Adria laughs bitterly, shaking her head. “Then she’s a fool.”
“Maybe,” says Ronan. “But she’s my fool. And I’m hers.”
He turns to the guards. “Take her to the dungeons.”
Chapter Forty
With Adria under the watch of no less than twelve guards in the dungeons, I’m more terrified than ever.
“She has to have a backup plan. There’s no way she’ll let this fail,” I tell Ronan when we’re safely back in his chambers. “She’s going to try to kill you. I don’t know how she’ll do it, but she’s going to try. You can’t go out there.”
The Festival of Night is tonight, and I know the chances of convincing Ronan not to participate are nonexistent, but I have to try to get him to see reason.
“Listen to her,” says Taran. They’re the same words he used when we were trying to convince Ronan to leave the griffin alone. I can picture him saying the same words under similar circumstances fifty years from now, assuming any of us survive that long.
“You both know what I’m going to say. Let’s just spare ourselves the argument, and you can both stay right next to me all night.”
I look at Taran. He doesn’t seem thrilled to have to stay withmeall night, but he’ll do it, for Ronan’s sake.
“Fine,” I say. “Butdon’t you dareleave my sight.”
“I promise,” he says.
The pounding of the drums begins right at sunset. The rituals of Vahlo, the God of the Moon, Shadow, and Death, are steeped in violence, the drumbeats meant to echo the heartbeats of the slain. Animal sacrifices are made in hopes of appeasing the god and keeping him from coming for us early. Flaming effigies are cast down the river, emulating the River of Fire on which souls are transported to Vahlo’s gates. The people gather on the bridges and the riverside, dancing and chanting, begging Vahlo to have mercy on them. To come for them late in life. To let them pass his judgment and be reborn.
My mother loved Vahlo’s worship. She had a morbid curiosity about the darker things in life, something I’d never quite understood in spite of the shadow-born nature I shared with her. I had found comfort in the hidden spaces of the forest, the darkened coves where ancient secrets were kept. She preferred the pitch black of the crypt, the burial grounds near our Temple of Vahlo, places where most feared to tread. Where shadowy dealings could be done.
She would have loved this festival.
I, on the other hand, am ready for it to be over. By the time Ronan and I are escorted from his rooms, the court has gathered along a grand balcony overlooking the river. The mood is still somber, but as the beer and wine start flowing and the sacrifices begin, it will rise to a fever pitch.
I shudder at the thought.
I hate this, and not just because of the festival. I hate being exposed here with so many people around. So many people wearing the black robes of Vahlo, blending together, nearly all of them armed, and the rest of them dangerous.
All I can think of is Ronan. How to protect him. How to keep him safe.
“It’s okay,” he says, wrapping his arm around me, rubbing the tension from my shoulders. “It’ll be over soon.”
I let him keep his arm around me. I don’t care who sees. I don’t care what they say. Let them see who stands between them and Ronan. Let them know that he’s protected.
When the bells ring midnight, the servants bring up a goat for the slaughter.
I don’t want to be near the sacrifice. I know it’s silly to be squeamish when I eat meat all the time, but I hate to hear the scream of the animal. I hate to watch its blood spill on the altar, to smell the burning of its flesh until only ash and bone remain for the ritual. It makes me sick.
Ronan lets go of my hand. He won’t make the sacrifice himself—a priest will do that—but, as the God-King, he must bless it.
I can’t back away from the altar. I can’t leave him there alone, but I can’t look either. The bells chime again. The beginning of the ritual.
I close my eyes and brace for the scream.
But it doesn’t come.
“What’s that?” someone yells.
“What’s going on?”
Cries are coming from the distance. The cries of the animals, I think at first. There are a hundred altars like this one on the banks of the river, a hundred goats being slaughtered at once.
