Page 15

“She is. When Tris and I call her a saint, we aren’t just being generous with our praise. She wields healing mana skillfully. But I’m afraid I never was particularly gifted at channeling magic in that precise way. Lord Ch—” Cedric cleared his throat. “In all my time training to take on the Crucible, I was really never able to get the hang of it. I figured it was like it is for those who have the ability to become seers—mindwielders, to you all. Some people can, and some people can’t. But now I am curious . . .”

“If you were just trying to do the wrong sort of healing?” Zephyr asked, her lilting voice soft. Cedric nodded. “I think you could do it, for what it’s worth. You already have everything you need.”

“I wouldn’t know where to begin. How do I⁠—”

“The same way you call on it to do anything else.” Kit clapped a hand on Cedric’s shoulder. “Only, you know, different.”

He arched his brow. “Very helpful, thank you.”

“Oh, give it a try, knightling. It’s only skin.”

He swallowed, a sort of nervous energy settling over the entire space. Zephyr glanced up, curious. Thraigg folded his arms over his burly chest. Tristan smirked from across the room. Nox turned toward Cedric and the group, their head cocked with interest, before returning their gaze to watch Ignatius and Tyrren as they spoke in low tones, slowly rising from their chairs. Their emotional recovery from Cedric’s interrogation seemed to have caught up to their physical recovery at last.

Sid hopped up onto a stack of crates just behind Cedric, as though the shadowcat was setting up a better view.

“I wasn’t looking for an audience,” he grumbled, but he lifted his hands, nonetheless, holding one over the other, palm to bloodied knuckles. Digging into his furnace of magic, he focused not on the flame, the part that could scorch and burn and hurt, but on light. He thought of sunbeams streaming through rainbow-colored leaves, of the scent of cherries and almonds, of rain-soaked clothing and slivered bars of soap. He thought about periwinkle waves splayed across his pillow, about soft skin and softer words whispered in the dead of night.

Warmth spread through him like honey, his sunfyre illuminating his veins, making them glow beneath his skin. And then his hand was glowing too, golden light spilling from his palm. Cedric’s inhale was sharp and sudden as his split skin pulled tight, knitting together in an instant.

Beneath his armor, the locket was hot against his chest.

“You did it.” Zephyr’s words were little more than a whisper, and for a few heartbeats, there was awe and joy and pride sweeping through the group.

Then it changed.

Tristan’s shout of alarm came first.

Then, Sid’s unmistakable hiss.

There was the clashing sound of weapons—loud, sudden. It took Cedric another few moments to realize that Ignatius and Tyrren were no longer huddled together across the room. To recognize the swords of red crystal swinging from their hands.

And the sanguinagi attacked.

4

STRUGGLE

CEDRIC

Tristan pushed Tyrren back with a grunt, his metal sword scraping against the man’s blood-summoned blade. “What in the ever-living fuck is wrong with you? You were free to go!”

Ignatius’s weapon dropped to the floor with a clatter as the man groaned, hands gripping both sides of his head. His mouth was open, his lips moving as though he was trying to speak, but no intelligible words came out. Only a strangled series of snarls and sounds that could barely be classified as human.

Barely human, too, were both men’s eyes as veins crept through the whites, drowning their formerly brown irises in red.

“Get back!” Nox yanked their batons from their back and held them at the suddenly rabid men.

Were they even men anymore?

Along with their bloodred eyes and the animalistic sounds they made, the hands that Cedric had just cut free from their bindings had transformed into black-tipped claws. Tyrren’s sanguinagi weapon joined his brother’s on the floor as the sounds of snapping bones and yowling filled the hut.

They came.

Cedric barely had time to free Ashrender from the sheath at his hip before Ignatius was on top of him, lashing out with a mouth full of sharp, jagged fangs. Cedric pushed Ignatius back before twisting the blade and slicing across his chest. In an instant, Thraigg was there, launching his body onto the cultist-turned-monster with abandon, his arms wrapped around his neck.

Ignatius released a pained shout that caught the attention of his brother, who had lunged for Kit. The momentary distraction allowed Nox to shoulder between them, meeting the blow meant for the fae with their own body.

The nocterrian hissed, the fabric of their black coat torn at the shoulder, wet at the edges, and dark purpose came over Kit’s face. Icy mist gathered around Tyrren’s ankles—his legs bent at painful-looking angles, like his shins had lengthened, his silhouette more beast than man. A bestial yelp cut through when the mist suddenly rose, coating Tyrren’s skin, painting him in frost.