And then there were other names, ones she’d never heard of before, shaped down the cave wall like an ancient family tree.
A lineage.
Where would she be among them? And how many others, she wondered, were like her? Sharing Wrenwyn’s blood? Sharing the ability her mother spoke of … to wield without invocations?
To haverawmagic.
Untethered by the gods.
‘Ezer,’ Kinlear whispered, because she was too busy looking at the symbols, reading the story, to notice what lay beyond. ‘Look.’
Six came to a stop, and Ezer gasped as she glanced forwards.
Because there, at the back of the cave, was an enormous black door.
38
The door looked carved by magic.
It was entirely black, embedded in the cave like a portal to another world. It towered above their heads, as tall as the Citadel. Ezer had to crane her neck back to see its rounded top, where more symbols arched over it, but they were so high up she couldn’t read them.
‘This is it,’ Kinlear breathed. ‘The entrance to his domain.’
‘Six found it,’ Ezer said.
The raphon’s tail twitched,yes.She lifted her head as if she were quite proud of herself.
Kinlear slid down from Six’s back, his hands trembling. Ezer didn’t want to leave Six’s warmth, her comfort.
But Kinlear was already limping towards the door, and her heart squeezed at the sight of him.
So she pressed her hand to Six’s neck.Stay.
‘Wait,’ Ezer whispered after Kinlear. She caught up and laced her arm through his, because suddenly she couldn’t bear the thought of him being alone.
He needed this. He wanted to do this, to be the one to make his mark on Lordach. He wasn’t a warrior like his father or Arawn. But now, if he made itinside and his dagger found the Acolyte … he would become a hero.
The savior of so many lives, and he’d go down in history for doing it.
‘Careful,’ Ezer whispered, as they stopped just before the door. ‘We don’t know if there are traps guarding it.’
‘Why would there be?’ Kinlear asked. He smelled like the liquid in his vial, sickly sweet as crushed flowers. ‘This is all as the intel promised it would be. A black door, an entrance, and … how else would the defectors make it inside, if not by this door?’ He glanced back over his shoulder, at the fading light of the outside world.
‘That door isancient,’ Ezer said, because anyone would be able to sense the strangeness of this place. The sort ofholyfeeling that came with it, as if even the air they breathed was filled with the sighs of spirits long lost to time. The closer they got, the more her head spun, almost as if she’d drunk winterwine. ‘What if it’s cursed or?—’
Kinlear lifted a dark brow. ‘That’s why it isn’tyouwho’s going to risk it, Ezer.’
‘Don’t touch it,’ Ezer hissed, but before she could stop him …
The prince placed his hand on the door.
She held her breath, waiting for something terrible to happen.
The Citadel’s wards could sense who was pure of heart and who was not. The shadowstorm too.
Surely this would be the same.
She waited for the ground to shake, or shadow wolves to come pouring out of the darkness behind them, or for the raphons to turn on them and attack, an ambush well played. But nothing happened.
