“I’m aware,” Leander said. “But I also know you’re in a hurry, and I believe these individuals will not be able to walk on their own even if the new queen orders them. They will likely be quite difficult to find as well, which is why I’m speaking to both of you.”
He stood up to face Adrian. “I know the witches of the Blackwood are adept at finding spells such as the one I saw your familiar using earlier. I want you to cast that same type of spell again using this.”
The prince flicked his hand like a stage magician. When his palm came back around, he was holding a woman’s severed hand with a black ring gleaming on its third finger. As always, Bex recognized her sister’s hand immediately, but she wasn’t sure which sister’s hand she was looking at until Leander spelled it out.
“This is all that remains of the Princess of Hate,” he said. “I picked it up after I evaporated her with one of the Royal Verses to give myself a starting point.”
“A starting point for what?” Adrian asked, confused. Bex, however, had already guessed.
“You’re looking for Mara’s body.”
“And you’re cleverer than Gilgamesh gives you credit for,” Leander said as he held out the hand to Adrian. “Mara and I searched for her real body for years without success. Since we’d investigated so extensively, we knew it had to be somewhere that even a prince and princess of Heaven couldn’t access. There are only two such locations in all my father’s domains: the king’s personal vault at the top of the Highest Heaven, and the bottom of the Lowest Hell, which is a place so horrid that even Gilgamesh himself cannot enter without becoming trapped.”
Bex’s eyes were huge by the time he finished. “You think the queens’ bodies are in the Hell of Pride?”
“I’m certain of it,” Leander said. “Father would never keep the bodies of his enemies close to where he sleeps. Also, the void left by the Queen of Pride’s shattering is the only thing strong enough to keep the daughters of Ishtar from popping back up like you do.”
His face softened. “My clever Mara was the one who realized those two facts first. She wanted to search this place herself, but princesses cannot enter the Hells for extended periods without risking their minds due to the excess of demon suffering causing cognitive dissonance with Gilgamesh’s loyalty programming. I tried to find a safe way inside dozens of times while I was serving as Prince of the Hells, but I couldn’t put so much as a foot through the holes in the ceiling without succumbing to the void demons’ effects. When my bastard of a father finally threw me all the way in, I thought I might at least be able to catch a glimpse of where her body was being stored, but I remember nothing except fear and falling from the moment Gilgamesh banished me to the moment you pulled me out.”
“Be that as it may,” Adrian said uncomfortably. “This isn’t going to work. I can cast the finding spell no problem, but if I do it using this hand, the magic will lead me to the Queen of Hate’s body, not Mara’s.”
“That should still be close enough,” Leander insisted. “Gilgamesh is too cheap to build nine separate prisons. Wherever Hate’s body is hidden, the others will be as well. I’d bet my life on it.”
“You’re betting all our lives,” Bex said, looking pointedly at the rising water. “I understand what you’re feeling, Leander. They’re my sisters too. But I have to prioritize the living over the dead, and we don’t have much time before—”
“I know,” he cut her off. “Believe me, I know. If things weren’t so desperate, I would never have stooped to asking for help from a witch.”
Adrian crossed his arms over his chest with a huff. “If you need me so badly, maybe you shouldn’t talk about witches like we’re trash.”
“Forgive me if being sacrificed to Gilgamesh as a child in exchange for the safety of a few trees has left me with a poor opinion of our mother’s profession,” Leander replied, giving his youngest brother a cutting look before returning his gaze to Bex.
“Please, Queen of Wrath,” he said as he lowered his head. “I’m begging you, help me save my Mara. I also need you to convince your other sister to move. I can’t get to the seal while she’s standing in front of it, and we’re running out of time.”
Now that he’d mentioned it, Nemini was being very quiet, even for her. They didn’t have time to dawdle, so Bex motioned for Leander to wait and hopped off the broom again, landing with a splash in the now knee-deep water beside her sister.
“Hey,” she said softly. “Are you okay?”
“No,” Nemini whispered, her whole body shaking. “I can feel them again.” She shook even harder as she cringed back from the sealed doors. “Theyhateme.”
“They don’t hate you,” Bex said, reaching up to give Nemini’s violently shaking shoulder a squeeze. “They’ve just been through a lot. I’m sure they’ll calm down once—”
“You don’t understand,” Nemini insisted. “They hated me long before I broke them.” She bit her lip. “I… was a bad queen to them.”
“But you don’t have tostaya bad queen,” Bex told her with a smile. “I don’t know what you were like before, but the Nemini I know is a good person who never stopped loving me even though I kept dying and forgetting her. I made you fight a war you didn’t care about and never took a word of your advice,but you still looked after me. That’s a person with the potential to be agreat queen if she wants to be, but everything starts with letting Leander open this door, because the people of Pride aren’t going to change their minds about you if you leave them locked inside a flooding room.”
Nemini blinked and looked down at the black water covering her legs like she was noticing it for the first time. Her yellow eyes went huge after that, and she quickly moved out of the way.
Leander swept in the moment the way was clear. He raised his hands as he did so, hovering his fingers an inch above the giant, cuneiform-covered seal that held the doors shut, which looked a lot nastier than the simple metal bolt that had been used to lock the Hell of Wrath.
“What happens if you touch it?” Bex asked curiously.
“A whole host of excessively unpleasant things,” the prince replied, closing his eyes. “Please be quiet. I need to concentrate.”
Bex nodded and dutifully zipped her lips, stepping back to stand beside Nemini, who was staring at the prince with a mix of hope and dread. When nothing happened for a solid minute, Bex decided to hop back up on the broom and wait next to Adrian instead.
“Pleasetell me you’re making progress,” she whispered. “If I have to spend another second watching your brother do nothing while toxic water creeps up my legs, I think I might explode.”
“That depends on your definition of progress,” Adrian whispered back, never taking his eyes off what looked like a small wooden carving of a cat covered in pine sap and black cat hair that he was attempting to balance on the palm of the princess’s severed hand. “Finding spells are famously forgiving, but we’ve already used most of the supplies Boston brought fromthe Blackwood. I’m down to the dregs on this one, and the Queen of Hate’s hand isnotbeing a cooperative component.”
