“No—”
“We were taking tea when I played. The last thing I remember was him looking at me over his teacup.”
“You’re wrong!”
My voice rises to a roar. “You poisoned my father during my performance! You blamed it on me!”
“You made me do it,” she says in a rush. “It was your fault. I never would have done it if your song hadn’t amplified my anger. I found out about the change of his will just that morning. How could I not be enraged?”
My chest heaves. “No one made you pour cyanide in his tea. No one made you carry it on your person to begin with.”
“It was for my own protection. Ever since my second husband—”
“That’s no excuse. You murdered my father.”
“No! It was your fault.”
My vision turns a strange shade of violet as a torrent floods my body, fills my blood and bones. Every inch of me seems to grow lighter. My hair lifts off my shoulders as a breeze begins to stir around me, coming from…me. I hover a few inches above my seat, barely aware that it’s happening.
My stepmother’s eyes go wide as she presses herself against the back of her seat. “Ember,” she gasps.
My words come out in a roar of sound, bursting from my lips on a storm wind. “You did this!” My words shift into a scream, and that scream becomes a song.
The coach bursts into splinters of wood.
47
FRANCO
Nyxia and I fly above the road that heads east from the palace. Both in our unseelie forms, I travel as a raven while Nyxia soars at my side as a shadowy wind. Despite being siblings, our unseelie shapes are quite different. I can easily be mistaken for a regular bird, while my sister looks anything but benign, with her shapeless, ethereal body, her red eyes, and sharp, gnashing teeth—perfect for striking fear into the hearts of those she emotionally feeds on. I’ve been envious of her terrifying unseelie form ever since we were young. My only hope of eliciting terror is to don a glamour, one I’m already poised to conjure as soon as we find our targets. I doubt I’ll be able to control my rage once I find Marus.
With my sister’s intel that he’s most likely heading straight for Saint Lazaro’s Cathedral, I’m able to pick up Ember’s energetic trail far faster than if I’d sought her out without a starting clue.
Her energy grows stronger with every beat of my wings.
“She’s close,” I say to Nyxia.
“Remember, don’t act too hasty,” comes her voice, an edge of warning to it.
“I’ll try,” I mutter.
A sudden shift emerges in Ember’s trail, spiking with citrus, rose, and wind. Even as a raven, I feel a chill run over me, rustling the base of my feathers.
I know what that energy says.
She’s singing.
It doesn’t last long, and her emotions shift again. She’s closer now. So close I can taste her energy as if she were at my side. My wings beat the air, driving me faster. Faster.
Several minutes pass before I spot a dark shape on the road ahead. A coach.
Another shift in energy, another spike of Ember’s magic. This time, there’s a deep note of sorrow. Grief.
Then rage.
The coach seems to ripple. A hard wind blows against me, momentarily halting my momentum. Once it passes, I train my attention on the coach…only to find it’s no longer there. Instead, there’s a swirling vortex of wood and debris.
Nyxia and I surge forward to close the distance and begin our descent. My heart pounds with every breath, then clenches as the view becomes clear.
