She shivered, rubbing her arms against the cold. She asked the attendants for a thicker coat, but they told her not to worry. It was time to leave. One took her arm and led her away from her home. She looked back one last time.
Her father watched her go, his expression hard. Eyes hollow.
Fi lifted back to consciousness as hands hooked beneath her arms, hauling her into a sitting position. Her head throbbed like a vicious hangover. Vaguely, she recalled hitting a wall, stone striking her skull. She shivered. No coat. Snow at her feet.
Someone pressed a hot mug to her lips. She drank, too eager. The tea scalded her tongue and sank like fire down her throat.
Even awake, the nightmare teetered at the edge of her thoughts.
She was twenty-two. She’d agreed to this years ago, long enough that she should have been prepared. Enough to follow willingly. She’d be given a tea, the attendants told her. When she drank, it would take all her worry away. It would take all the pain away.
Fi’s throat clenched when the numbing sensation registered, a cloying creep down the back of her throat. Twilight sorel. For daeyari sacrifices. She spat what remained in her mouth, butanother pair of hands held her still. Someone forced the cup to her lips.
“We’re sorry.” Milana’s voice, thin with fear. “It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. Please. We’re so sorry.”
Fi tried to curse, but her tongue was leaden. Too much tea swallowed already, and as her limbs weakened, Erik pulled her head back for Milana to open her mouth. The rest of the drink slid down like honeyed poison.
The attendants dressed her in silver robes and led her through a stone hall. When she hesitated, when her pace began to lag, they gripped her arms and urged her forward with saccharine smiles. Outside. Into the forest.
Milana and Erik hauled Fi to her feet, a limp weight between them as the twilight sorel sank into every muscle. Groggy, she registered the shadows of conifers. Night. The forest outside Thomaskweld. Her captors dragged her through the snow, arguing in hushed tones.
“This is madness,” Erik said.
“He requested a sacrifice,” Milana cut back. “You want to refuse himnow, of all times? She’s our best option. Ouronlyoption on such short notice.”
Fi’s heart tried to flutter, but even that was muted.
“Don’t be afraid,” the attendants told her. “It won’t hurt.”
She didn’t believe them. The cold already bit her cheeks. How could teeth be kinder?
The cold cut Fi now, sharp through the thin fabric of a long-sleeved shirt she didn’t recognize. More silver of a daeyari attendant, without the extravagant furs. She tried to curl her fingers, but they refused more than a twitch.
“We should be long gone,” Erik said. “Cut our losses.”
“That would look even more suspicious! We hold out a little longer. It’s almost finished.”
“Is it?We thought we knew the plan. Then that… creature appeared. Whatwasthat?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
The trees parted. A stone structure rose in the clearing, pillars lined by silver lanterns.
At the sight of Verne’s shrine, Fi’s courage fled. She wasn’t ready. She’d been a fool to agree to this. She dug her heels into the frozen ground, but the attendants gripped her harder.
“Don’t be afraid,” they said. Stern this time.
Fi rallied every muscle to fight, to bite and scratch her abductors, but the tea left her limp. Where was her cloak of bravado when she needed it? That cage of barbs she’d crafted to hide this brittle heart? Useless. Fionamara Kolbeck, bane of a dozen territories, barely able to focus on the skim of stone beneath her boots. Milana and Erik carried her onto a patio with a silver mat and satin pillows. Pine boughs arced overhead like a vaulted ceiling.
The attendants urged her on, reminding her of her pledge. They told her what a boon this would serve for her town. Didn’t she want to honor her family? But Fi fought back. She’d heard of hares throwing themselves against trees as they fled, rupturing their own hearts in panic. Hers didn’t feel far off from splitting.
“I changed my mind!” she shouted. “I don’t want to go!”
They laid Fi upon the mat. Milana worked gently, for a cold-hearted bitch, arranging Fi into a comfortable position, clearing the hair from her face.
“It won’t hurt,” she whispered.
Fi didn’t believe her.
