‘What Iwantis for you to do exactly as I tell you from here on out. And you can start by winning me the war.’
Syla blanches. ‘How?’
‘By stripping your people of their power.’
She barks out an empty laugh. ‘Never.’
Caius smiles. ‘I thought you might say that. Only you haven’t heard what I’ll offer you in return. Something tells me it might change your mind.’ He raises his voice, addressing someone beyond the door. ‘Bring in the girl.’
My heart twists violently as a knight drags Senna into the throne room, whimpering with fear. I don’t realize I’m shaking until Fox touches me lightly on the shoulder.
Syla’s eyes are wild, her hands gripping the bars of her cage. ‘Let her go.’
Caius presses the tips of his long fingers together. ‘Only if you do as I ask. Submit to me. Strip my enemies of their magic.’
At his words, Syla turns very still.
‘And be warned,’ Caius continues pleasantly. ‘If you’re pretending to comply only so that I will free you from that cage, you would be unwise. For I had one of the Magi prisoners of war cast a rather ingenious enchantment in exchange for his freedom. If you ever disobey me, young Senna here will die. So I ask one more time –take away the powers of the Magi.’
Silence falls like an axe. Past, present and future hang in the balance as Syla looks up at Caius, then over at Senna. The expression on her face is one of pure agony and pure love. It stays with me even when the vision fades. I suspect it’ll stay with me forever.
When I open my eyes, I’m back in the Wildlands, drizzle falling softly overhead.
‘Had enough?’ Fox asks quietly.
I nod, blinking away tears before they can fall. Tremors rack my body. My mind is full, but I feel only sick and hollow.
In order to save Senna, Syla agreed to give up her freedom and use her power to betray her own kind. She condemned her homeland to ruin, her people to a life of poverty and servitude. That was the cost of her sister’s life –everything.
And it was a price Syla was willing to pay.
26
Blaze
Iyelp as Fox’s dagger slices a shallow cut along my thigh. ‘Thathurt.’
‘Oh please, I barely scratched you,’ he drawls, dodging another of my ill-aimed swipes. ‘And maybe if you were paying attention, it wouldn’t have happened at all.’
‘Iampaying attention.’
‘No, you’re miles away. Come back to me, then we’ll fight like civilized people.’
He’s right – I am distracted, not to mention short-tempered, and so tense it’s difficult to achieve any degree of agility as we circle one another in the ring Fox has fashioned from several intertwined saplings. I’ve barely slept. I’m still reeling from those visions of the past. And is it any wonder? It’s not every day you come face-to-face with your adolescent grandmother, or witness a war that took place more than fifty years ago.
Eventually, I give up and toss Silverclaw to the ground. Fox does the same, driving the point of Soulkiller deep into the earth and hitching himself up on to a fallen tree.
‘Come, sit,’ he tells me, patting the patch of moss beside him as though it were a silk chaise. ‘I’ve been told I’m a good listener.’
I arch a brow. ‘Really?’
‘No.’
Rolling my eyes, I clamber up on to the tree.
‘I’m guessing this –’ Fox gestures at my brooding expression – ‘has something to do with this?’ He holds up the Eye of the Past.
‘I can’t stop thinking about it,’ I say quietly. ‘Our grandparents, the war, the sisters, Syla. It’s all so muchbiggerthan us. I suppose I’ve been reminded of how much is at stake.’
