Reyla stood beside her, seemingly unbothered by the cold, her writing slate clutched to her chest. She stood on her toes, leaning precariously over the railing, staring down into the mist.
Please, Seraphina prayed yet again, feeling like a woman stuck in a repeating dream.I do not care that he betrayed me. I do not care about the lie. Just let him be alive. Just let it be him.
The top of the cage cleared the lip of the landing. The gears ground to a halt. The iron gate swung open with a screech.
A man stepped out, stumbling slightly as his boots hit the stone.
Seraphina’s breath caught.
It was Calix Fitzjesmaine.
The half-Kunishi man looked as though he had been dragged through the Underworld and back. His face was a map of healing cuts and purpled bruises. But he was alive.
“Calix,” she breathed, dispensing with all formalities as elation surged through her veins. If Calix was here, Aldric had to be close. She rarely saw the two of them apart.
Behind him, Rakon ducked to exit the cage. Then came Kyn, limping heavily, missing his medic bag for once. And finally, Leif—looking even more shrunken than when she had seen him last, as if the oldest Son had aged even further in the time they were gone.
Four. Her heart skipped a beat. The cage was empty.
She scanned the lift again, desperate, looking for a shadow, a hidden corner, anything. But there was nothing. Just the empty iron grate and the swirling mist beyond.
Reyla made a small, keening sound in her throat.
Seraphina took a step forward, her legs trembling. The four Sons huddled together, shivering in the cold. None of them met her gaze. They looked at their boots. They looked at the snow swirling past. They looked anywhere but at her.
“Where is he?” Seraphina finally asked, her voice nearly lost in the wind.
Calix flinched. He slowly raised his head, swallowing hard. He opened his mouth, closed it, and then whispered, “He is dead, Your Majesty.”
The wind ceased its howling. The cold vanished, replaced by a numbness that started in her fingertips and raced to her heart.
Dead.
Beside her, Reyla’s right hand went slack. Her chalk slipped from her fingers and hit the stone with a sharpclack, shattering instantly. What pieces remained rolled across the uneven flagstones, driven by the wind, tumbling over the edge of the precipice and disappearing into the white void below.
Reyla didn’t move. She just stared at nothing.
Seraphina felt her knees giving way, but Kyn rushed forward, bracing her shoulders before she could fall.No.Her words to Coreto echoed through her mind like a cruel jest. All her talk of legends. Her implication that the infamous Crow of Drakmor could never die.
And now…
“How?” she heard herself ask, her voice far away once more.
“We were ambushed,” Calix explained, his voice thick with emotion. “We barely made it out. But Aldric…he didn’t.”
Rakon bowed his head. Kyn finished steadying her and stepped back, looking away.
Only Leif seemed to not mourn their fallen leader. He stared at Calix, his lips twisting into a dark scowl. “Liar,” he accused.
The word cracked through her grief like a whip.
Her gaze snapped his way. “What?”
Leif spat on the ground, his glare still fixed on Calix. “I said he’s a liar.”
“Shut your mouth, old man,” Calix hissed. “We swore an oath.”
“I ain’t swore nothing to no one,” Leif volleyed back. “He was alive last we saw him, Your Majesty. Making a big ruckus of a distraction so we could escape.”
