“I don’t want to see it either.” The bitterness came out unguarded.
There was a question in his golden gaze as it found mine. Concern. For me or for his plan or for both, intermingled. I had the feeling it had become both for him, Lightbringer and I braided into one.
Lightbringer and I, both used. There was no love in that.
Then he looked up, and I followed his gaze. I could see nothing in the darkness, and then he lifted one of the torches and flung it into the air. It went end over end, sending flickers of flame and shadow alternating over the wall, and then I saw the Skein.
The antechamber ceiling was vaulted and high. I could see them now that I knew to look: the pale shape pressed against the ceiling like something painted there, wings folded tight, their elongated body motionless. Waiting. Then I picked out the second one. By the time the torch had fallen back to earth between us, the fire smothered by the sand, I knew what was above.
And I had decided what to do.
My hand went to his belt while his attention was on the Skein. I had told myself I would not be weak. I lifted the small vial—I didn’t even think about it, my fingers closing on glass—and in one fluid motion, I stole the potion from his belt and palmed it.
The monster writhed past us, wings flapping desperately, and I plunged in after it. I just wanted to get away from him.
Fear cursed and followed me. We reached the end of the corridor, where a dark mirror watched over us in a rounded antechamber; here the two of us had room to swing, side-by-side. As he skidded to a stop at my side, the sound covering us, I dropped the potion. I didn’t dare give myself the opportunity to second-guess.
The Skein whipped its tail out toward me, and I met it with my blade, and I stepped deliberately on the glass and felt it break beneath my boot.
My monster—the smaller and easier of the two—died first.
I straightened, catching my breath, knowing Fear did not need my help as he struck out at the monster, and it recoiled, hissing, dripping blood. I was probably more trouble than I was help at this point, given he watched over me—over his mission—just as much as he fought the monsters. It would be no loss to Bismyth when I went back to Stonehaven.
And so I could see the mirror come alive behind his back, unnoticed.
The space was unidentifiable by its stone walls; it could have been back at the castle or behind the dais. Tay stood looking at something off to one side, a grin fixed across his face. Lidi was sitting in a chair that was too tall for her—a normal chair was too tall for her, and the chairs here were sized for longer Fae legs—so she swung her legs as she examined something in her hands, a bauble or toy she seemed to find fascinating.
Mam was hunting around in that space. It took me a second to understand, because she looked like she had when she was annoyed she could not find a gardening tool or—but there was terror on her face too. My own terror kindled in my chest in response.
She was hunting for a weapon.
She would strike out at the queen rather than be raised to the Fae, perhaps as unwilling as I was to lose her mortality. If she did, the Nightwalkers would strike her down.
Her mortal life would end tonight, one way or another.
Pack your bags for Stonehaven.
Unless I preserved her life. Unless I ensured the queen did not raise her hands to my mother for a blessing that was also a punishment.
My throat closed.
Tay laughed at something outside the frame. Lidi looked up from her trinket at the sound and smiled. She was my bright and shining little sister, and after tonight, if I failed her, she would never be herself again.
Mam gripped a fireplace poker. What was in her face was desperate and terrible and full of love.
Something that had been rushing through me since the queen’s study, since the labyrinth that morning, since Maura by the waterfall, settled.
Quietly, very quietly, I slid my sword home into the sheath.
Tonight I will raise three mortals.
Mam’s hand closed around the fireplace poker.
My hand found the knife’s hilt, and I drew it. Not the one he had given me. The other.
Fieran drove the sword through the Skein’s guts. “You were faster than me this time. Putting me to shame as any good student does eventually, though?—”
This was the only way to protect them.
