City of Spells (Into the Crooked Place #2) - Alexandra Christo Page 0,77

Forest. It wasn’t her job to take responsibility for everything that went wrong in the world.

“It might not have been him,” Saxony said.

She didn’t want to think it, but how could she not? Dante Ashwood knew about the Uncharted Forest and with Zekia by his side, she’d be a fool not to consider that her sister might have told him. Though Tavia seemed sure it was Nolan, Saxony couldn’t quell the doubts in her mind. Her Kin had been hiding there for decades without suspicion and yet their attackers knew the weakest parts of their defenses.

Zekia had betrayed her so many times now. Saxony couldn’t trust that she hadn’t done it again.

It made her wonder whether her sister was truly lost.

“It wasn’t Zekia,” Wesley said.

“How could you possibly know that?” Saxony asked.

“Because she told me.”

“She told you,” Saxony repeated.

Wesley looked reluctant to say more, as if admitting any kind of connection between him and Zekia would be acknowledging the connection that he and Saxony now shared.

“Think of it as using her own tricks against her,” he said. “Mind magic is a two-way street and once a lock’s been broken, it’s not hard to walk through the door.”

If Wesley was suggesting what Saxony thought he was, then that seemed dangerous. He’d only known about his powers for a few weeks, whereas Zekia had been learning to craft since she was a child. If Wesley wanted to try to invade her mind from here, it would take work, and Saxony worried about just how much.

She looked at him, into those black eyes that still unsettled her. It happened sometimes with magic poisoning, or when Intuitcrafters spent too long inside a person’s mind, which was a roundabout way of saying that Zekia had drained all of the color from Wesley’s eyes when she tortured him.

Saxony felt too much shame to know what to say.

She should have done more to stop Zekia from taking him. She should have tried harder to save him and worked with Tavia to bring him home.

But she hadn’t. She’d left her brother to rot.

Saxony already owed Wesley her life and now she had yet another debt to him that she couldn’t repay. Another mistake she couldn’t take back.

“Mind magic is tricky,” Saxony said. “You could hurt yourself.”

Wesley looked insulted at the thought of himself not being invincible. “It’s not tricky with her,” he said.”I don’t even need to try much when it comes to Zekia.”

“Yes,” Amja said. “Your connection is strong, both in your minds and in your blood.”

Wesley shifted a little, probably because of the unblinking way Amja stared at him.

He adjusted his lapels.

“Point being, I can make her see sense. We just need to hold out.”

And by hold out, he meant hide out in this safe house with a weakened army and little hope for more recruits. They had lost dozens in the fight, and now that the other underbosses had been killed, there would be no reinforcements from their buskers.

The Kingpin had seen to that. He’d slaughtered their soldiers before they’d even had time to recruit them.

“What we need now are ideas on how to deal with Ashwood,” Wesley said. “Fenna Schulze has agreed to discuss an alliance. Now that Ashwood’s forces are closing in on the government city, she welcomed my bat.”

“So we need to have a plan to present to her,” Tavia said.

Wesley nodded. “Any ideas on a way we could halt the spread of the Loj?”

“You should speak to my amja about that.” Saxony folded her arms across her chest. “She’s the one with all the plans.”

Like the plans to have Saxony kill her own brother.

“And you’re the one who enjoys doing whatever you like with no regard for my wisdom,” Amja said.

“At least I’m not a liar.”

“Well, not right now.” Tavia leaned back against the wall with her eyebrows raised. “But your track record is a little shady.”

Saxony turned to glare at her. “Says the girl who runs off to rob buskers by herself without consulting anyone and nearly gets herself killed.”

“Yeah, well, you’re the one who—”

“Enough!”

Wesley slammed his hands down on the table.

“We need to present a plan to the Doyen, and right now the only thing I have to show her is a bunch of people feeling sorry for themselves.”

He rubbed his temples like they were giving him a headache.

Saxony had rarely felt so chastened, even by her amja, who made a sport out of guilting her.

“I just meant that my amja is the Liege,” she said. “So you should