I need to get my shit together and move past everything that happened today. I doubt the Wing or any of the Noctises are feeling shitty about the ways they’re manipulating me. And they are manipulating me. I’m sure of it. But when I try to do the same, there’s this bitter taste in my mouth that I can’t seem to get rid of, and the tang of it tastes awfully close to regret.
But as genuine as Lorn might have been in his guilt and wanting to make things right, it doesn’t mean I can trust him. And as good as Aeson felt, it doesn’t mean he’s not playing me. I can trust myself and I can trust Enslee. I used to think there were more people on that list, but what happened with the Tainted has rocked that foundation. Either way, I’m here in Four Tiers for a reason, and it’s not to make nice with the Noctises and their Wings.
It’s time to get some answers.
It’s time to find what I came here for…or ratherwhoI came here for.
Chapter 32
I CHANGE INTO LOOSE BLACK pants and a fitted top with a hood I can pull up to hide my hair. I’m not sure exactly what I’ll find once I activate the Syphon Glass. My plan tonight is mostly to see if it even works and where it links if it does. I doubt I’ll port anywhere, but I want to be prepared just in case I stumble across something that might be worth the gamble.
I tie my hair into a chaotic pile on top of my head and move toward the bed to pluck a shard of glass from under one of the pillows. Iaccidentallybroke a vase earlier, and this piece should be sharp enough for what I need.
My heart is beating fast but steady in my chest. Adrenaline warms my veins and magnifies an anxious urge to get going already. My gaze darts to the two doors that lead into my room, and I pull in a fortifying breath as I weigh my options. The main entry is a revolving door of random checks from Aeson’s Wing. It does lock, but the Wing has a key, and I learned early on that locking the door isn’t a deterrent when it comes to them ensuring I haven’t flown the coop.
The question I’m wrestling with now is, do I lock it tonight?
If I do, it may give me the few seconds I need to shut down the Port and cover my tracks if someone tries to walk in. However, if I lock it and Ogdan or Gatlin hear it, that might make them suspicious. If I pique their interest, they’ll no doubt switch up their schedule and check in on me at all kinds of random times, and I’ll be screwed.
I weigh the pros and cons and then decide not to take a chance locking the door. With their advanced hearing, I’m sure it would tip the Wing off, and I think that’s more likely to get me caught than the off chance Gatlin wanders in here unexpectedly while he’s on watch tonight. Hopefully, my emotionally tortured, red-eyed performance will keep the Wing at bay and give me a little extra privacy for the night.
Before I can change my mind and convince myself to wait a few more days to do this, I step up to the big mirror and slice open the pad of my thumb. Blood fills the tiny gash, and I crouch down and press the bloody digit to the floral crest etched in the bottom right-hand corner of the mirror.
I close my eyes in silent plea for the Port to work, and to stave off the memory that’s trying to surge. I can hear the faint rumble of my father’s voice in my mind as he tells me and Ens about magic mirrors.
“Do you see that symbol right there, my girls?” Dad asks as he points to a flower with six petals sitting in the middle of six circles that all intertwine until they look like an even bigger flower surrounding the first.
Enslee and I both nod our heads.
“That is what connects all the Vitric Ports and that also keeps anyone who isn’t a Tenebrae from using them,” he explains, and I marvel as I take in the symbol and the big mirror in front of us. “As long as two mirrors have this symbol, you can use them like a spy glass, or you can communicate back and forth with them like a com, but my favorite way to use the Syphon Glass is to travel from one Port to another.”
“Like the gate we used to come here?” Enslee asks excitedly.
Dad smiles down at her and smooths the hair on the top of her head. “Exactly like that, only the Syphon Glass doesn’t let you go as far as a gate does, but you don’t need a sorcai to use the Port, you only need your blood.”
I shake off the memory, hastily closing the door on our little girl giggles and the games we played with our dad as he taught us how to use the Syphon Glass and then showed us all kinds of things around the keep with them. I press my bloody finger harder against the symbol that was created and keyed specifically to the Tenebrae bloodline thanks to a favor owed to a long dead ancestor by a long dead powerful sorcerer.
Pulling in a deep breath, I open my eyes to see if the blood and the symbol are doing what I need them to. A gasp escapes me when the surface of the glass ripples.
Bloody stars, it worked!
Awe and a zap of excitement replace my trepidation. A blurry image starts to fill the surface of the rolling glass, slowly coming into focus with each second that passes. It takes me a moment to realize what I’m looking at. It’s some kind of cover, a dusty drop cloth maybe. I try to see if I can make out any details beyond the white expanse taking up the entire frame, but I can’t tell where this Port might be or what’s blocking it.
I move my bloody finger from the center flower and trace one of the concentric circles surrounding it. Suddenly the image floating on the surface of the rippling glass flicks from the white drop cloth to something else as though I just changed the channel. Which, I suppose in a way, I did.
A dark office with a desk and empty bookshelves now fills the bronze frame. I study the space for a moment and then change the channel again and again. I connect to several more random Ports, located who knows where, before I land on one that shows people.
I fight the urge to duck and hide when I find myself staring at three women. My pulse thunders in my ears, and I go completely still, worried that they’ll somehow be able to see me.
But when they don’t start screaming or freaking out and just keep talking like they were before, I blow out a careful breath and tamp down on the smile that wants to take over my face.
Elation bursts through me like fireworks, and I bite back the excited squeal that tries to slip out.
I can see these women, but they can’t see me.
The magic mirrors really fucking work. I’m connected to the Port hanging in this room, and they’re none the wiser.
“Don’t worry, Jess. You two have had an agreement in place for forever. The king isn’t going to dishonor that. Whoever she was, it’s probably not what you think,” a pretty black woman with waist-long braids assures either the small blonde or the woman with bright candy-apple red hair. Both are sitting in comfy chairs across from her.
