Valorre’s words echoed strains of memory, but the voice of the past belonged not to the unicorn. It belonged to her enemy. The man who’d smirked when she was labeled a murderer. A man who’d dragged her to the edge of the woods outside the castle walls, drew blood from her palm, and shoved her out into the night. After that, shadows had come to life, growing paws and hooves and teeth. “Better run,” he’d said?—
Run, Cora! Get away!Valorre’s warning roused her from the haze of memory, but she still couldn’t take her eyes from the creature. It plodded into the camp and went straight for the two horns, consuming them in a single bite. Gringe leapt back but Hammond flung out an arm and forced him to be still. Next, it swung its head toward the cages, where James was slicing loose the bindings with trembling hands.
The Beast let out a roar as he dove for the unicorn in the now-open cage. The creature moved too fast for Cora to realize what was happening. Not until she heard the halfhearted, terrified whinny, then a crunch like bones snapping, teeth gnashing. Saw a slash of blood spray the dirt at James’ feet.
That was all it took to send her half falling, half climbing down the tree. She had no awareness of whether she’d been seen, whether her shields were up or down, whether the sounds she heard now were her pounding steps, her racing heart, or the crash of another cage coming open.
She knew nothing. Saw nothing through her tears.
She simply ran.
Valorre found Cora hours later.She was crouched at the base of a birch tree, her shoulders heaving, legs burning from how fast and how far she’d run. He nudged her in the shoulder with his muzzle. When she wouldn’t look at him, he blew a warm breath in her face and nudged her cheek. Finally, she glanced up at him with eyes that burned in the wake of her tears.
“They’re dead, aren’t they? The unicorns?” Her voice came out small and tremulous. Weak. She hated it. Hated that she’d run.
The three older ones, yes. I no longer feel them near.
Cora’s stomach turned as she recalled the sound of bones snapping beneath the Beast’s jaws. The sight of blood. She shuddered as the vision played over and over in her mind’s eye. Followed by her moment of cowardice.
There was nothing you could have done, Valorre conveyed. His sorrow was equal to her own. She could feel it in her bones.
“I could have tried to shoot it.”
And get shot back by the hunters?She felt his emotions ripple with something like a disbelieving scoff.
“I could have done something,” she said, but even as the words left her lips, she knew they were folly. She’d done the only thing she could have through the haze of her terror.
The haze of memory.
Valorre studied her.You know the abomination.
“I’ve seen it before. When I was twelve. Although…” She swallowed hard as near-forgotten visions surged through her. It had been the middle of the night after the queen was found dead, and Cora was locked in a dungeon cell. She’d spent all evening crying, shouting at the guards to hear her out, begging them to listen to the truth. She wasn’t responsible for killing Queen Linette. Morkai was. She’d seen him standing over her dead body. She’d witnessed him doing…somethingwith the blood. Something with his hands. Dark magic. Ithadto be dark magic.
But no one listened. No one came.
Only Morkai.
Cora shuddered and stared down at her palm, trying to see beyond the ink, seeking a thin pink line. A scar. But there wasn’t one. There hadn’t been when she’d received her first tattoo, and it had made her doubt how much of what she remembered from that night had been a fever dream. But now…
Now she knew better.
It had been real. All of it.
She remembered how the duke had pulled her from the dungeon. Bound her, gagged her, dragged her through the sleeping castle, across the lawn, through a secret gap in the castle wall, and out to the edge of the woods. There they paused in darkness, the moon nothing more than a sliver above them. “I’m doing this for you,” he’d said as he cut her bindings. “I could have let you rot in that cell. Remember that. The king would see you dead for what you’ve done.”
She bared her teeth and scrambled back from him. “I did nothing wrong. It wasyou. I know it.”
He ignored her. “You murdered Queen Linette.”
“You lie.”
“You killed Princess Aveline.”
She froze in place at the name. “What?”
Before she could say a word more, Morkai seized her hand and ran his knife over the center of her palm. Blood welled in a thin red line. She tried to snatch it away, tried to cover the wound, but he held her hand in place. With his other, he trailed a finger through the air. Ribbons of blood appeared out of nowhere, suspended in midair. With another wave of his finger, her own blood rose to meet it, weaving toward the other threads until they merged as one. It was over as quickly as it had begun. One moment, it was as if some gruesome tapestry was forming before her eyes, then the next, it fizzled into air.
That was when she heard the pounding. That was when she saw the dark shadow tearing alongside the castle wall as if it had sprung from shadow.
