressed my back into his front. He held me to the spot as Ethan picked himself off the floor. In the background a large cat-like creature snapped and snarled at several blood-eyed Berserkers while they stuck their claws in him.
“Remind me to put that on a note when I send your ashes to your brother,” Ethan said cockily. There was a sharp THUD as Ric landed a deadly blow on one of them circling him. The Berserker screamed and returned the favour by sinking her teeth into Ric’s shoulder.
“Remember, boy-” I turned to face Daniel as he sidled towards him. “This isn’t my first slaughter.”
Both of them pulled back their lips and snarled, flashing dangerous teeth at one another. All sound seemed to fade, like my hearing had been lost as I struggled against Roan’s strong grip. The pair of them moved further and further away, destroying the terrain as they went and eventually I managed to free myself and chase after them.
The forest around me was alive with creatures tearing into one another. A knife flew in front of me and I pulled back, dodging it with ease. I threw myself out of the path of a crazed Berserker, stopping forcefully to drive my dagger into its neck. No matter how fast I ran Ethan and Daniel moved further and further away.
Eventually I ripped through the branching treeline and saw them cleaving into each other like animals. My hearing peaked and sound began to trickle in. The growls and sound of claws meeting flesh was sickening, and I looked on in horror as Daniel scooped up a fistful of dirt. He threw it in Ethan’s eyes and knocked him unconscious. As Ethan lay there, Daniel drew back his hand like a spear and before I could scream out a warning he drove it into Ethan’s chest, tearing through his heart.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
ROAN’S WARNING WAS still dancing around our minds as the deadline for the ambush had come and gone. Two or three days, he’d said. We were sitting on the afternoon of the fourth and wondering if it had just been another mind game, a play on us while they used the tunnel below Carrandell to steal soldiers for their army. I shuddered and hoped not, otherwise not telling the others about the passage was the stupidest thing I’d ever done.
In that time I’d made sure to keep my distance from Ethan, though he seemed not to mind it since I’d lost my temper and yelled at him. Maybe that wasn’t entirely it. There was something that crushed me every time I saw him. I knew I’d dreamt of him a few nights back but what had it been about?
I groaned and shoved an old, dusty book aside. It had just been busy work. While the others came up with strategies and potential weaknesses in our defences I was left alone, and since I was banned from the planning room I had to make trouble elsewhere.
Enter: the library.
I’d spent more time than I realised on organising the place, categorising and cleaning the shelves and sorting the books properly, and I hadn’t even gotten through half of it. Despite my desperation for distraction I’d also been scouring the books for information on Demon history – on anything that could give me an idea as to what my birth parents were like and what kind of House ours was. Were the people friendly? Were the staff treated fairly? A few books were written in the ancient language, though it took me a few pages to realise it. If it was as Ethan said before, and modern Demons couldn’t understand it, it meant that I was one of the few who could. That in itself was a fairly clear telling of my origin; that, or I’d somehow managed to pick up a language I’d never seen or heard of before on a whim. Unlikely.
I placed the crumbling products to one side and picked up another. It was bound in hard, brown leather embellished with gold lettering as the front read-
“The Witches of Monterreny Moore,” I smiled. “What are the odds?”
I read the fairy-tale over and over again, absorbing the comfort the words gave me. I remembered Mother’s smell, her smile, her energy, but I couldn’t remember her voice. In fact, in the time since I’d seen him last I could barely remember Father’s voice. Would he remember mine? Would he have returned home at all?
“Here you are.” I jumped as Ric’s voice echoed in the room. “We should have guessed you’d be up here.” I smiled until I saw Ethan walking up behind him and instead stuck my nose back into the book. Ric looked behind him and rolled his eyes, groaning. “Really? We’re going to do this again? You realise we could all die any day now…”
“In a fight that isn’t going to happen,” Ethan sneered.
“Five silvers says you’re wrong,” I spoke over the pages of my book.
“You want to bet on our deaths?” He took a step forward.
“No, I want to bet on whether I’m right and you’re wrong,” I said, putting the book down.
He smirked. “Fine, you’re on.”
“What are you reading?” Ric asked, cutting through our line of sight.
I opened the book out further. Of course it was all just gibberish to him. “My mother – my Gnathian mother – always thought it was bizarre that I chose this as my favourite night-time story over the ones about princesses. I must have been odd from the start.” I pulled my hands through my hair, unable to shift the knot of worry that clumped in my stomach. “I’m starting to think I’m more of a bloody omen than a Demon-Gnathian-Noble.”