“I know the Priestess’ puzzle more than most,” Gideon explained.
“Why’s that?”
“I helped her create it.”
His words dug deep, and for a second, the battle around us muted as his words found a stickier place in me.
The winged creatures still cut through the sky above the tower, and Stella’s magic still flashed against the dark. The masked fighters still surged through the courtyard below, meeting wolves and orcs in terrible bursts of steel and shadow.
But knowing the man who helped create this mess was now offering to help both worried and confused me.
Keegan’s head turned slowly toward him.
“What did you say?” His voice dropped so low that my skin prickled.
Gideon didn’t flinch, but I caught that something moved through his expression that didn’t look like amusement anymore.
Regret, maybe. Or memory. Or the kind of fear that only arrives when the past finally catches up and taps you on the shoulder.
“This tower was never meant to be part of her compound. Not originally.” He shook his head. “It was designed to hold.”
“Hold what?” Keegan asked.
“Hold who?” Gideon corrected.
He looked at me then, and I wished he hadn’t.
I let out a low and steady breath and waited.
“For whoever she couldn’t control,” he finished.
My stomach tightened as another scream echoed from inside the tower, but this one broke strangely halfway through, scattering across the stone like the sound had been caught and thrown down several corridors at once.
Celeste.
Or the tower using Celeste. Was she part of the puzzle?
I didn’t have the luxury of figuring out which.
“She has my daughter.” My hands nearly shook.
“She’s using her to play with you,” Keegan corrected.
Bella landed hard on the balcony beside us, her boots skidding against broken stone as she shifted back from fox form. Her copper hair whipped around her face, and her eyes flashed gold as she glanced from Gideon to me.
“I hope whatever he’s saying is useful because the entrance Caleb spoke about is closing.”
“I know a better way,” Gideon directed, glancing at Caleb.
“Why should we trust you?” Keegan asked.
“You shouldn’t, but I can get you to your daughter,” he said to me, not looking in Keegan’s direction. “And to your mother.”
The pendant at my throat burned suddenly, and the silver thread Stella had tied to it lifted from my chest, pointing toward the breach.
The tower wanted me inside.
Or Celeste did.
