Chapter 20

Upstairs, in the aftermath of the hag, it was frighteningly quiet again.

I moved slowly, as if walking through yet another nightmare. The mirror pulsed beneath the velvet cover I'd wrapped it in. After the hag had wrenched herself free of the glass, the floor-length mirror had shrunk down to the size of a handheld one, solving the smallest of our problems. Its insubstantial weight was a relief to my exhausted body.

Rosydd had scorched the air with magic as she'd fled the warehouse. The power was different than the others' I had felt. This was a deep, ancient magic, one that gave birth to worlds and tore others asunder. It vibrated in my bones, my teeth, as I traced its path up the stairs and back into the library.

I counted the others as I saw them.

One —Caitriona standing on the remains of the bookshelves, staring through the missing door into the hall. A glob of viscous blood fell from the ceiling onto the floor in front of her, and as I neared, I could see where that same monstrous blood had painted the ceiling. In the grand hall, only a scattering of bones was left of the Children.

Two —Neve sat beside three, Nash, watching as he bent over four, Emrys. His shirt had been torn open, exposing the horrifying wounds and the way the claws had reopened some of his scars. The bridge of Nash's nose was still swollen from where I'd hit it, and the bruise only seemed to add to the seriousness of his mien. His brow furrowed in concentration as he used a needle and thread to try to sew the gashes shut.

I'd seen him stitch himself up countless times after run-ins with unhappy business partners and close calls with curses, but seeing him do it to another person—and a Dye at that—only added to the surreal quality of the moment.

"There, dove, you can apply it now, just be quick and gentle with it," Nash murmured.

Neve screwed a small jar of ointment open, and its soft, minty fragrance somehow cut through even the vile stench of death around us. Her fingers shook as she dabbed it onto the row of stitches Nash had just finished before moving on to the next.

I chewed on my lip as fear swallowed the rest of my thoughts. Emrys's skin looked like wax, as if all the life had drained from it. But somehow his heart was still beating. Somehow he was still breathing.

Nash finally looked up, his eyes scanning me quickly before returning to his work. "You've had some real harebrained ideas in your short life …" He looked up again, the corner of his mouth twitching. "That, however, was not one of them."

That rare bit of praise caught me off guard.

"Are you okay?" I asked Neve, despising the emotion overtaking my voice, the strain. She waved off my concern, still looking a bit worse for wear. "Next time you think about being that brave, remember that no one's going to take care of your weird bone collection. And I'm going to be very upset."

She struggled to smother her smile. "Are you … mad at me for getting hurt?"

"Of course I am!" I said huffily. "You're not allowed to bail on us—"

I clamped my lips shut, glaring at Nash as he pretended not to listen.

"And you, " I said. "You couldn't have shown up five minutes earlier?"

He scowled. "If you'd just done what I asked, the four of you— "

I stilled, letting the rest of his words roll past me like the rumble of thunderclouds.

Four of us. Four.

I scanned the wreckage of the library again, fear spiking my pulse. The mirror slid from my hands, hitting the floor with a dull thump. Neve sent me a questioning look.

I counted five, but there should have been six.

"Where's Olwen?" My voice sounded like I was speaking underwater.

Caitriona was in front of me in the space of a moment. "What do you mean? She's downstairs."

My pulse sped and sped, until I thought I would double over. "No. She came up to help you—"

Caitriona pushed past me. Her silver hair streamed out behind her like a banner as we bypassed the open doors of the elevator and made for the stairs again. By the time we reached the warehouse, the magic that had burst from the mirror with the hag had settled, and the room was cold and silent again.

"Olwen?" Caitriona called out. " Olwen! Where are you?"

"Maybe she hid when she heard the Children?" I thought aloud. But even I knew that made no sense. She would never abandon the people she loved, even to a losing fight. "Olwen!"

Caitriona went right, heading in the direction of the armoire Emrys and I had hidden inside. A new thread of cold weaving through the air drew me left, and as I made my way through the shattered remains of shelves and cases, I saw something that hadn't been there before.

Snow.

White flakes floated in the standing crimson pools of champagne, then melted away. More and more of it was scattered over what was visible of the floor, over furniture that had been kicked over and out of the way.

I followed the trail of it, gaining speed with every step, tracing that same icy thread through the darkness of the room until it brought me to a stone wall. There, the snowflakes were drifting into the warehouse not from a crack between the stones, but through the stones themselves.

I held out a hand, pushing it forward, feeling the magic crawl over my skin toward the hidden passage on the other side.

"Cait!" I shouted.

Emrys had been right after all. There was a way out of the warehouse—a little smuggler's tunnel that opened to a storm-whipped river. The snow shrouded much of the surrounding landscape. I could only make out the scattered trees by their shadowed outlines. The sigils carved into the stone near my feet were the same spell that had concealed the entrance to the warehouse.

I shielded my eyes and, bracing my front foot, leaned out from the edge of the tunnel, wary of the steep drop down to the water. "Olwen!"

The sharp smell of snow filled my lungs, undercut by the river's earthiness. There was no dock, but the river's dark water lapped up against two wooden posts marking either side of the tunnel entrance. Loose ropes twirled from each.

"She fought," Caitriona said quietly behind me.

I spun around. She gestured to the wall beside her, sweeping her hands down to the ground, revealing what my untrained eye had missed. The gray stone was charred black, and chunks of the smooth surface were scattered around her feet. She took a careful step toward me, crossing one foot over the other. Her mouth tightening with concentration as she knelt to touch a groove in the dirt, where something—someone—had been dragged.

Her eyes followed its path, stopping at a spot near my feet. It was only then that distress settled over her expression, carving deep lines in her face.

I forced myself to look.

Buried beneath a layer of snow, painted brown with the tunnel's grime, was a bracelet of braided fabric, torn apart at the knot .

I picked it up with trembling fingers, holding it out for Caitriona to see. The tunnel seemed to press in around us, suffocating.

Only two alive in Rivenoak had known about this way out. One was upstairs, unconscious. The other …

Caitriona's eyes met mine, burning with rage, and I knew she was thinking the same thing.

Wyrm.