CHAPTER 24

AUREN TURLEY

The dungeon's corridor is made up of a half wall of thick gray stone. Gripping the top like a balcony railing, I look over and down, taking in the multiple levels that seem to sink below at least four stories.

Just how many people does this king keep imprisoned?

Sparse echoes and muffled shouting come from somewhere in this labyrinth, and there are blocks of light that filter in through large open grates at the ceiling.

Even with that fresh air filtering in, the smell in here…well, it's not great. I guess that's to be expected. I probably don't smell great either.

"Hey!"

I snap my attention over to another guard hurrying toward me. "What are you—"

My ribbons surge forward and wrap around his body before slamming him into the wall. I hear a woman scream in alarm behind the thick stone door of the next cell over.

My stomach seizes, eyes pinning to the guard. "Who's the prisoner in that cell? Is it Emonie?" I demand, anxiousness tearing into my chest.

He sputters, and I let a few of the ribbons loosen from his neck so he can answer. "Fuck. You," he spits.

I let out a growl of frustration, and my ribbons toss him into my cell with Una and the other dead guard. Then my gold grabs the bottom of the door like curled knuckles, and shuts it firmly in place, locking him in.

Breathing hard, I look around, trying to come up with a plan. The size of this dungeon is overwhelming, but I can't waste any time. I need to look for Emonie and Wick. If I can find them, I can ask them questions, and maybe more of my memories will untwist.

I need to check the cells.

Hurrying over, I stand in front of the door where I heard the muffled scream. But there's a whole row of doors beyond too, and even more in the levels below. I need to be quick and quiet.

My gaze flashes down to where the gold sloshes at my feet, and an idea catches fire. Instantly, I direct some of my magic to narrow into a thin strip, and then let it sink into the lock of the door. As soon as the keyhole is plugged, the liquid metal hardens into the key.

Please work…

The key turns and the lock disengages. Excitement swells through me, and a smile bursts on my face as I shove the cell door open—

But it's not Emonie inside.

The female fae is hunched in the corner, her face pale, clothes mere rags. She looks at me with fear.

"I won't hurt you," I tell her. "You're free to go."

She's too scared to move with me standing here, so I head for the next door, my gathered gold streaming behind me. I stop and look down the line at the cells, and then I send my magic flowing all the way down the corridor. Once it reaches the end, the gold breaks off into several small cords, each one delving into the locks and snicking open the doors one after the other.

I stride forward, the golden armor over my torso and arms moving with me like a second—although far stronger—skin. I push the door open, searching for Emonie and Wick, but I find a skeleton inside instead, skin and sinew long gone.

At the next, there's an old fae lying on his bed who looks at me with awe. "You're free," I tell him before hurrying on.

The next cell is empty, and the one after that too, but the following one holds a male with dark hair, and my heart leaps at the sight. Until he turns to fully face me and I see it's not Wick.

This male has a different shaped face, and there's a thick barb that's been stabbed through his tongue. It hangs from his mouth, leaving him wordless. The female I find in the adjacent enclosure takes one look at the open door, leaps past me, and sprints away.

I don't know why any of these prisoners are in here, whether it's rightfully earned or not, but I don't care. I'm not leaving until I check every room.

Rumbled footsteps come running, and I tense as more guards appear around the corner, probably tipped off by some of the escaping prisoners. I glance up, sizing them up, my magic readying. All six of them lift their weapons and charge toward me, their steps echoing throughout the dungeon.

"Where are Emonie and Wick?" I call.

The one at the front shouts back, "Arrest her!"

My lips pull into a sneer and my ribbons tense. "Go ahead and try."

Their steps falter when I start sprinting toward them instead of running away. I see their expressions flash with concern just as I release my gold on them like a pack of wild dogs.

The guards might as well be holding their dicks instead of swords for all the good it does them. My gold races ahead and tackles their group to the ground, feasting on them with molten retribution.

As soon as they hit the floor, the gold solidifies, hardening their bodies beneath the shell. Their screams are muffled under the thick layer, bones knocking against the hollow trap.

Looking around, I see I've cleared this entire section of cells, but I'm not leaving yet. I might not know exactly who Emonie and Wick are or who they are to me , but I know that we were arrested together. And I know that Emonie gave me that Vulmin ring, trying to help me remember.

I have to find them.

So I work meticulously. Thoroughly. As quickly as I can.

The inmates crawl out from their dark spaces like rats flooded from their holes. Some look like they're near death, others like they've only just been tossed in. Most take one look at me and my coiling ribbons and run the other way toward freedom.

But none of them are the two people I saw in my memory.

I pull at my tangled hair in frustration. Where are they?

A sinister thought enters my head, telling me they could be dead already, that I could be searching for them for nothing. I bat the thought away. I refuse to believe that until I see it with my own eyes.

But my frustration continues to build with every cell I open. Luckily, I get to take it out on the next two groups of guards that I run into. After they refuse to tell me any information, I leave them as gold lumps upon the floor.

When I open the very last cell on the very bottom level and find another woman who isn't Emonie, I lean against the wall, panting hard, sweat dripping down my temples.

They're not here.

I slam my hand against the wall in frustration, teeth gritted and eyes burning.

"Lady Auren?"

I jerk upright at the call, looking at the woman as she gets up from where she was crouched in her cell. She has a mark on her cheek, like someone took a whip and lashed it across her face.

I study her, hoping recognition will flare, but it doesn't. Tears fill her eyes as she rushes over to me, her bare feet scraping against the floor that's now littered with flecks of gold.

"Lady Auren," she pants again, reaching forward to grip my hand. "You saved us!"

My eyes flick up to her ears that are blunt and rounded like mine. My brow furrows, thoughts tripping over the divots in my mind. The information I seek is just out of reach.

Even though I don't recognize her, she recognizes me, and it makes a fragment of relief fit into me. It might be strange, but her knowing me makes me feel more real. To her, I'm someone. I just have to figure out exactly who without making myself vulnerable.

The look on my face must show something concerning, because she pauses and peers at me, her hands dropping mine. "Are you alright?"

"How do you know me?" I ask carefully, my tone guarded.

She blinks. "You…you came to save us. At the manor. Remember? I first saw you in the village."

My thoughts stall, her words not bringing up any connections. "Do you know who Wick and Emonie are?" I ask, changing tactics.

Her face screws up in thought, and she shoves away limp, oily clumps of hair. "Are they the ones who came with you?"

"I…think so?"

She shakes her head. "You three weren't brought down to these levels with us."

"Us?"

"More of us Oreans, yes. They didn't kill us all," she tells me, tongue darting out to her cracking lip as it quivers. "Though I think that's only because they wanted to use us against you."

Oreans.

I feel my brows draw together in a frown. That word is just at the edge of a memory…

The woman's eyes drift over my shoulder, and then she suddenly runs past me. "You're okay!"

I watch as she hugs another man, and then five others reunite with wet eyes. I'm guessing these are the Oreans she mentioned. Each of them is marked with their own evidence of abuse, and each of them has blunt ears.

My mind continues to delve, trying to grasp hold of something tangible, but the memories slip past my fingers.

"Lady Auren, where is the king?" one of the men asks.

I turn to him and shake my head, remembering the crowned man with the cold eyes. "I don't know, but he better hope he's nowhere nearby," I say, vengeance coating my words like the gold that coats the ground.

The man frowns.

My fingers press against my throbbing temple, a grimace slipping past before I can stop it. My mind might be muddled, but my body is speaking to me crystal clear—I'm run down and my strength is waning.

"Time to go," I say once I drop my hand. "Anyone know the way out?"

A male fae with pointed ears lifts his hand. "I do."

With a nod, he starts leading the way. We head down the long corridor and up the slatted stairs to the higher levels. My legs burn from exertion, and the rest of the inmates struggle too, but escaping imprisonment is quite the motivator.

Once we reach the top, we walk down a tunnel, coming out from a cave that's right beside a thundering waterfall. The water gushes down off the cliff we're inside of, kicking out spray as it falls far below us, and hits the awaiting river with churning mist.

We walk along a narrow path, the stone slick beneath my bare feet. We wind up and away from the cave, and then we reach sunlight and grass and fresh air. I take a deep breath, reveling in the freedom, my ribbons basking in it as much as I am.

The prisoners who've slunk out with me all stop and stare, eyeing everything warily while I look around. There aren't any guards lying in wait, no soldiers here to try to shove us back into the dungeon. Instead, trees stand sentinel, proving just how arrogant the king really is. How much he's underestimated me.

The forest is quiet, blue sap bleeding from the trees' white-trimmed bark. Their green leaves hang heavy, like unrolled balls of wool bunched up along the branches.

Through these timber troops, I can see we're on a tall, flat circle of land. The rest of the landscape sits in a sunken valley, with a river fed from this very waterfall. But my eyes drift to the grand palace straight ahead, standing right at the center of this plateau, with a mountain at its back and the valley below.

The palace is ethereal. Smooth white stone like quartz bolts upward in graceful arching lines. The top of the turrets bloom with geodes, and the sloping rooftops glitter with a spray of crystals that sparkle in the sunlight. Hundreds of stained glass windows decorate the lengths of every wall, like the building is adorned with elaborate pieces of jewelry in every color.

"Never thought I'd see Glassworth Palace," the woman with the whip mark murmurs. "Now I want to get as far away from it as I can."

I know what she means. It might be beautiful to look at, but there's a danger that lurks beneath the allure. An elegant mask over a monstrous face.

Spinning in a circle, mind spinning with me, I know that I need to get these people safely away from here. I need to get somewhere we can rest and wait, where I can use more rot magic to exterminate the infestation in my head.

"I know who you are."

The sentence startles me, making my heart skip a beat. Turning, I take in a stooped fae male. He has an iron collar around his neck and rotted teeth lining his gums. "You're a Turley, aren't you? That's why you're gold. You're that dead golden girl the Vulmin always told stories about." He looks me over, glassy eyes bulbous inside his thin face. "Didn't think you were actually gold."

That word again—Vulmin. That's what Emonie and Wick are. I think that might be what I am.

"And the Vulmin are…"

His brows lift in surprise and he looks around at some of the others. "The rebellion, of course. Never was a part of it myself… For all the good it did me," he adds bitterly before spitting at the ground that leads back toward the dungeon. "Still got locked up for ten years, didn't I? This monarchy will arrest anyone who even thinks of looking at the king sideways."

"I need to get you all away from here," I say, looking around again.

"We need to get off the plateau," a different male fae says, lips hidden behind a beard that's twisted in thick, matted knots. He points with his pinky, for he has no other fingers on his hand. The nubs left behind all look like they've been hacked off long ago, the skin uneven and stretched. "This way."

The other Oreans look at me in question.

I glance back at the palace. The urge for me to find Emonie and Wick is riding me hard, but I can't storm the place. I don't even know if that's where they are. All that's clear right now in my memories are their names and faces, and the king who imprisoned us. I need to find somewhere I can get my bearings, find out more information, and formulate a plan.

"Lead the way."

The prisoner starts limping ahead, while I take up the rear. I keep my senses peeled for any guards, and keep looking over my shoulder at the palace. It feels like its stained glass windows are watching me.

We walk for about five minutes past the waterfall before coming to another spot on the perpendicular cliff. A path has been molded into its side like a raised scar against skin, leading all the way to the bottom where the valley sits.

Some of the inmates shoot me worried looks, and I have to admit, the steep, narrow path does look daunting. But unless we want to go toward the palace, this seems like the only way to go.

I give them a comforting smile while I swallow down my own unease, and then we start to make our way down. There's only a splintered wooden rail that's more rickety than secure, so I keep my hands at my sides and stay with the inmates who have a harder time walking, just in case one of them slips.

We're somewhat exposed here against the cliffside, but I can't help but appreciate the view. There's a large, beautiful city down there in the valley, amongst the tall trees that must be at least a hundred feet high. Their deep green leaves offset the lavender sky, and their branches and trunks twist like plaited hair.

Orbs of light glitter from the trees, casting a glow below of purples, blues, and yellows that must look beautiful at night. The white stone buildings themselves have swooping architecture and intricate designs with arches and steeples, glass atriums and draping eaves.

From here, I can see glimpses of covered stone roads and half-moon bridges that arc over crystalline canals fed from the waterfall. The river branches off into different directions, feeding both forest and city.

"What is that place called?" I ask.

"Lydia," a fae female answers. It's the first sound I've heard her make. "Annwyn's capital city." She says nothing more, though she eyes it with distrust.

When we get to the bottom, I think everyone breathes out a sigh of relief. The road isn't far from the river that churns out from the falls, and down here, beneath the canopy of the branches, the air is brisk and fresh. We go beneath the thick trees to get out of the open. By the angle of the sun in the sky, I think it's nearly midday.

Everyone is antsy to keep going. The question is, which way?

"That road'll take you right to the city, but you're mad if you go anywhere near there," the male fae says before pointing at the collar that rings his neck. "Stone Swords are everywhere in the city, and they'll take one look at you all and toss you right back in a cell. I'm heading away from Lydia, and you all should too if you have half a brain."

He glances at the Oreans. "And cover those ears of yours. Oreans aren't welcome in this part of the kingdom." He turns and hurries away, heading deeper into the trees. Most of the other prisoners do the same, swiftly disappearing from sight.

"He's right," the Orean woman tells me. "We should go."

A distant swell of cheering comes from somewhere in the city then, making me stop and turn. I try to look through the thick trees, but I can't see any of the buildings from here.

Another burst of noise rises from Lydia, and I frown, feeling something in my gut wedging its way in. I understand that everyone else wants to move in the opposite direction as fast as they can, but…I can't seem to force my feet away. Something is telling me not to.

"Lady Auren? Are we going?"

Without my memories, I don't have a lot to go on, so I can't ignore my intuition. Something is screaming at me to go toward the city instead, and I have to pay attention to that.

I turn back toward the woman and glance at the other Oreans. "You all stay hidden here," I say. "I'm going to check the city."

Her eyes widen. "But it's dangerous."

"It's okay," I tell her with a smile. "I'm dangerous too."