Chapter 38

The suite of rooms they'd stuck me in was hardly a jail cell, but I felt the bars there all the same.

They'd locked the door behind me after they shoved me inside. And, with little else to do, I showered. The bathroom was almost obscene—bigger than my entire apartment, every inch of it pristine white marble with gilded accents. The water was hot, the pressure perfect. I might have treasured the experience, transcending to a new state of glorious existence, if my world hadn't been collapsing around me.

True to their word, the sorceresses left a change of clothes—jeans, a T-shirt, and a sweater, as well as new undergarments. They, and the basket of food beside them, didn't warm my heart to the Sistren in the slightest. After a quick inspection of the clothing, I put it on, tetchy at the softness of the fabric, the perfect fit of it.

The food was another story. If I hadn't been close to starving, I would have avoided it altogether. There were too many stories about fools eating faerie food and becoming trapped in Otherlands, or being cursed into sleep with a single bite, but I had crossed the point of desperation. My thoughts were becoming sluggish, and dressing had taken what little energy I had left.

So I ate an apple, and some bread, then the tasty little bits of unidentified cheese, and began to plan as I paced the room.

The midnight-blue walls were cluttered with framed pieces of tapestry, declarations, and portraits of sorceresses I only recognized by name. The assortment of deep armchairs and emerald-satin-covered sofas was an invitation to stop and rest, but I wasn't about to be wooed into letting my guard down by a nice suite and some fancy cheese.

The shifting light beneath the door told me someone was standing guard. Even if I got past them, the hallways were covered in curse sigils; I might not even make it to the room where they were keeping Neve, wherever that was. Emrys's room, maybe. But if I had a guard, so did he.

A gust of warm air rattled out from the vent above my head. Slowly, I tilted my neck back.

I'd seen a few security cameras in the hall; they'd stuck out like broken fingers among the old-fashioned finery the Sistren preferred. It hadn't even occurred to me to check my own room for them. Sure enough, in the upper right corner of the room, a camera was swiveling, tracking my movements.

My face flushed with anger as I wadded up my filthy old T-shirt and flipped the glassy black eye off. It took three tries to hook the shirt around the camera to block its view.

Satisfied and ever so smug, I turned to the opposite wall, where a large HVAC return vent had been placed.

They'd taken my workbag, of course, but they'd been kind enough to leave me a plastic toothbrush. Snapping the handle over my knee, I used the jagged end to unscrew the vent's cover. The metal sheeting groaned as I squeezed inside and replaced the cover behind me.

I had just enough room to wriggle my way up to where the vent turned at a ninety-degree angle and continued horizontally over the rooms on this side of the hall. I had to lie flat on my belly, but there was enough room to drag myself forward using my arms alone.

I winced as the thin metal of the vent let out an excruciating bang. Up ahead, light filtered down from above; I stayed focused on that, not the way the pathway seemed to be narrowing around me with every inch of forward progress.

"Um … hello? "

I reared up, knocking my head against the top of the vent. A face stared down at me through its brass cover, both brows raised.

And because my plan had existed for all of five minutes, without any sort of contingencies, I froze.

"I'm Mage Robin," they said. "Are you … stuck? Do you need some help?"

Mage was the neutral title chosen by those who felt the title of sorceress, and the feminine implications of it, did not fit them, but their skill and depth of power were the same.

"Can you pretend you didn't see me?" I whispered hopefully.

"How about I do you one better and just take you where you need to go?" Robin was already unscrewing the vent cover. Their wand was unusually short, at least compared to the one I'd seen Neve and the others use, but the athame end was a handier substitution for a screwdriver than my busted toothbrush.

With the cover lifted off, I got a better view of Robin. They wore their hair bleached blond and cropped close to the scalp, which created a beautiful contrast to the rich brown of their skin. With their warm, pleasant face, and eyes that damn near sparkled with excitement as they took in the sight of me, I felt myself relax, just a little bit.

Robin reached a hand down to help pull me through the opening. Knowing I wasn't about to escape now, I grasped their arm. The sleeve of their amethyst velvet duster was stained with what looked like splotches of ink. Their black shirt and trousers were simple but elegant.

Somehow, with Robin pulling and me pushing, I negotiated the opening and crawled out onto a wood floor. Turning onto my back, I surveyed the room.

Shelves upon shelves of Immortalities were stacked up to the vaulted ceiling on all sides. When I drew a breath, it was perfumed by old paper and ink. A nearby table was cluttered with leather notebooks and open Immortalities.

A library, my mind sang .

"Where … ?" I began, forcing myself to sit up.

"Welcome to the attic," Robin said. "Otherwise known as the Council's archive. I'm one of the recordkeepers."

"Nice to meet you," I said warily, pushing a strand of damp hair out of my face. They might have been perfectly nice thus far, but they were still part of the Council. I'd need to watch my words, and my back.

"You're Tamsin, right?" Robin asked. "One of the Unmakers."

I tried not to melt back through the floor. "Yeah. We're big fans of that nickname."

"Sorry," Robin said. "I take your point. Where were you going, anyway?"

"I was trying to find Neve," I said, my eyes greedily scanning the shelves again. "Do you know where she is?"

"She's with the most senior members of the Council of Sistren," Robin said. "They're warding the room for her protection as we speak. I promise you, she's quite safe."

I gave them a dubious look.

"It's all right," Robin said. "They won't hurt her. I'm doing research for them right now, to see if there're any instances of this happening before."

"I need to see her," I said. "You seem nice and all, but I hope you understand why I can't just take your word for it."

"I get it, believe me," Robin said. They stepped over to their desk and lifted something from behind the teetering stack of books: a perfectly modern laptop.

A silent video feed was playing on its screen. The crisp footage revealed Neve stretched out over a large bed, her eyes closed. They'd taken care to clean the dirt and blood from her and had dressed her in a pristine white gown. A crown of flowers had been arranged in her hair, and more flowers were scattered around her. The sight of it made bile rise in my throat. She looked like she was about to be sacrificed. Or buried.

"Why did they dress her like that? "

"They're honoring her," Robin said.

A circle of sorceresses, including Kasumi, were consulting one another about something I couldn't hear, even as I turned the volume up. As I watched, a ripple of that same fiery magic raced over Neve's skin, burning one of the flowers in her crown to ash. The bedsheet caught fire, but it was quickly stamped out.

"Listen, I know you want to see your friends," Robin said. "I can help you get to them. But in return, I'm wondering if you can do me a favor."

"I'm listening," I said, still guarded.

"I wanted to question you about what you witnessed in Lyonesse, and Neve's power," Robin said, "but the High Sorceress didn't think it was a good idea."

"Of course not," I said bitterly.

A new thought occurred to me as I turned to take in the shelves again. We must have been in some sort of secluded corner; I could hear hushed voices and creaking floorboards somewhere just beyond the bookcases.

"I'll tell you whatever you want to know, if you'll help me get to Neve and, " I said, "look into who her birth mother is. She may be Creiddylad's soul reborn, but someone brought her into this world and left behind evidence of being a sorceress. Is there a way to find out?"

"Of course," Robin said. "I can test her blood against the database of Immortalities and other enchanted objects to see if there are any matches. From there, it'll be easy enough to follow her line."

I tried not to let my molten anger show, but Robin sensed it anyway. "What's wrong?"

"She came to the Council months ago to further her education, but they turned her away because she didn't have a known bloodline," I said. "Are you telling me they could have tested it right then and there? How does that make sense?"

"It doesn't," Robin said, sighing. "It never has, and it never will, but they won't change because it's the way it's always been done. "

"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard."

"Tell me about it," Robin said. "Do you know what it feels like to have all of this"—they gestured to the books and Immortalities—"to have all of this information at our fingertips, and to see, time and time again, the Council act on feeling, not fact?"

"Will you help me?" I asked Robin. "Because I'll help you."

"Of course." Robin shrugged their robe off, handing it to me. "Put this on and try to keep your head down. I can get us set up in a room where we'll be more comfortable, away from prying eyes."

I did as I was told but couldn't resist sneaking a look at the glowing displays of relics as we moved through the labyrinth of the archive. Here and there, I caught a glimpse of things I recognized, like a piece of a banner from Avalon. There was more from the isle scattered around us: pieces of bark from the Mother tree, gowns worn by the first sorceresses as they returned to the mortal world in exile, daggers, jewelry—but it was the mural painted on the far left wall that made me slow and take a second look.

The tower and Mother tree were gleaming in sunlight, surrounded by vast orchards and small houses. A river ran along the bottom, flowing into the blue of the runner beneath it.

"Is it a good likeness?" Robin asked, studying it again beside me. There was a hint of longing in the question, and I felt the tragedy of the isle's loss all over again. "We sent some archivists and scholars to the ruins, but … it was hard to tell anything, with all the destruction."

This depiction of Avalon was alive and glorious. It was how it should be remembered.

"Yes," I lied. I pointed to a hooded figure, half hidden in the painted trees. "Who's that supposed to be?"

"The Lady of the Lake," Robin said. "The first one, that is, who founded the order of priestesses at Avalon and was said to have tremendous power. Her daughter eventually inherited the role and became the last to bear that title, sadly."

My brow creased. "It was an inherited role? You're sure? "

That wasn't what Flea had told me—or maybe I'd simply misunderstood? She'd made it sound as though a new priestess was chosen for the role with each generation. That there had been far more than two.

"Yes, actually," Robin said. "Their line was a focus of mine during my training in the archives. The daughter, Caniad, chose to stay behind in the mortal world when Avalon was splintered off into its own realm."

"Huh," I managed. Something in Robin's explanation had stroked the back of my mind, though I couldn't place what. "Why didn't she return to Avalon?"

"The records claim she was furious that her mother's sword had been given to a succession of mortal kings, including Arthur," Robin continued, their gestures becoming more animated. "Caniad felt the sword had been created by the Goddess for her line alone—and to be fair, it does not sound like any of those men were able to use it at its full power."

The history we'd read in Librarian's office fluttered through my thoughts … the mirror of mortality, judge and executioner of the pitiless wicked, savior of the ensorcelled, and the mercy of the innocent.

"Sorry," Robin said, pressing a hand to their face. "Sorry. I can really go on and on if you let me. Come on, we're nearly there."

With one last look at the mural, at the hooded figure, I followed.

Despite Robin's fears that I'd be spotted, all of the other purple-robed workers we passed were either frantically flipping through the pages of books or boxing them into large crates and sending them out through an open Vein. No one acknowledged us; there was no time to.

"What are they doing?" I whispered.

"Some are going through and searching for other divinely forged weapons, in case Excalibur doesn't turn up again," Robin said.

There's not time for that, I thought miserably.

"Others are moving the most treasured pieces of the archive to a safe location, until the threat passes," Robin explained. "Relics they might use against us, Immortalities valuable for their insight on history and spells—that sort of thing. I'd take it all, if I could, but the High Sorceress only just allowed us to start the process. She thought taking preventive action would be admitting defeat."

I could see how that would be bad for morale.

"Here," Robin said, taking my arm and guiding me through one last spiral of shelves. The archive was limited to the central section of the building's attic, but it had still taken us several minutes just to reach a wall of doors on the opposite side from where we'd started.

They looked like study rooms, of a sort. All but one had signs that read OCCUPIED . Robin flipped the sign on the final door as they ushered me in.

It was larger than it had looked from the outside, big enough to fit a table with six seats. A small statue of the Goddess had been placed beside the door, as if to guard it. The candle in her upturned hands was unlit, but there was a faint glow radiating from behind the curtains that surrounded the room on all sides.

"Have a seat," Robin said, sitting on the edge of the desk, where they had easy access to the paper and quills. "Do you mind if we dive right in?"

"Sure," I said, my brow creasing. A strange feeling, almost like static, growled against the back of my neck. I rubbed at it, but it didn't go away.

"Can you tell me what happened when you found Excalibur?" Robin asked, dabbing the quill into the ink. "Spare no detail. Even something you think is irrelevant could be helpful."

"All right … well, there was a dragon," I began.

Robin's head shot up, their amber-colored eyes wide. " Really? A red dragon?"

"Yup," I said, then told Robin about Neve's appearance at the end of the hall, just in time to save us.

"How did you get to Lyonesse in the first place?" they asked.

"A hag," I said. "The Hag of the Moors?"

"A hag ?" Robin repeated, with obvious envy. "What was she like? Did she exhibit—" At my pained look, they caught themselves. "Okay, we'll come back to that. Go on."

I continued, explaining how Nash and Caitriona had managed to kill and gut the dragon. Robin looked to be fighting not to ask me something. Their expression reminded me so much of Neve, a pang went through my chest.

"So the dragon is cut open, and all of the various things spill out, including Excalibur?" Robin prompted.

"Not Excalibur," I said. "Neve found the sword lodged in the dragon's throat. She asked if the hilt was supposed to have beasts on it and then grabbed it, pulling it free, and that's when all of the magic and light exploded around us."

Robin's brow furrowed. They scribbled something on a sheet of paper, holding it against their leg. "And the light that exploded around her, she's been able to call on it before without the sword?"

"Yes." Something about the way the mage asked the question made my pulse tick up. "What's wrong?"

Robin ignored my question in favor of their own. "Have you ever seen her exhibit any other unusual abilities—something maybe involving plants, or the recent dead?"

That sinister prickling sensation was back, spreading over my arms as the hair there rose. I felt almost dizzy with it. "No."

Before I could ask what they were talking about, Robin was already moving out of the door, saying, "Stay right here— right here, okay? I'll be back. I just need to—"

They shut the door before they finished their explanation.

The buzzing around me didn't cease, it only grew louder, until the curtains, and that strange light emanating from behind them, seemed to shiver with it. I moved to the nearest curtain, drawing it back.

Behind it was a wall of protective glass. And behind that was …

The tapestry was a fraction of the size of the one in Lyonesse's great hall, but I recognized it instantly, even without the layer of ice. The mortal men in their fields, trying to spark fire. The Firstborn wearing their crowns. The clash of swords.

I pulled the next curtain away, my heart hammering. The man with the silver hand, Nudd Llaw Ereint, and his three sons.

The humming grew louder in my ears. I hadn't seen the other panels in the hall—they'd been covered by too much ice or destroyed by water and age. I pulled the next curtain open.

My skin was crawling over my bones—as if something were moving beneath it, desperate to escape.

My breath turned shallow and quick as I leaned in close to the protective glass. The Goddess appeared again, this time cradling a child, gazing down at its face. Spring bloomed around her in vibrant colors, radiating her joy.

Black splotches appeared on the glass, floating in my vision. I stepped back, fighting to steady my feet against the sudden spinning of the floor. A sharp pain sliced through my stomach.

I held on to the edge of the table in a desperate bid to stay upright. Warmth streaked down my face. I brought my own hand to my cheek.

Crying—why was I crying?

The darkness in my vision was spreading. Scenes of other halls, other worlds, other faces flashed through my mind, too quick to grasp, to truly see.

"You were never supposed to see this."

I spun around on unsteady legs.

Nash stood in the doorway, his face blurring as he came closer. Before I could speak, before I could move, my mind sank into the darkness clawing at it, and I knew nothing more.