“What do you want me to do with it?”
“Toss it out. Whoever is doing this doesn’t know who they’re dealing with. The good witch who sits on that throne is more powerful than she lets on, and the dragon who sits beside her is no fool. They’ve won the hearts of the majority. Whoever is behind this would be wise to simmer down before they boil over and fizzle out.” He raised his brows and turned to stroll back to the bar.
Harlow glanced down at the paper. Frowning, she looked over both shoulders, folded the flyer, and put it in her pocket. She wanted to talk to her father about whether he knew anything about it and then share what she’d learned with Marius. He needed to know there was a group gunning for the throne.
Once the tables were cleaned and the last patron walked out the door, she said her goodbyes to Roosevelt and started for home. Night had fallen over Paragon. She smiled at the memory of watching the stars while Marius sent her soaring into them. Goddess, she couldn’t wait until he was over this bump. It was all she could do not to run toward the palace and beg to be in his arms again.
“There’s a lesson in the past. What’s happened before can happen again.” A stranger stepped from the shadows and waited in a patch of moonlight. The deep hood the person wore hid their face, but the voice was undeniably male. Not one she recognized. The hood inclined toward her pocket.
Eyes narrowing, Harlow remembered the flyer. We’ll find you, it had said.
“History is on our side,” the man beneath the hood said.
“Who are you?” Her voice held an edge that she hadn’t meant it to. She saw the moment the man went on the defensive. He backed up a step. “Wait!” She reached for him, her fingers digging into the cloak. “When are you meeting next? Where?”
He yanked his arm away from her. And then he was gone.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Raven wasn’t above asking for help, and when it came to obscure magic, the smartest wizard she knew was Nathaniel. The dragon had studied both human and dragon magic for longer than she’d been alive, and his mate was her sister, a powerful witch herself. Although Clarissa was finishing a project in Everfield, Nathaniel, thankfully, was able to give the problem his full attention.
With Charlie by her side, Raven showed him her model of the thirteen dimensions and explained about Brynhoff and Killian. “We think they’re stuck in a perpetual loop, fighting their way through dimension after dimension.”
Nathaniel gestured at the model. “Imprisoned in the underworld.”
Raven nodded. “Exactly. These levels are not where souls go to rest. Eleanor locked them into a purgatory meant to be temporary.”
“Mother kept them from moving on. It’s brilliant magic and also incredibly cruel. Her trademark. I presume you want to free them so they can rest.”
“The problem is that Brynhoff’s and Killian’s souls are bound to their hearts by magic. Those hearts were buried with Eleanor’s ritual room. Do you have a spell capable of retrieving them without bringing down the castle?”
Raven was distracted by Charlie hopping by her, pretending to be a rabbit. She usually didn’t allow her daughter in here, but the girl had been clingy today. For some reason, even Gabriel wasn’t enough to placate her. She didn’t feel well and wanted her mother. Raven didn’t have the heart to send her away. Besides, in the past when Charlie’d felt this way, she’d either experienced a growth spurt or some new magical ability. It was best to keep her close.
Nathaniel stared at her model of the thirteen underworld dimensions. He brought his pipe to his lips and lit up. The magic smoke circled his head, bending and twisting with his concentration. “I suppose you’ve tried a simple retrieval spell?”
“Multiple times. Multiple ways. The problem is a dragon’s heart is a jewel, and this mountain is full of jewels, each with a similar magical signature. Yes, these two have souls, but the mountain itself has a similar magical signature because of the presence of the goddess. It’s like trying to find two grains of rice buried somewhere on a beach full of sand.”
The palace magician straightened the lapels of his suit and took another puff on his pipe. Raven found it charming that Gabriel’s younger brother had returned to wearing human apparel. Once he’d retrieved his oreads from Mistwood Manor, he’d gone back to formal suits and ties. Although the look wasn’t popular in Paragon, it went with his personality. Besides, what court magician dressed like everyone else?
He blew out another puff of smoke, the tendrils bending in on themselves and flipping over in the air in front of him. With delight, Raven realized he was using the smoke to analyze the problem. The beauty of the twining tendrils made her smile. Charlie was enjoying it too, staring at the show as if he were bending balloon animals for her amusement.
“Together, we might be able to pinpoint the souls,” he said. “With enough power and the right symbols. The problem I see is retrieving them. It’s one thing to float a couple of objects across the room. An entirely different one to pull them through tons of solid rock.”
“Exactly.” Raven tugged at her long black braid. “We could locate them and then use a different spell to blast through the stone to physically get to them.”
He sighed. “Thought of that. If we do it, we’ll have to evacuate the palace. There’s the risk that we could cause a collapse or a landslide.”
She ran a hand through her hair. “Not a good time for that, Nathaniel.”
“There’s never a good time for this type of spell. But it may be the only way to get them back.”
“No. You don’t understand. The palace is warded against malevolence. It’s safe here, for all of us.” She glanced down at Charlie but thought of her sister Avery. The wards on the palace were keeping all of them safe.
“Surely we could find another, temporary location—”
“There’s a group called the New Order that has become a growing threat. We’ve received malicious messages at the gate. Enchanted messages that appear from thin air.”
“They have a witch working with them?”
