“She told me to trust you. That you’re more than you seem.”
Peeble silently nodded, and the others stared.
I gathered everyone close. “Here’s the plan. We enter the tunnels now. We move fast but carefully—there will be traps, guards, obstacles. When we reach the branching passage that leads to the seed chamber, Eltrien, Pebble, and I will go for it while the rest of you secure our exit route.”
“Why Eltrien?” Vashael asked.
I met Eltrien’s strange eyes. “Because I think he’s been preparing for this moment for a very long time.”
“Longer than you know,” Eltrien agreed quietly.
“We have three days,” I said. “We cannot afford mistakes. We cannot afford mercy. Anyone who stands between us and Elle dies. Understood?”
Grim nods all around.
“Then let’s move.”
We gathered our supplies, checked our weapons one last time, and approached the tunnel entrance. The symbols carved into the stone seemed to pulse as I drew near, responding to my corruption in ways I didn’t understand.
Before we descended, I paused and looked back at the morning sky, wondering where Bryx and Kevin had gone, what could possibly have been important enough to make them abandon us now.
But there was no time for waste.
“For Elle!” I said, and stepped into the darkness.
“For Elle!” the others echoed behind me.
The tunnels swallowed us whole, ancient and aware, and somewhere far ahead, destiny or doom or both awaited.
The countdown had begun.
31
Bryx
I shouldn’t have left.
That’s what the rational part of my brain—you know, the tiny part that wasn’t constantly suggesting I flirt with danger, death, or anyone with a pulse—kept screaming as Kevin and I buzzed through the pre-dawn darkness toward the Heartspire. But the irrational part, which was basically everything else, was having the time of its life.
Kevin, my magnificent bee companion, was the size of a small horse when he wanted to be, with fuzzy black and yellow stripes that I’d personally groomed to perfection. His wings made that beautiful thrumming sound that meant business, and his compound eyes reflected my own insectoid features back at me in thousands of tiny mirrors. We’d been partners for years now, ever since I’d found him as a larvae being sold in a black market for spell components. The merchant had called him defective because he was too smart, too independent. I’d called him perfect and stolen him that very night.
“This is the stupidest thing we’ve ever done,” I told him, my antennae twitching with more excitement than nervousness as we flew. “And that’s saying something, considering that time we tried to seduce that carnivorous flower. Remember? You got pollen-drunk and I nearly lost an arm.”
Kevin buzzed something that roughly translated to “That was your idea, idiot.”
“Everything’s my idea! That’s the problem!” I shifted my grip on his fuzzy thorax, my partially translucent skin catching the moonlight in ways that I knew looked absolutely magnificent. “But you have to admit, my ideas are at least entertaining. Remember the time we convinced those Crown guards we were exotic dancers hired for the prince’s birthday? We got all the way to the throne room before they realized the prince’s birthday was three months away.”
Kevin’s buzz was definitely laughter this time.
Being part insect had its perks—compound eyes meant I could see in almost every direction, my antennae could pick up pheromones from miles away, and I had extra joints that gave me flexibility most people couldn’t achieve even in their wildest dreams. The downside? Well, try getting a date when you have mandibles that click when you’re nervous. Though honestly, some people found it exotic. There was this one bartender in the lower districts who said my compound eyes were ‘mesmerizing.’ We dated for two weeks before she realized I literally couldn’t stop staring at her because that’s just how compound eyes work.
“You know what I want, Kev?” I said, knowing full well he understood every word—our bond went deeper than most people realized. “I want someone to look at me the way Kaelren looks at Elle when he thinks nobody’s watching. Like I’m worth becoming a monster for. Though let’s be honest, I’m already pretty monstrous. In the best way possible.”
Kevin’s buzz softened to something almost sympathetic. “You’re already a monster, just a funny one.”
“A devastatingly handsome funny one,” I corrected with a grin he couldn’t see but definitely felt through our bond. “With excellent taste in bees and a singing voice that could make a siren weep. Remember when I won that singing competition contest in the Thornwood? The prize was a year’s supply of fermented nectar. Best Tuesday ever.”
The Heartspire loomed ahead, and my good mood shifted into something sharper, more focused. The fortress was wrong on levels that made my compound eyes water. It twisted reality around it like a tumor, all sharp spires and surrounded by rot. The original structure had been beautifulonce, I’d seen paintings in the old archives. A palace of beautiful wood and cultivated stone, where the first Crown had married Root and Bloom in harmony. Now it looked like that palace had gotten cancer and the cancer had gotten ambitious.
