Mareleau had practicedthe warding gesture Ailan had taught her dozens of times by now, and she still wasn’t certain if it worked. Noah lay on her bed, wrapped in lavender silk swaddling embroidered with a gold dragon-scale pattern. She sat beside him and performed every move that her hands had already memorized. She pressed her thumbs to her ring fingers, angled her wrists, then linked her fingers together. Another turn of her wrists, and she pressed the tips of her remaining fingers together. She held the gesture for a few breaths, then laced all fingers before spreading them over Noah like she was covering him in an invisible blanket.
She stared down at her results. Like always she could see nothing out of the ordinary. How could she ever know it worked?
Remembering what Ailan had told her about practicing on herself first, she strode to the mirror and repeated the same gesture but for her own body. She tried to perceivesomething, some clue that it had worked, but neither her eyes nor her claircognizance told her a damn thing. Clenching her jaw, she whirled away from the mirror. She didn’t have time to practice or wonder. Ferrah had returned from the tear not long ago, which was the signal that the ambush had begun.
How long ago had that been? Ten minutes? Twenty? Was it evening on the other side of the Veil, or daytime like it was here? She tried to estimate the hour, but math had never been her strength. Besides, the discrepancy of time between the two realms was an estimate, not an exact science.
Still, it chilled her to think that even though it had only been minutes for her, hours of battle may have already passed. Hours that Larylis could be fighting. Struggling. Or…
No, she wouldn’t think of anything worse than that.
A knock sounded at her door, and Garot entered without waiting for her to answer. “Are you ready? We must make haste to the dragon caves as a precaution.”
Mareleau wasn’t overly fond of the idea of hiding in dark caves with a horde of feisty dragons, but Ailan had assured her it would be the safest place for her and Noah. That the dragons would protect them if the worst happened.
“I’m as ready as I’ll ever be, I suppose.” She returned to the bed and scooped up her son, cradling him close to her. She shouldered his carrying sling as well in case she needed it. She’d come to rely on the convenient item and couldn’t imagine these early days of motherhood without it.
She joined Garot outside her bedroom and found Etrix in the hall. Both had stayed behind to guard her and Noah. Garot led the way, though not with his swirling tunnel. Instead, they made haste through the halls on foot. The cheery sunlight streaming through the arched windows made it hard to imagine a deadly battle was taking place at that very moment.
They reached the stairwell that led down to the next floor?—
Mareleau sucked in a sharp breath as threads of invisible energy poured over her, tingling her scalp, filling her throat, her chest, her stomach. Garot, already a step down, whirled to face her, brow raised in question.
Etrix placed a hand on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”
She opened her mouth but no words came out. The tingling force continued to wash through her, an ice-cold thrum so soft and foreign she couldn’t make sense of it. Her mind spun, eyelashes fluttering as the energy flowed down her legs, her feet, then rose again.
Noah stirred in her arms, and the tingle lessened by half.
The sensation remained, but it was subtler now. Quieter. And it was pulsing between her and Noah.
“What…” She swallowed the dryness in her throat. “What was that? Did you feel it?”
Etrix furrowed his brow, head tilting to the side.
“We must—” Garot’s words cut off as he reached into the pocket of his teal robe. He extracted a strange green orb, one that glowed with a pulsing emerald light. His tan, freckled face paled, his eyes shooting wide. “No.”
Etrix rounded on the Elvyn. “One of the triggers was tripped? Where?”
“Not just one,” Garot muttered as he reached for the top of the glowing orb with his thumb and forefinger. Gingerly, he tugged until something like a petal spread down. He peeled another, then another, until the orb flattened out into what looked like a multilayered map. If a map could be made from an unusual flower bud. She could hardly comprehend what she was seeing as Garot lifted one petal, then the other, flipping them and rearranging them like pages in the most oddly constructed book in existence. Finally, he paused on one petal. Darker green veins patterned its surface, which Mareleau soon realized weren’t random or organic markings, but shapes of landmarks—lakes, forests, and mountains. It really was a map. And beneath one of the mountains marking the petal pulsed a small red light.
“The dragon caves in Bel’Dawn,” Etrix said, brow knitting deeper.
Just as quickly as the red light flashed, it disappeared. Garot flipped through the petals with haste until he found the light again. “Now the Lo’Sel Mountains.”
“What’s happening?” Mareleau asked, her voice strained. She understood enough to know this map must be what alerted the Elvyn of non-fae trespassers. It was how they’d found Cora the first time she’d worldwalked here, as well as how they’d reached Mareleau’s group when they’d arrived with Ailan.
Etrix and Garot exchanged a weighted glance.
Etrix’s throat bobbed. “He’s here. And he’s worldwalking from cave to cave, locations he recalls from when he lived in El’Ara. He’s figured out where they’ll be hiding.”
“That can only mean…” Garot’s shoulders visibly shrank, his expression empty as his lips flattened into a tight line. Mareleau had never seen him without a jovial smile on his face. Never heard him at a loss for words. Even Etrix, who always maintained a neutral, stoic air, crumpled, his eyes glazing with tears as he flung his palm over his heart, as if smothering a piercing ache.
Even without their reactions, she understood what had happened. It had been written in that strange tingle of energy she’d felt. The energy that continued to pulse between her and Noah even now.
Ailan was dead.
Mareleau was regent.
