and terrifying. “Leave this place. I require neither lance nor sword—I shall tear you asunder with hands and will alone.”
14
Rags
Shining Talon had dropped into a crouch, one arm flung out to keep Rags in relative safety behind him. His bulk stood between Rags and Morien like a living shield—not that it mattered, because Rags was bound to the sorcerer by mirrorcraft. Morien could snap his fingers and slice Rags’s heart open from the inside out.
The only good thing about the situation was that Morien hadn’t done it yet. And there was a fae in the mix who might be able to prevent the heart slicing from happening.
Or he might cause further, unfathomable damage.
It was impossible to read Morien’s face, hidden behind swaths of red cloth. But he definitely didn’t look as shocked as he should have to see a real live fae standing next to Rags.
Standing in front of Rags, to be more accurate.
Rags slipped the rock into his pocket. The instinct to hide what he could was still stronger than fear for his life.
“Rags,” Morien began, “you should have called—”
“Silence,” Shining Talon said. The word rippled through the air, twisted it into something solid, like it too could be used as a weapon. “My lord Rags, I shall protect you from this foul creature with my life, if necessary.”
That might be useful. Rags thought of his assets, and the fact that the fae seemed fonder of him than of Morien was going in the plus column.
Morien took a step back, holding up gloved and empty hands. “It will not be necessary. Rags and I are friends.”
“Lord Rags would not trust a Lying One with his oath of friendship and alliance.” A pause. Shining Talon’s shoulders tightened at Rags’s silence. “The Lying One speaks false, Lord Rags?”
Rags wet his dry lips with his tongue. “It’s a complicated situation that, uh . . .”
“Oh.” A hint of sorrow beneath a wealth of anger. “The Lying One has bound you to his cheating will with wicked mirrorcraft.”
As opposed to the really good mirrorcraft that had tried to eat him in the glass maze, Rags thought.
Recognizing the potential value of not speaking up in the situation, he kept his lips buttoned.
“I effected an act of security against my interests, to which Rags agreed,” Morien said.
In a manner of speaking.
“Against this I cannot protect you fully,” Shining Talon told Rags. “I am no master of the lying arts. I am a warrior only. If I could protect your heart—”
Nope. First things first. If they were on the same side, that meant Rags needed to make Shining Talon stop talking. He was only going to get the pair of them into trouble. “Not necessary. Heart in one piece currently, so if you’re dead set on helping me, you could start with more specific directions to the Great”—what was it called?—“Paramour?”
“Paragon.”
“Right, the treasure . . . thing,” Rags agreed. “It’s the deal I made with the Lyi—the sorcerer. The issue here is if I don’t deliver.”
“For a Lying One to possess the Great Paragon—”
That sharp pain again. On the other side of Shining Talon’s devoted collection of coiled muscles, Morien had a hand lifted in the air, tracing invisible symbols. Commands. Rags’s heart answered by slowing, shuddering, stopping. His face paled, his fingertips turning blue. The blood that still oozed lazily from his open cuts dried up at once, and he pitched forward into Shining Talon’s back, gasping for breath that didn’t answer his call.
Rags gurgled a wordless sound, begging despite himself. He’d made it through all those fucking doors, had been so clever, and what did it matter? At the end there was no treasure, only a pissed-off sorcerer, and Rags was the most likely target for said sorcerer to vent his frustrations.
No, it was smarter than that. He was being used. No one in the Clave would’ve stopped to spit on him if he were dying of thirst, yet here he was, tormented by mirrorglass in his heart into forcing a fae to give up his fae secrets.
There was no way Shining Talon would fall for—
“Very well. I will lead you to the Great Paragon, however I am able,” Shining Talon said.
Rags’s pain vanished.
“But it will be perilous,” Shining Talon concluded.
“Anything worthwhile tends to be,” Morien replied.
“What hasn’t been, lately?” Rags muttered.
“And Lord Rags will be required each step of the way,” Shining Talon concluded. “Alive.”
Moment of surprise at the stipulation aside, Rags liked the sound of that part.