Hélène sighed.“Seb, you of all people know that jobs aren’t personal.It’s just money, right?Same reason you worked for Elias.Same reason Elias is trying to get his stupid scepter.We don’t have a choice if we want food to eat and a roof over our heads.”
Sebastian hesitated at that, his grip on his dagger loosening.Kieran felt his chest ache.Having grown up in such an affluent family, he barely knew how to wrap his head around the threat of poverty.Only recently had he known anything about struggling with money.But granted, he’d had Delilah and Briar’s support while they all tried their hands at living in that terrible apartment back in Gellingham.He hadn’t needed to support himself and his siblings as Sebastian did.He hadn’t had to sacrifice his morals just to put food on the table.
“What about you, Elias?”Sebastian asked, gaze sliding to his former employer.“You know what Verbena did to me when I tried to steal the scepter.What makes you think she won’t oppose you?”
“I’m not afraid of a geriatric witch who hasn’t taken a shower in at least a decade,” Elias said, sounding as if he was on the verge of laughing at such a question.“And I’ve already figured out how to subdue her.Once I’ve done that, I’ll use the scepter to take the vein’s magic and turn it into panaceas—ones that will be able to do more than just break a curse, mind you.These will betruepanaceas, able to cure any ailment that has befallen someone, magicalor medical.Do you have any idea how much people will pay for a cure-all?I’ll be richer than anyone else alive, including that scam artist Klaus Hammond.”
“At least my father has some semblance of a moral compass,” Delilah snapped.“All you care about is yourself.”
Elias scoffed.“Ah, so you’re the daughter he mentioned.Naturally, he’d find a way to be a thorn in my side without being here himself.Then again, I didn’t come to discuss Klaus.I came for the Crown.”His eyes traveled down to Kieran’s feet, where the sapphire-encrusted crown sat.“And I suspect you won’t be giving it up willingly.”
“Correct,” Briar snapped.
Kieran’s fingers had begun to itch as magic traveled from the well in his chest down his arms.On another day, he might have tried to reason with Elias.Try to talk through what their options were, see if they could reach some kind of agreement.But diplomacy went only so far when the man in front of him had preyed on the vulnerability of someone Kieran cared about.
Kieran reached down to the ground, snagging the Crown.“Try me.”
With that, he spun, punched out a fist, and launched a fireball straight at Elias.
Immediately, the room exploded into a cacophony.Mercenaries sprinted toward Kieran and his friends while Delilah and Briar stepped into ledrith stances.Delilah fired off an electric bolt at a mercenary while Briar summoned vines to encase another.Sebastian yanked Kieran sideways as Hélène fired off another crossbow bolt in his direction.It got close enough to slice Kieran’s temple, ahot bead of blood dripping down his jawline.Seaweed snarled and sprinted in Hélène’s direction, teeth bared.
As soon as Kieran was out of the way, Sebastian whipped around and launched a knife at Hélène.They jerked their crossbow sideways so the metal jammed into its wooden side.Without a second’s hesitation, they fired off three more shots at Kieran.Kieran was barely able to slide out of the way of two.A third one, though, sliced across his hand.His grip on the Crown went slack.
The Crown clattered to the ground as Kieran howled in agony.Hot pain shot up his nerves as if the wound had been dipped in boiling oil.Blood speckled the snow below him.He clutched the injured hand with the other, moaning as he squeezed his eyes shut.Pain clouded over every thought.
Especially as Hélène managed to fire off another shot straight into Kieran’s shoulder.
He cried out.Sebastian looked as if he was about to shatter his own jaw, so tightly were his teeth clenched.With a roar, he ran for Hélène.The other assassin spun, bobbing and weaving through the mercenaries.As they did, fangs snapped free from Sebastian’s gums and his fingers twisted into those spiderlike claws.
For the first time, Hélène looked horrified.Before they could speak, though, Seaweed sank her teeth into their leg, and they cried out in shock.Sebastian used the opening to pounce, attacking them with a swipe of his claws.
Kieran, meanwhile, had begun seeing double.Where Delilah and Briar had previously been fighting four mercenaries, suddenly there were eight, then sixteen.Kieran’s head swam, and a strange, numb feeling overtook him.He staggered sideways, trying tosummon magic.As he did, though, he found the well in his chest empty.It was strange—he hadn’t felt that kind of emptiness since his curse had all but hollowed him out from the inside.
“Kieran!”Delilah cried as she grabbed a mercenary’s wrist and sent an electric jolt up their arm.“What’s wrong?Are you—”
Kieran, however, didn’t hear the end of her sentence.His vision began to swim, and the world turned watercolor in front of him.All the fighting seemed to slow to a crawl.Sebastian had sliced his claws across Hélène’s chest as they trained their crossbow at him.Seaweed’s mouth was stained with their blood.Briar punched a man in the jaw as he went for Delilah, who was busy kicking away another one.Some mercenaries had fallen, though based on the rise and fall of their chests, they were simply knocked out instead of dead.
Finally, Kieran saw Elias smirking, standing back near the passageway he’d blown open.As Kieran’s vision began to close in at the corners, black swallowing the scene around him, the last thing he saw was the glint of those snowy white teeth beneath the aurora light.
Poison,Kieran realized as his last shred of focus went to the crossbow bolt in his hand.The bolts were dipped in poison.
His knees gave out, and he slipped into darkness.
Chapter Twenty-Four
In his dreams, Kieran was on a beach.
He might have believed it was real if not for the fact that there was something too watered down about the way the sunlight felt on his skin.The quiet rumble of the waves made it clear it was simply his brain trying to re-create something it was only half familiar with.The only beach he’d ever been to was in Kitfield, Delilah’s hometown, right after they’d visited to celebrate the end of her Calling.This one looked similar, with white sand that sat at the edge of a leafy forest, the trees verdant as if in mid-spring instead of the dead of winter.
Despite that, though, Kieran’s skin felt cold.He shivered even as the sun beat down on him from above.He felt feverish and dizzy, sweat making his hands and forehead clammy.
“Kieran,” someone called.“Over here!”
He did his best to shake off the nausea that was roiling in his guts.He put a hand up to block out the sun, squinting to see whohad called his name.Slowly, a figure came into focus.She was tall and lithe, with white-blond hair and dark-brown eyes, like Kieran’s own.She wore a loose sundress, and her smile was serene.Instantly, the ill feeling that had come over him vanished.
“Adelaide!”he called, eyes brightening at the sight of his relative.“Is that you?”
Adelaide Pelumbra stepped closer and swept Kieran into a hug, just as she’d done his entire childhood.For most of his formative years, Kieran had thought Adelaide was nothing but another employee of the family, splitting her time between cleaning duties and teaching some of the younger Pelumbras magic.She’d remained eternally youthful due to a geas—a combined curse and blessing—that had rendered her unable to speak.He’d only discovered that she was something like his great-aunt a couple generations removed when he’d been on Delilah’s Calling and they’d found a way to end her geas.Since then, Adelaide had been using her newfound voice to upend the Pelumbras as much as she could—revenge for the years they’d kept her silent.
