“Should someone stay with them?” asked the rebel who’d lit the fire.
“I can.” Aleksander raised a hand. “I’ll be using Arla to continue to patrol the area while the rest of you search the homes and businesses she couldn’t get into. But I’ll hear if they need anything.”
If any one of us deserved a rest, he did. His white hawk had been patrolling the area for over a day. During that time, Aleksander had stayed awake to relay what Arla saw. Then he’d ridden here through the night to help. I thanked him as we left the home, and entered the street once more.
It took little effort to force our way into a home and less time to find the family who had lived there, all sharing a bed, likely for heat, embers burning in the hearth. All dead.
Though I’d known to expect this, my throat tightened as I took them in. “Do you think they died last night?”
“The fire suggests yes,” Vale replied.
“If only we’d moved faster.”
“We came as quickly as we could. Should we search for the Scepter?”
Thyra and I had told others about our secondary quest, and people were supposed to be keeping an eye open for the Scepter.
I shook my head. “This home is too bare; the family was probably poor. I cannot believe that it would be here when someone could easily sell it and improve their lot.”
Vale held out a gloved hand. “Come to the next one. There might still be survivors.”
I held out hope as we searched five more homes, noneof which housed a single breathing inhabitant. Nor any sign of the Ice Scepter.
We walked past the inn where we’d stayed, and my eyes began to water. Itham, the bard who had played us a song, was sitting in a chair outside, his instrument in hand. He almost looked at peace. Like he’d known death was coming, and he’d exited the tavern to play a tune for the town. Vale took my hand.
“He didn’t deserve this. None of them did.”
We said nothing more as we approached the coinary. Nearly there, Luccan joined us, also pale-faced and somber. He didn’t have to speak for me to know that he had found only corpses too.
The door to the coinary hung open, a bad omen if there ever was one. Inside, there was no sound of coin being passed from hand to hand. No scratching of quills on parchment. No padding of leprechaun feet across the floor.
And as we strode deeper inside, my hope dimmed further. Two leprechauns had frozen at their desks. Were there more below?
Venturing deeper into the coinary gave us all pause. What if we triggered alarms? We had no intention of robbing vaults here, but there could be spells in place that only leprechauns could disable. Without one to guide us, we didn’t know.
Rubbing my hands up and down my arms, and ever so thankful for the many warm layers I wore, we approached the door that led down into the vaults. We took the stairs slowly in case monsters had been released. When we reached the bottomwe found that the vaults in this coinary were very plain—there was no goldwork on the doors or ogres on guard. Additionally, all of the vaults had been placed off of one main, circular room.
Laying between the vault doors were leprechauns who had taken refuge from the cold. When my gaze fell upon one, Coinmaster Hyknas, my throat tightened. She’d been the very leprechaun to help us here, and she looked stiff and blue. It took only a brief assessment for us to know that they were all dead.
Swallowing down my sorrow, I pulled my gaze up to the vaults, seven in total. “The Scepter might be in one of these.”
Vale nodded. “If that’s the case, we’re out of luck. You need a leprechaun and the blood of the vault owner to open them.”
“We can’t know today, but if we don’t find it, we can try to get our hands on coinary records for vaults later,” Luccan added, his voice despondent.
“We’re racking up quite the criminal records,” Vale shook his head.
“Right,” I said, barely listening to them, and really just wanting to get out of this room. “Let’s see if the others have found anyone.”
Hearts heavy, we climbed the steps. We’d no sooner stepped out into the brilliant sunshine than someone called my name.
“Princess Neve! Prince Vale!” I twisted to find Freyia waving at us.
“Have you found people who need help?” I asked,hoping it to be true. Maybe a large group of neighbors had banded together, and against all odds, lived?
“Afraid not. No one has located a living soul. Thyra has foundsomethingodd, though. She wishes to have your opinion.”
“Show us the way.”
