As I count the skylights, using them to orient myself, I tell my father all I’ve learned.Vance is getting very worried. Is Imogen still going through the cargo?
Silence.
Dádhi?
The sky growls and flashes twice before his voice lights up my mind.I didn’t speak to her.
If neither he nor Vance can reach Imogen, then that means someone wedged obsidian through her heart. Who? Salom? Bohdan?
Did you truly sense her at the capital’s train station, or did you make that up?
The last time we had contact, she was landing beside Bohdan’s sleigh which was parked beside the train terminus.
I spot something through the hallway skylight that grinds down the beats of my heart. A numbness slicks through my blood as I beat my wings to reach the next ceiling window, then the next…the next…the next… The blue-and-white runner is littered with bloodied corpses.
Chill after chill zings through my marrow as I soar over more of the castle, absorbing the devastation within. Even though I cannot create thunderstorms, this one feels of my making.
I pivot and rocket toward Konstantin’s window, reminding myself that he wears his necklace, that even if he bleeds, he lives. His curtains are drawn—both the one above his bed and the one above his desk.
ISLA!My shouted name draws me out of my dark mind.Isla Mara Ríhbiadh, if you don’t answer me this very second, skies help you when I land in Glace.
May the skies help me before you get here,I think.
They murdered all the guards, Dádhi.Even though everything within me beats with anger, my voice is toneless.All of them.
Through the pack bond, I call to Lachlano, to Aodhan, to Imogen, to Fionn, to Colm. None must be in feathers, given that their voices don’t resonate between my temples.
Dádhi, can you ask Lach and Aodhan if they found out anything?
Lach hasn’t been answering.
A fresh wave of fear dashes against me.But you can feel him?
I can feel he’s inside the castle.He must’ve picked up his pace, because his every word is punctuated by a raucous inhale.
Has anyone—save for me—managed to communicate with you?
Not since Aodhan went after Izolda. We’re in the dark here.After a beat, he asks,You are with Vance, correct?
Yes,I say.
Why do I lie? For the same reason he did earlier.
Please find a safe place to hide until we arrive.My father is breathing so hard that his voice is as choppy as the rhythm of my heart.Colm and Fionn are on their way. They had to board a train for a part of the journey, but they’re on their way,he repeats.Wait for them. Wait for me.
If anyone had told you to wait when Mádhi was kidnapped, would you?
It’s not the same thing.
Because Konstantin isn’t my mate?My heart feels as hard and cold as compressed ice.I love him.
Silence reverberates down the bond.
I’m invisible.To reassure him further, I add,Vance painted the sigil.
Invisible doesn’t make you insubstantial.
I understand what he means, that magic and weapons can still touch me, but to touch me, the bastards would have to spot me.
