Even though the snow is just as thick—thicker—than the first time I crossed and the ice is just as perilous, I move with ease. A gust of wind tries to knock me over; I crouch low and stabilize myself. The ground below tries to rise up and meet me but I won’t let it. I won’t let the monster of fear consume me.
Back on the other side of the castle, I exhale in relief. Traversing that icy path was all the proof I needed that I have changed. For all IwantRuvan, I don’tneedhim. It’s oddly reassuring to know that these feelings don’t stem solely from gratitude over the protection he’s offered me.
I move to the room that I was first taken to, the same one that Drew occupied a day ago, to stand in the same place I stood in my dream. I look over my shoulder at the fireplace. I can imagine the bookshelves full of the same trinkets I saw in my dreams.
“Was this room yours, Loretta, or Solos’s?” I say to her ghost. I wonder if she still walks these halls. I can almost feel her here with me. I cross to the bed and lie down. This was where I received my first dream. I can make no sense of how I get them, or why, but I’m going to retrace my steps, even if I must go all the way back to the old castle to do it. “Though let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” I say to the ghost. “If you want me to know the truth, now’s the time.”
I close my eyes and wait.
At first, I’m keenly aware of everything. Small shifts in the air, the way my body twitches just before it falls asleep, the growing ache in the back of my head that threatens to become unbearable in short order. I’m hardly tired, but this specter isn’t going to come to me in the waking world.
Except, she did once.
I sit up and reach down to my hip where the blood silver dagger is holstered. I bite my lip and twist it in the moonlight. Do I dare cut myself with it again? Ruvan’s sunken face flashes before me. If he needs more blood, I’ll give it to him. He also has the Hunter’s Elixir. This will be worth it.
The cut on my forearm is small but it saps the pain from my mind. I hold the dagger to my chest and feel its power focusing me. Lying back down, I take a deep breath, and focus on my feet. I force the muscles in each of my toes to relax, then in the arches of my feet, my ankles. I work my way up my body, one muscle at a time. It’s a trick Mother taught me. The smithy is relentless, and sometimes you ache so badly that you can’t even sleep, not even when you know it would make you feel better.
Somewhere between my abdomen and hands I drift off.
I don’t realizeI’m asleep until the dream hits me. I’m still in that bedroom. Except it’s not the same, I’m back in an earlier time when the castle was still pristine.
It’s night here, too, and Loretta fumbles about. She runs between the bookcases and a desk positioned underneath the window—a desk no longer present in my own time.
“They’re not here.” She curses under her breath. It’s then I notice that three books are missing off the shelf. “Damn him.”
She’s back at the desk, quill moving frantically over parchment. I approach. It seems the more aware I am of these dreams, the more autonomy I have within them. Or perhaps I’m just stronger every time. Perhaps it’s the magic of the dagger drawing power from the recesses of my body.
She’s writing a letter, a few short words:
Tersius came back evenafter you banished him. He stole our work. I’m going to get it. Don’t follow me, it’s too dangerous for you to move across the Fade with Tersius as he is. He’ll hurt you if you come. But don’t worry, I’ll be safe. I’ll return soon.
“I should have known,”she says softly. “I should have seen what you had really become and let Solos kill you when we had the chance.” Loretta hunches over the desk, tears streaming down her cheeks. Wiping her face and composing herself, she goes back to the bookcases. She lifts a short sword from a stand and unsheathes it halfway. Red and black lines squiggle across the metal. It looks almost like my own dagger.
She sheathes it with purpose and straps it to her hip. I can tell from the way Loretta moves that she’s not a combatant. She’s going to die. All signs point to that tragic truth.
A woman, loved by two men, betrayed by one in anguish, it would seem.
Loretta goes to the corner of the room and puts her shoulder into the bookcase. To my shock, it swivels open. She descends into the darkness. I try and catch up to her, but the moment I take the first step, the darkness swallows me.
Jolting awake,I fly to the bookcase and push just like she did. It refuses to budge. I keep pushing. My legs and arms strain. With a groan, the ancient hinges slowly loosen and the door to the secret passageway cracks open. I keep pushing until it’s open wide enough for me to squeeze through. I need to suck in everything to fit and, even then, it’s a tight push, but I make it. I silently thank Mother for all the times she pushed me to lift more heavy ingots, coal, and water. Without the strength she helped me build, I could do none of this.
The stairs round down, before opening to what appears to be another workshop, though this is far less stocked than the one in the depths of the old castle. Through another room, I suddenly recognize where I am. I catch my bearings and head right. Sure enough, at the end of this passage is the study I found the letters in—the one that connects through forgotten halls down to the workshop.
I wonder if Callos has had a chance to read those yet. He was going through everything brought back from the workshop so slowly. I wonder, if he did, if he would have found more concrete proof of a relationship between King Solos and Loretta. I’m beginning to affirm and expand my theories as I walk through these abandoned halls, a forgotten corner of a mazelike castle.
Lorettawashuman. Solos kept her hidden because he knew his people wouldn’t accept her and, since he only spoke through Jontun, that was an easy feat. These were her chambers and secret passages. She was the castle’s unseen presence. Solos took all the credit for her work on the blood lore. And yet…she loved him anyway. Despite all odds, she did; I can feel the emotion so vividly in the brief moments that I see the history of this world through her eyes.
And now I have another piece of the puzzle.
Tersius, the first hunter, stole the first three books of blood lore—the ones Callos has been after. Her initial work with Solos. They were the books I saw the statue holding in the underground hall of the fortress. Those tomes enabled Tersius to lay the curse, which he did in vengeance. Maybe if I can figure out what was in those books, I can find a way to identify the curse anchor or nullify the curse without it.
I stand back at a crossroads, looking up the passage I came from, and down farther still. Loretta had said that she was going after Tersius. That means she had some way to leave the castle and cross the Fade, even though she wasn’t a vampir. Maybe it was even something that could get Solos himself across, too. She said it was too dangerous for him to go, not that hecouldn’t.
Perhaps that same pathway is what the Succumbed use. Another mystery explained. Everything is falling into place and soon enough I’m going to have all the proof I need. Ruvan will listen to me, then. He’ll have to.
Down it is. If there’s a way to make it easier to get across the Fade for the vampir, they’re going to need it. Maybe then I can get across myself, too. If Loretta was a bloodsworn and had a way to make it across on her own then I should be able to use that same method as well. If I can’t find alternative records of her initial work then I’ll go back to the hamlet myself, sneak in, and somehow steal them from the fortress.
My heart is racing. It’s all coming together. I’m so close to the truth—to figuring out the last pieces we all need to break this curse once and for all. I can feel it in my marrow and I will do it whether Ruvan and the rest of them believe me or not.
