My head snaps back to her, and I finish her sentence. “Properly heal myself.”
Saipha kneels and locks eyes with me. “Here’s what we’ll do. I’llgo to the workshops; I’ll find bandages or something that can be used as such; I’ll get food, too;andI’ll keep an eye out for a key for you while I do it, just in case. Rest, for now, then I’ll patch you up. Won’t be as good as a proper renewer, but I’ll do what I can. Come sunset, if you’re still unsure and we found you a key, we can make a final decision if we want to try. But key or no, I think we should.”
What would a Mercy Knight do?
Not back down.
“You’re right. We should,” I say with more confidence than I feel. If last night is any indication, this Tribunal is only going to get worse. We will need every advantage we can get. And, maybe since I’ve survived this long already, I’ll actually make it through.
But despite my forced optimism, I can’t help but feel like this plan is a terrible, terrible mistake.
16
Saipha and I stand on the last stair at the bottom of the residence hall’s staircase. Night has fallen on the Tribunal.
I spent the entire day in her room but still feel like I’ve fallen down a set of stairs…twice. Bandages fashioned from torn strips of cheesecloth she found in the workshops are wound tightly around my torso underneath my shirt. I almost asked Saipha to find Lucan to ask him to refresh the salve he made, but I’d rather be in pain than go to him for help.
Expectedly, no one else is out. No one else is reckless enough to do something like this.
That’s probably why Saipha likes it.
She would never say it, since I got hurt, but I know a part of her is genuinely a little jealous I had “all the fun” last night. That I’ve had a chance to prove myself as a candidate for Mercy already and she hasn’t. This drive is what will make her an excellent Mercy Knight.
I kept an eye out for Lucan on our way down, but he’s nowhere to be seen. I wonder if he used the rest of the night, or the day, to find a key. Something I should have been doing—would’ve been, if not for being shackled on the roof and then needing to recover as much strength as I could, as quickly as possible.
“Ready?” Saipha asks.
I’m not, but I’ll need days to heal, and we don’t have them. The best I have is a chance at a sigil that’ll do it for me. “Ready.”
With that, we both lunge forward. I go straight for the yellow tapestry and shove it aside to reveal the dragon automaton, hoping Saipha’s right and this yellow dragon replica has a sigil that’ll help fix me. Between that and the silver dragon’s armor sigil, I’ll be nearly invincible. Getting the rest would almost beeasy.
Saipha runs in the opposite direction, straight for the copper dragon tapestry. She stops right before it, holding herself in place, waiting for the tapestry to roll up.
I’m searching for the yellow dragon’s pedestal panel when it hits me.
Something’s wrong.
None of them are moving. I’m squeezing into the narrow nook the dragon is tucked within. It should have wheeled out by now.
“Isola, how long does this take?” Saipha calls.
I don’t answer, instead ripping off the panel door and crawling underneath. It’s nearly pitch-black inside, and I struggle to find my way by touch alone. My movements are nearly frantic, fingers gliding over the completely still springs and gears as I inch my hand toward the center point, where the sigil should be.
There’s just enough light to see that it’s gone.
Did the inquisitors disarm them? No, there’s no way they would make this placelessdeadly. Unless they didn’t want us to find more? But if that were the case, I imagine I would already have faced their wrath for finding and using one.
I study the remnants of the chalk where the sigil was. There are only a few pieces of lines—nothing I could connect with confidence. It was smudged off with a handprint that I know. My back tingles.
Lucan did this. As I was distracted by just how large his hands were, he was scheming. I curse under my breath.
“They’re gone,” I announce as I emerge from underneath the mechanical dragon. “All the sigils are gone.”
“What?” Saipha crosses over with urgency. “How are they allgone? Did the inquisitors disable them?” She’s looking around the room. There’s barely a sliver of moonlight to see by streaming through the slitted windows high above.
“You really think they’d make this place easier on us?” I askflatly.
“Then how?”
