24

This is worse than I could ever have imagined. Worse than losing my city, my friends, and my mother to the invading forces of Vohrain. Worse than being snatched up by a dragon whom I thought was going to ravage me with his giant cock. Worse than weathering the Mordvorren and birthing a pair of dragon eggs.

I've been through a huge mountain of traumatic shit that I've barely had a spare moment to deal with, and yet I've never been so afraid as I am while I scuttle through the back passages of the palace like a rat.

This time, I slide through cramped spaces that I'm not even sure are actual passages, drag myself around tight corners, climb rickety ladders in the dark. I don't stop moving, not even when I can no longer hear the Vohrainian soldiers behind me. I just keep going up, and up, behind the hot bricks of chimneys and through cobwebbed spaces that the servants haven't cleaned in years.

I encounter more than one actual rat. But they'renormal rats, which feels like a relief after the spider-mice, so I grit my teeth, let them pass, and move on.

My lungs are tight and my throat itches from all the dust. At last I run out of places to go and I stop moving, wedged in some pitch-black crevice in the bowels of my ancestral home, trying not to think about the size of the spiders that probably live in this space.

I'm hidden. Safe for the moment. But Kyreagan has been captured.

What if they kill him?

I should have stayed. Should have died with him. But he told me to go—commanded and begged me with those passionate dark eyes of his. I don't think Rahzien will finish Ky off yet—not until he has me back in his power. Rahzien loves the delicate agony of unraveling a mind, and he won't be able to pass up the chance to torture both Ky and me emotionally. He'll want to dismantle us in the most painful way. Which means I have a little time—a very small window of time, in which to figure out what to do.

They poisoned me, and they poisoned Ky. Rahzien knows the truth about the Prince of Gildas and his retinue, and if he has already notified the gate guards, Aeris might be arrested when she tries to get back into the city. Which means I can't count on her for an antidote.

I need to find the poisoner myself and force them to give me an antidote for Kyreagan. I'll resort to torture if I have to—my mother made me watch a few torture sessions when I was about fourteen, so I know how it's done.

First, I need information, which means I'll have to approach some of the servants. Rahzien killed the last two servants who helped me, and I'm sure the word of that tragedy has spread to the others. They'll be rightfully terrified, reluctant to aid me. They might even turn me in. But I have to risk it. I won't be the useless princess who stands by while everything she loves is destroyed. I did that once. Never again .

There are so many people I love in this palace, so many I care about in this city. And yet Kyreagan's life is worth more to me than any of theirs. Maybe that makes me cruel and selfish—maybe it's my mother's blood in my veins, but it's true. I would go to terrible lengths if I thought it would save him. He is mine. He has made me stronger, better . And he made me what I always wanted to be, even when I was rocking the servants' infants while they worked. He made me a mother.

Enough hiding in the dark—I need to save the father of my babies.

I pick my way back through the dusty crawlspaces, doing my best to remember the route I took earlier. I have to move slowly, carefully, lest a beam or board creak too loudly and give away my position. Fortunately for me, a few creaks and bumps are normal in an old building of this size.

Occasionally I hear the murmur of voices and I pause until they fade. At last, after what feels like interminable hours of fumbling and squirming through the dark, I see thin streams of light coming up from the floor, and when I crawl over to the grate, I can see down into a hallway.

I can't see much, but I recognize the pattern of that carpet. I'm in the oldest part of the palace, a mostly unused wing where antiquities and relics are kept. The Supreme Sorcerer's study was in this area, since he liked to work far from others, without being disturbed.

The Supreme Sorcerer was a gaunt, silent man with sallow skin and thick black hair, streaked with gray. High cheekbones jutted above the beard that cloaked his jaw, and full lips were visible beneath his mustache. I suppose he might have been attractive, though I only ever saw him as distantly dreadful. I've wondered occasionally if he and my mother shared more than a mutual interest in magic and power—if they were ever intimate. The thought makes me shudder .

I only entered his study once, in my mother's company. A huge dragon skull hung over his desk, and the shelves were full of books, bones, dried herbs, lumpy things in jars, and several animal skulls. I couldn't get out of there quickly enough.

Urgency thrums through my veins as a fresh realization explodes in my mind.

If I can think of one place in this palace where Rahzien's poisoner might want to spend their time, it would be the Supreme Sorcerer's study. I wish it had occurred to me earlier—I could have suggested that Ky and his allies check there for clues as to the poisoner's identity, though it might have been difficult for them to gain access to that wing without arousing suspicion. Perhaps it's just as well that I only thought of it now. I can head there alone and investigate.

After a few wrong turns, I manage to locate the nearest exit from the passages, and I emerge through the back of a wardrobe in one of the old bedrooms. The wardrobe doors creak loudly, and I have to fight my way out through the dust-sheet that's been draped over it. The whole chamber looks like a tomb, each piece of furniture shrouded in pale sheets. A little light slips in around the edges of the drapes, and after the darkness of the passages, it's an immense relief.

My clothing is a smudged, shredded mess, my hair a wild tangle. If I do encounter anyone, I'll probably look like some wretched waif, mistakenly buried, who had to dig herself out of her own grave.

Before leaving the room, I shove aside the sheets and ease each drawer open, hunting for anything I could use as a weapon. Lucky for me, a faded cloth case in the dressing table contains a single pearl-handled letter opener, sharp enough to pierce skin and flesh if I put enough effort into the blow.

Perfect .

At the door, clutching my new weapon, I hesitate, struggling with my fear of moving out into the hall, where I could be seen and recaptured.

"This is it, Serylla," I whisper into the somber silence. "This is where you shake off Rahzien's influence. Set aside all guilt, grief, and fear. Do what must be done. Save Kyreagan. Save yourself."

Right now, Kyreagan is either being tortured, or torturing himself for not being able to rescue me in some beautiful, dramatic way. I hope someday he will understand that he did save me, just by leaving everything and coming after me. At the moment I needed him most, the moment I was on the verge of fracturing beyond repair—there he was. Against wisdom, against self-preservation, he relinquished his role, his clan, and his offspring… and he became human in a deeper way, a more dramatic incarnation, for me.

And if I have to, I will become a monster for him.

I slip out of the bedroom and glide along the gloomy, deserted hallway. A few of Rahzien's men probably patrol here from time to time, but for now, I don't see anyone.

There it is—the entrance to the lair of the Supreme Sorcerer. A towering ebony door engraved with dragons, tentacled men, half-human serpents, and creatures that I now recognize as voratrix. It's a dreadful irony that the Supreme Sorcerer would have his door decorated with dragons, when his final act in life was to doom them to extinction.

Holding the letter opener in my right hand, I press the huge bronze handle of the door with my left hand, and I push inward. Firelight flares into the hallway, and my breath catches.

Shit.

I wait, but no one exclaims at my presence, and there's no sound from within.

Slowly I push the door wider, slip through the aperture, and close it quietly as I look around .

Someone has definitely been using this room. The fireplace has been recently fed. A bit odd, since it's springtime and sunny outside, but then again, the room does feel chilly. I remember it feeling cold during my last visit as well. A side effect, perhaps, of some spell gone awry.

Despite the firelight, the room is as morose and forbidding as ever. Unlit lanterns on long chains hang from a domed ceiling painted with yellow constellations on a deep blue background. Heavy, dark bookshelves stretch all the way up to the point where the ceiling starts to curve. Two ponderous tables stand in the center of the room, with an area of flat, slate-gray tile between them—the spot where the Supreme Sorcerer would draw the circles and symbols for his magic. Beside the fireplace is an oven with a flat top, and on the hearth rest two unlit dyre-stones.

The sight of them pierces my heart like a dagger. Kyreagan and I spent so many days in his cave during the Mordvorren, with dyre-stones as our only light. We cooked meals over them together. He traced Dragonish symbols on my bare skin in their warm glow.

How dare the Supreme Sorcerer have dyre-stones here? Where did he get them? What was his connection to the dragons, to the voratrix, to Ouroskelle?

I'm striding toward the dyre-stones when I see it. Slung over the big leather chair, its fringe trailing on the floor. Its bright, embroidered flowers contrast starkly with brown leather, the dark bookshelves, and the array of smoky amber jars on the table.

The shawl of the healer. Lady Cathrain.

I approach it skittishly, as if it's a living thing that might leap out and bite me. Directly in front of the chair on which it lies is a polished wooden tray, and on that tray are vials of blood, locks of hair, and nail clippings arranged in neat rows, with tiny labels beneath them. I spot an extremely long, shiny black hair, and I know whose it is even before I read the cramped script on the label: The Dragon Prince.

Near it lies a scrap of blood-soaked cloth marked Serylla. It's part of the dress Cathrain had to cut off me after the beating.

Fury snakes through my belly up into my chest, where it swells hot and molten.

She had the nerve to be kind to me. To pretend she was helping me solve the mystery of my poisoner, when all along it was her . And I even suspected Parma, my sweet maid, if only for a moment.

Surging through my anger is a golden wave of triumph, because I figured it out . I found her, Rahzien's royal poisoner.

I almost pick up the shawl and fling it into the fire. But I can't touch anything, can't leave any sign that I entered this room. And I need to find a good hiding spot, because if my guess is correct, she'll be back soon. Now that they've captured Kyreagan, she'll probably want more samples from him. He's an oddity to her, a creature worthy of study, so she'll bring the samples here to catalog and store them.

The enormity of what she's done to me, to Kyreagan, to the dragons—it rivals the Supreme Sorcerer's wickedness. I can barely grasp the idea that the rest of the dragons might be dead, and I can't even imagine how Kyreagan must feel. Surely they can't all be gone. It would be impossible to ensure that every single one of them would consume prey from the Middenwold Isles. Maybe Rahzien plans to send hunters to the island to ensure that any survivors are destroyed. It's what I'd expect from him. He's not one to leave anything to chance, or to leave a job half done. If the rebels hadn't been irritating him so effectively and the people hadn't proven to be so resistant to his rule, maybe he would have already sent men to Ouroskelle to finish off the clan .

Whatever the truth may be, I still need this woman. I have to make her set me free of Rahzien and unlock Ky's dragon form again.

I choose a dark corner between two bookshelves where I can stand comfortably yet be all but invisible in the shadows until I decide to dart out. My palms are sweating, so I switch the letter opener to my other hand, and wipe my right palm carefully before grasping the weapon again. Much as I'd like to use the long chopping knife lying on one of the tables, the healer might notice its absence the moment she enters. I can't give her any warning.

I need to take her by surprise.

Tilting my head back against the wall, clutching the slim pearl-handled blade, I wait. And while I wait, I compose a ballad of vengeance in my mind.