The soldiers of the Kingdom of Sky are not spread out too far from one another. We soon determine the periphery of their camp and move stealthily around it. But we reach the opposite end of the bivouac with no tent sighting.
Jihun circles his index finger in the air, suggesting we make our way around the other side. He leads the way, pulling out a pearlescent white plaque.
“You’re going to flash your suhoshin captain emblem at them?” I whisper.
He deigns to glance over his shoulder, but the seonnam is much too dignified to roll his eyes. “The tent is likely warded. This emblem will emit a faint glow when it detects a ward.”
“Awesome.” I grin. “It’s a two-in-one.”
Jihun frowns and raises a finger to his lips. I wisely stop talking. With the weight of Sunny’s disappearance lifted from my chest, I’m too giddy for my own good—for any of our good.
As we approach the midpoint of their camp, the emblem glows a ghostly white in the night. Jihun comes to a standstill and slowly pivots with the plaque. I watch silently at his side. I feel something too. A whisper of powerful magic.
Jihun tilts his head for me to follow and makes his way inward, flitting from point to point like a shadow. I do my best to mimic his movements, but I am not a seasoned suhoshin like him. My stomach clenches with nerves that I’ll give us away.
Gods, I wish I was invisible.
The number of sleeping soldiers increases as we near the center of their camp. Then we discover the shimmering outline of a tent ahead of us. Enemy soldiers stand guard around the entirety of the tent, with their arms locked together, forming an impassable circle.
My brows draw low over my eyes. This isn’t the tent of a commanding officer. They have someone inside that they don’t want to escape—a prisoner. Jihun turns toward me with a grim set of his mouth, then he jolts, a gasp slipping past his lips. He freezes in place until he’s certain no one heard him before swiveling his head left and right.
What the hell?
I can’t dare ask him what’s going on. But when his eyes widen with panic, I clamp a hand on his shoulder. For some reason, that scares the shit out of him. His extensive training is probably the only thing that stops Jihun from scrambling away from me, screaming his head off—that and his nerves of steel.
His Adam’s apple bobs as he tries and fails to swallow, then he takes a measured breath and reaches out a hand. He pats my face, and I shovehis hand away, glaring at him. But he blows out a sigh, his whole body sagging for a second. Then he looks toward me again, an odd smile spreading across his face.
I side-eye the seonnam. He needs food and rest. He is unwell.
Jihun gives his head a sharp shake and scans the area around the tent. Then he points at a diminutive seonnyeo sitting cross-legged near the entrance to the tent, two soldiers flanking her. Glancing in my direction, but not quite meeting my eyes, he presses one forearm over the other in anX.
I rear back.He wants me to kill her?
I take a closer look at the seraph. She wears ahanbokwith a long overcoat made of a patchwork of blue, red, yellow, and white fabrics. Her eyes are closed, and her hands rest over her knees, her thumb and middle finger pressed together. It’s difficult to be certain in the dark, but her lips quaver as though she is talking to herself.
The seonnyeo is casting a spell. The tent isn’t protected by stagnant wards. She is continuously reinforcing the wards. A memory—my mother’s—sparks in the back of my mind, and I recognize the female as a spell maiden, a rare shinbiin whose affinity lies in spoken spells rather than elemental magic.
Jihun stands patiently at my side while I figure it out on my own. He wants me to entrap her under a dome and cut off her magic. I have to stop her from casting her wards on the tent for us to get inside. I nod at Jihun, but his gaze stays on the spell maiden.
I extend my arms in front of me, pressing my wrists together, and fire a stream ofgifrom my palms toward the seonnyeo and the two soldiers guarding her. When my magic engulfs them, her eyes snap open, and her guards spin from side to side, their mouths gaping with shock.
Before the soldiers circling the tent can alert the rest of the camp, Jihun binds all of them—hands, feet, and mouths.
“Is it done?” A muscle tics in his jaw.
“Yes, I’ve trapped the spell maiden and her guards,” I whisper.
With a nod, he heads for the tent entrance, glancing over his shoulders. The bivouac remains quiet. I follow Jihun inside and bump straight into his back.What the ...I step around him to find his face slack, and I trace his line of sight.
A female sleeps on a mat in the center of the tent, her long braided hair lying over one shoulder. She’s beautiful, but I see her pallor in the dim glow of a light orb, and her lips have a faint purple tint to them.
Gods.She isn’t asleep. She has been poisoned.
“Who is she?” I ask in a wary voice.
“She is”—Jihun blinks and drags himself out of his stupor—“the Queen of Sky.”
The Four Gods
