One snarled and lunged. Einan slammed the hilt of her dagger into a digger’s head.
Cab’s face felt tight and hot and One’s claws were stained ruby when they finally lowered their weapons to silence.
“Shit.” Einan’s voice was hoarse.
She was closest to the dig site, so it was she who’d first seen what the Queen’s men had been excavating from a nearby mound of dirt and stone: the corner of a glass coffin, threaded with silver.
Inside, a pulse. A glow that throbbed like a heartbeat.
One padded closer. The carvings on the walls brightened, lit from behind.
Through the glass, they saw it together: the top half of a golden face in repose. Asleep. Peaceful. When their shadow fell across its features, its eyes fluttered open, and they were silver through and through.
60
Inis
Between Three and Shining Talon, Somhairle made his staggering way to bed. One of the servants had a cup of strong tea waiting, smelling of bark and ginger and mint, and Somhairle nearly spilled it in his lap with shaking hands.
Inis helped him to drink.
“I fear I’ve overextended myself.” His fingers lingered on hers for an instant, letting her know he was all right.
Should have been an actor. Two sounded impressed.
Tea finished, Somhairle collapsed on the pillows, face releasing its tension in sleep.
They left him with Three standing guard, perched on the bedpost.
When they returned to the hall, Morien awaited them. His eyes glittered with veins of silver.
Had they been that way before?
“No need to worry,” he said in his steady, unimpressed voice. Each word was a pinprick in Inis’s heart. “I don’t intend to do to the prince what I needed to with you. He’s a vulnerable spirit, too kind for court. Would he do a thing that would put your life in danger, Inis Fraoch Ever-Loyal?”
It was like being back on the Hill, at a ball or tea party, trading barbs with a smile. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean—” Inis began.
“Find me the next fragment.” Morien held up his hand and Inis’s throat shut tight. She couldn’t breathe. When Rags choked on a gasp, Inis understood she wasn’t the only one suffering from Morien’s warning. “That is all I require.”
The curtains in the hallway billowed inward, though the windows were shut.
Morien was gone when they settled.
Inis snarled and slammed her hand into the wall. She let it hold her weight as she gasped for breath, trembling and fiercely glad Somhairle hadn’t seen her like that.
If she could keep her temper from getting the better of her, she could believe they’d win this battle.
So why did it taste bitter, like soft, smoldering leaf ash, reminding her of the pipe her father used to smoke?
You’re a puppet who sees its own strings, Two said. No peace until they’re cut.
One day, she’d learn how to unravel the knot in her throat.
Inis rubbed her neck as if to reassure herself that no invisible fingers still gripped it. There was no safety to be found in defying Morien.
No safety in the Queen’s embrace, either.
Any mistake could spark unforgivable consequences, but Inis couldn’t protect her family by merely staying out of the Queen’s way.
She felt Two twine around and between her legs, momentarily getting lost in her skirts before reappearing. His eyes peered out under the fall of fabric.
The little thief has provided us with something invaluable. Not everything is lost.
Inis crouched to rub Two’s head, the jagged shape where his missing ear should be. Inis didn’t know why she hadn’t thought of it before, but someone must have stolen a fork or spoon from the set.
“We’ll have to wait for Somhairle to wake up,” she said aloud, with the same false confidence she used to show for Ivy’s sake. This time she wasn’t trying to fool her frightened little sister but a nasty sorcerer from whom only her inner thoughts were safe. Her false certainty would have to work. She knew what awaited them if they failed. “I can tell Somhairle how to commune with Three, how to figure out where to go next, if he hasn’t worked it out already. Maybe Morien will have found what we lost by then.”
“Wanna bet me on it?” Rags asked.
They met each other’s eyes.
“I’m not the betting kind,” Inis replied.
61
Cab
Cab had to use the sword’s pommel to chip at the stone around the fae coffin, dirt laid atop ancient white rock that fought them for every inch. Einan hacked away beside him, holding one stolen dagger two-handed. Neither of them was as successful as