The shift in his tone is immediate and sobering, all trace of his usual theatrical nonsense vanishes like smoke. The change is dramatic enough to make Esme step away from me automatically, her spine straightening into the posture of someone preparing for a blow.
“The king’s been taken,” Rue says, voice dropping to barely above a whisper, as if speaking the words too loudly might make them more real. “The queen and General Erron ambushed him in his private study last night. I was there, cloaked and hidden, thank the gods, watching as she shackled him with magic-infused iron specifically designed to lock down his abilities. She was villain monologuing all over the place, really quite tiresome, but I knew I couldn’t be of any use to him if I got captured along with him. So, I had to fight my way free to get back here, to warn you.” He pauses, running a hand through his disheveled hair. “She’s declared herself regent, ruling in his stead until he officially renounces you as his heir. But I have a feeling this coup has been in the works for much longer than we realized. You, Esme, were just the convenient catalyst she needed.”
Esme sways on her feet, the color draining from her face so quickly I’m afraid she might collapse. Both Sam and I step forward instinctively, ready to catch her if she falls.
“I knew my father was planning something,” I say, anger building in my chest like a furnace. “He was acting too calm after what happened in the Great Hall, too composed. This explains everything.”
“It gets worse,” Rue continues grimly. “The queen’s already spread word throughout the realm that you’ve betrayed the court, Esme. The entire population is being told you’re a dangerous threat, a half-breed imposter who somehow seduced and captured our rightful king. Meanwhile, he’s being held prisoner in the very castle he should be ruling from. It’s brilliant, really, if you appreciate political maneuvering. Which I do, unfortunately.”
“They’ll come for you,” Sam adds quietly. “All of them. Every soldier, every loyal subject who believes the lies.”
“I have to go back,” Esme says, voice rising with the edge of panic that I’ve learned to recognize as dangerous. “I have to help him, he’s my father, and they’re using me to destroy him?—”
“No,” I say firmly, stepping between her and the door before she can do something catastrophically stupid. “Absolutely not.”
She looks at me with a mixture of betrayal and desperate determination that makes my heart clench, and all I want to do is pull her close and promise that everything will be fine. Unfortunately, I can’t make promises I’m not sure I can keep, and she needs truth more than comfort right now.
“You can’t help him like this,” Sam says gently, his voice carrying the wisdom of someone who’s learned hard lessons about the difference between bravery and suicide. “Not yet. Not without your full power.”
Rue nods emphatically. “He’s right, darling. She’s got everything now, power, position, soldiers, and magic-wieldingfae at her disposal. Plus, the entire damn realm wrapped around her lying finger, believing every word that comes out of her mouth. If you want to win this, if you want to save your father and reclaim your birthright, you need your magic back. All of it. Every last drop that the goddess took from you.”
Silence settles over the room like a heavy blanket as we give her time to process, to think through the implications and possibilities. She has me, Rue, and Sam, but we won’t be enough against the combined might of the queen’s forces and the realm’s belief in her lies. Not on our own. We need Esme at full strength, need her to become the weapon she was always meant to be.
Then Esme breathes in deep, squaring her shoulders with the kind of determination that speaks to something unbreakable in her core. “Then we go to the Plains of the Dead. We finish what we started.”
I nod, feeling something settle into place in my chest. “It won’t be easy now that we have both time and the entire realm against us, but we’ll get you there. Whatever it takes.”
Sam steps forward and grips her hand firmly. “Together. We do this together, or not at all.”
Rue sighs dramatically, but his expression is serious beneath the theatrics. “Of course, together, darlings. You need my beaming personality and quick wit in these trying times. Oh, and perhaps my extensive knowledge of palace security and secret passages.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Also, maybe a proper nap before we embark on our suicide mission. Beauty sleep is crucial for maintaining morale.”
I think we all roll our eyes at Rue’s antics, but he’s not wrong about the rest. Sleep is definitely in order before we embark on what very well might be the end of everything we know.
Outside, thunder rolls across the horizon like the footsteps of approaching gods, and lightning illuminates the rain-soakedstreets in stark, dramatic flashes. The storm is coming whether we’re ready or not.
My father and the queen want to wage war, because taking the king is exactly that, an act of war disguised as political necessity. They’ve drawn their lines and chosen their sides, thinking they can control the narrative and eliminate any threats to their power.
Well, we’ll be ready for them, but first we have to make it to the Plains of the Dead and survive what waits for us there before we tackle the final trial. It won’t be easy, nothing in this life ever is, especially not the things worth fighting for.
Together, I tell myself, watching Esme’s face in the lamplight as she prepares for whatever comes next. Together, we’ll be unstoppable. Together, we might just save the realm or die trying.
Either way, it beats following orders for a man I no longer believe in.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
ESME
We leave the Dog & Dagger while night still clings to the edges of dawn. The air hangs heavy and motionless, thick with the lingering dampness of days upon days of relentless rain that seems to have no intention of lifting.
Lucky stands sentinel on the weathered stone stoop, her arms crossed firmly over her chest, the fabric of her burgundy coat pulled tight against the morning chill.
“Take the back road,” she says, her voice carrying that particular authority that comes from years of knowing these lands better than the maps plastered on the walls of her tavern. She nods toward the winding mountain path that disappears into the misty foothills like a serpent slithering into shadow. “Cuts through the foothills proper, skips all the villages where curious eyes might linger too long on your faces. You’ll hit the Plains by dusk if you ride hard and don’t stop to admire the scenery.” She pauses, her pale eyes catching the faint light filtering through the clouds. “If all goes well, and the gods know that’s a mighty big ‘if’, the safehouse in the foothills has been prepared for your arrival. Stocked with supplies and warded against prying eyes.”
Locke’s expression darkens further than usual, his eyes narrowing as he studies the treacherous path she’s indicating. The warrior in him is already calculating distances, assessing risks, counting the ways this could all go catastrophically wrong. “That path’s the toughest route through the mountains,” he says, his voice carrying the weight of someone who’s traveled these roads before and lived to regret it. “Steep grades, loose rock, places where one wrong step sends you tumbling into ravines that don’t have bottoms.”
Lucky’s laugh is sharp and knowing. “It’s also your fastest route to where you need to be,” she replies without hesitation, her tone brooking no argument. “Unless, of course, you’d prefer to take the scenic route through the valley villages, where you are likely to run into the queen’s hunters.”
Lucky turns to where Rue sits astride his mount, looking for all the world like he’s posing for a portrait rather than preparing to flee into the wilderness. She tosses him a carefully wrapped leather satchel that I’d watched her methodically packing earlier, rolls of clean linen bandages, small pouches of healing powders in various shades of green and brown, several small glass vials filled with something that smells potent enough to strip paint and probably tastes worse than death itself, and a few ration bundles tied in waxed cloth. Dense slices of emberbread, dried starfruit curls, and thin strips of moon-spiced jerky. The kind that burns your tongue but keeps you warm in the snow. I know that now from experience.
