“Are you all right, Nellie?” I asked her.
She flicked her ears. I had to assume that meant she was fine.
Kalen strode toward the war table, and his very essence seemed to take up the entire room. He went around to the side of the map where Gailfean sat, and then he gently tipped over the figurine of their castle. Toryn’s jaw tightened.
“Have the scouts returned?” the King of Shadow asked.
“No,” Fenella said in a tense voice. “They should have returned hours ago. I think we can assume they won’t be coming back.”
Kalen palmed the table and stared down at the map. It was a beautiful piece of artwork. I’d never seen anything like it before. Someone had spent weeks—months, even—crafting this thing. Every mountain pass was carved as a precise miniature replica of the real thing. The bend of every river was there, snaking through Aesir’s once-glorious lands. Even the chasm was represented with painstaking accuracy. And from this vantage point, Gailfean looked so very close to where we now stood. Such a small distance to cross, especially for winged, immortal gods.
“How many did you send?” Kalen asked in a hard voice.
“At first, we sent three, thinking a small party would be more likely to avoid detection. When they didn’t return, I sent a larger party of six. I thought the others might have encountered pookas or wraiths. Or one of those scorpion things we faced in Itchen.”
“And not a single soul has returned.” He closed his eyes. “We can’t risk trying again. I will not send my men to certain death.”
“Death is coming for us, Kal,” Fenella replied with a sigh. “We’ll all have to face it, one way or another.”
“I’ve been thinking,” Toryn said, pacing from one side of the war table to the other, arms folded, head cocked. Now that his people were safe, he looked more like himself again, though there was a heaviness in his expression that hadn’t been there before. “They let us escape, and Sirius—” He shuddered. “Sirius said all they care about is Talaven, and they don’t want the fae lands. Perhaps they don’t plan to come for us at all.”
“They just want the human kingdoms,” Fenella murmured.
My heart pounded. “It doesn’t matter if they want Aesir or not. We can’t let them reach Talaven. We can’t let them enslave the humans and use them as food or whatever it is they do to them.”
“And how will we stop them, eh? With our swords? That doesn’t work. Neither do Kalen’s powers.”
“We can’t justletthem do this.” My voice dropped to a hiss.
Fenella sighed. “Look, I want to fight them just as much as anyone, but we can’t throw ourselves into the line of fire and expect good results. We need a plan. One that will work. You get us one of those, and I will gladly fight by your side.”
I fell silent, my cheeks heating, hating that she was right. We had no plan. We had no weapon that could destroy them. Nothing that could even harm them. Nothing but…Nellie. But even if her claws could wound the gods, we couldn’t send her up against five of them. She wouldn’t survive.
And even if we did send her, then what? The gods would only heal themselves if she harmed them, and then they’d continue on their path of destruction. We needed something else. Somethingpermanent.
Suddenly, a muffled voice cut through the silence. “Your Majesty!”
Kalen stiffened and pulled a pale gray communication stone from his pocket. Within seconds, he’d lit a flame beneath it, and a face flashed across the stone’s surface. A dark-haired fae—bloodied and dirtied and bruised—looked out at us.
“It’s one of the scouts,” Fenella hissed, coming around to Kalen’s side. “Kerr, what’s happening?”
The scout heaved, his face twisted in pain. Even from here, I could clearly see the lines that bracketed his mouth. “We went across the border, just like you asked. There are—”
Kerr screamed, and blood sprayed. The communication stone went dead.
Kalen swore and dropped the stone on the table. It thudded against the surface, a heavy noise that reflected the pounding of my heart. My mouth dry, I tried to blink away the image. So much blood. Whatever had killed him…he’d been ripped to shreds.
Had it been the gods? Or something else?
Truth be told, which was worse?
“That settles it, then,” Kalen said grimly. “If the gods were heading to the mortal kingdoms, they would have moved north toward the coast. If they’re this close to the border, I think we can assume they plan to destroy Dubnos.”
“We could be in their way,” Toryn pointed out. “If they want to reach Talaven, they might plan to sail from Star Isles or even Sunport. That means going through Dubnos first.”
“They have wings,” I said, gazing around at all of them. “Don’t they? Why would they need a ship?”
Kalen traced a path along the table from Gailfean to the coast. “We’re just reaching around in the dark and hoping to find purchase. But truth be told, we have no idea what will happen next. So we need to prepare as if the gods are on their way to attack this city. It’s time to reach out to Ruari and Gaven. We need them both if we’re going to win this battle.”
