A fresh thread of guilt twined around my insides, squeezing my stomach tighter. Adriel had dragged us through the earth all the way from Dorthus to save me from capture.
“Let’s say we did manage to retrieve the Death Bringer’s hands from Mirabella’s crypt. We would still need the blood from two more courts to unlock the Great Oak.”
“One court,” Adriel corrected, dipping his head toward Sorsha. “The princess is a half-blood, same as Kaden.”
I raised my eyebrows. With Sorsha’s fair skin, golden hair, and startling turquoise eyes, I sometimes forgot that her mother had been Drathen.
“Any idea where we might procure the blood of a demon?” I asked.
“The Great Oak requires the blood of three courts,” Adriel muttered. “Anythree courts.”
Sorsha scoffed. “There may be those who claim otherraces in their distant lineage, but you know as well as I that there is no other true fae court left in the realm.”
Adriel arched a brow. “There is always the Scolendra.”
“TheScolendra?” The princess let out a trill of unhinged laughter. “Now Iknowyou’ve lost your mind.”
“Who are the Scolendra?” I asked.
“An ancient faerie race that died out centuries before the Uprising,” Sorsha explained with an eye roll.
“They aren’t extinct,” Adriel argued. “They reside in the Demon Woods.”
“That’s a myth.”
“It isn’t. The Scolendra live in mossy knolls and sow discord among —” Adriel broke off, twisting once again to vomit over the low stone rail.
“Come on,” Sorsha murmured, casting a wary glance down the footbridge. “We should speak somewhere more private.”
“Didn’t think you’d want me hurling all over your pretty silk pillows, princess.”
A flush of color tinged Sorsha’s cheeks. “If anyone gets wind of our plan to contact a lost fae court, a bit of vomit will be the least of our worries.”
My stomach dipped. With her winning smile and skill with a blade, it was easy to forget that Sorsha was a princess living in exile. Her uncle had stolen the throne from her and Kaden’s mother in a violent coup and banished Sorsha to Cragsmuir. Any talk of contacting a foreign court could be seen as an act of war.
With another furtive glance over her shoulder, Sorsha ushered us down the footbridge to the corridor that led to her private chambers. Two Drathen soldiers stood guardoutside the doors, but instead of leading us inside, she kept walking toward a smaller door.
The hinges creaked as she led us into a dank stairwell, which twisted down into darkness.
Down, down, down we climbed, Adriel pausing every few minutes to heave onto the stones. The air grew colder with every step we took until we finally reached the bottom.
A rough-hewn stone tunnel loomed ahead, balls of faelight winking every few yards to illuminate our path. My neck prickled at being so deep underground, but Sorsha kept going to the very end of the tunnel, where a set of enormous wooden doors beckoned.
They were weathered from age, arched at the top, and covered with carved symbols I did not recognize. I longed to reach out and trace the ancient markings, but the princess grasped the huge iron handles and threw the doors open before I had the chance.
The scent of old parchment and binding glue hit me at once, mingling with the earthy, mineral odor of the tunnel.
I gaped.
Just beyond the stone passageway was a magnificent chamber that stretched four stories overhead. The ceiling was bare black rock, and walkways along each floor were carved from the same dark stone. Narrow staircases meandered up and down in a disorganized fashion, leading to endless towering shelves groaning with thousands upon thousands of books.
Faelights twinkled from enormous iron chandeliers and hovered over long trestle tables heaped with books. Fae in pale linen robes roamed among the stacks, pushing carts laden with more tomes and reshelving the volumes.
Others sat at the long tables, poring over scrolls thatlooked as though they might crumble to dust. These they handled with cream-colored gloves, some of them reading with magnifying glasses held over the texts on spindly brass frames.
“Whatisthis place?” I murmured, my mouth hanging open as I took in the enormity of the chamber and the unfathomable number of books.
“The Cragsmuir Repository,” Sorsha answered. “The library predates the outpost by several thousand years, and the monks who live here are charged with safeguarding the texts within.”
