We searched the space carefully, but it was entirely deserted, which made no sense; the coronation revelry had likely ended hours ago, but there should have been servants still moving about, cleaning and otherwise putting the palace back together. Drunk and exhausted guests stumbling through the hallways. Guards making their rounds. Some sign of life.Anysign?—
“Nova.”
I turned toward Aleks, who stood by one of the tall windows flanking the front door, his hand pulling back the heavy curtain to show me something.
My hand flew to my mouth as I noticed the figure at his feet—a young woman I quickly recognized as Aveline’s niece, Sylvia. One of the servants who had frequently tended to me since myreturn to the palace, who had made this palace feel warm and inviting even when I’d felt like an imposter within its walls.
How many more familiar faces were dead and stashed in shadowed corners and behind elegant drapery?
And where was her aunt?
I walked over and knelt at her side, stroking her hair—which was matted with blood—out of her face. There was a gruesome wound gouged into the side of her head. A tremor went through me as I noticed how similar her dark blue eyes were to Aveline’s. She’d died with them wide open in shock. Looking out this very window, maybe, unaware of her assassin until it was too late.
Probably because she was too busy staring at the horror on the other side of the foggy glass.
There were several more dead bodies strewn across the lawn. Some wore the colors of my guard. Others were dressed in the fine clothes of nobles and dignitaries who hadn’t made it far enough to escape.
Hands shaking, I pulled the curtain back over Sylvia and took a step back. “We have to find the others. My brother, and…”
I heard a voice in my head, calling my name, and I spun around.
Phantom—who had spent the evening at Captain Voss’s side, helping him patrol—had appeared in the foyer. He gave an anxious whimper and raced toward us, his movements clumsier than usual. He collided with me in a tangle of limbs and fur, body wiggling and tail thrashing despite his obvious distress. Clearly relieved to see me, even if he would never admit it.
Thankfully, he was in one piece with no obvious injuries. But there was someone else’s blood splattered across his fur, turning it darker and shinier in places. His paws were stained as well; he’d left a faint trail of prints across the pearlescent grey floor.
“What’s happened, Phantom?”
He fixed his bright eyes on mine, and he pressed only one word into my mind at first: (Marius.)
It took some work to calm him down—I’d never seen him rattled like this—but eventually I managed to sort through the rambling words he was pushing into my mind, to put together a fractured picture of how the attack had unfolded. How the Drynland King had turned on us the moment the opportunity presented itself, his soldiers joining forces with Order figures who had seemingly materialized from nowhere.
Many of our guests had evacuated, at least; most of them had fled into Tarnath, following the lead of Lord Brennan. Some of our soldiers had gone with them, establishing a more solid defensive perimeter around that city’s gates. Others had scattered, fleeing into the night—with plans to return with reinforcements, I hoped.
Captain Voss had personally led a company of soldiers to come find me, but where that company had ended up was unclear; Phantom had lost track of them in the chaos, when he’d moved to help protect Eamon and his little sister as they fought their way toward safety. He’d followed them to where they’d taken shelter, but then he’d caught my scent and made his way to me.
I went to the massive front doors, throwing them open with a violent motion made more powerful by the adrenaline rushing through me. Stepping outside, the eerie quiet was replaced by the sounds of distant screaming and clashing weapons, along with odd cracks and wails that I suspected might have been more of the Order’s corrupted spells going off.
Aleks followed me, standing close at my shoulder, his hand on his sword.
“Our fears are confirmed, then,” he said, after I had quickly shared all that Phantom had told me. “I wonder who else theOrder has tried to sway? And what did they promise them in exchange for their help infiltrating this palace?”
“No telling.”
“Fucking traitors.”
The word burned through me, filling me with rage. But it wasn’t only toward those traitors. Part of it was fury toward myself, too—for not navigating the emerging political situation more carefully, for not seeing the warning signs. For not being able to convince my detractors of my ability to control our world’s magic into something strong enough to save them all.
A crown was merely a symbol.
I had so much left to prove.
“Marius, and others like him, are desperate for power,” I thought aloud. “It’s no wonder they bought into whatever lies the Void Order fed them. My brother and I didn’t lie to them. We spoke of sacrifice and hard-won victories to come, not false promises of easy conquest and unlimited power.”
“And one is infinitely more tempting than the other for weaklings like Marius,” Aleks muttered. His gaze narrowed, scanning the yard.
I swallowed hard, thinking of all the times I’d dismissed Marius as merely irritating rather than genuinely dangerous.
But it wouldn’t do me any good, standing here lamenting my mistakes and trying to determine all the places where I’d made wrong choices. I needed to focus on my next step. And, after me, I knew that my brother would be the next biggest target of our enemies.
