January 1, 2060
New Year’s Day
I had woken like this once before, thinking I was dead.
The æther was calling me into his arms, telling me to abandon all my cares, to leave my tender bones behind. My eyelids parted, just enough to see a pale hand clad in shards of glass. The rest of my arm sparkled, armored in diamond and glazed with molten ruby. Even my lashes were frosted with gemstones. I was a living jewel-box, a fallen star. No longer flesh, but crystalline.
Wind howled through the part of the roof where the angel had passed through. Splinters tinkled from my hair as I turned to see the ceiling. The white light had been extinguished. All that was left of Senshield was a cavernous hole in the æther, marking a place where a spirit had dwelled for many years. Over time, it would stitch itself back together.
There was one thing I wanted to know before I left. My hand shook as I rotated it. The fallen angel had carved a word into my skin, joining the fragmented pieces of the scars.
KIN
I lay back in my bed of glass. A friend had once told me that knowledge was dangerous. When I let go, I would have all the knowledge of the æther; this mystery would soon be solved. And I could find the others. Even if they didn’t know, I would stay with them. I would watch over them. I would help them win the next stage of the game, the war that had begun today.
Footsteps came through the glass, drawing me back. A moment later, my head and shoulders were lifted into the crook of an arm, and Rephaite eyes were smoldering in the gloom.
“Dreamwalker.”
His features gradually sharpened.
“Leave me,” I murmured. “Leave me, Alsafi.”
He took hold of my left hand and pried my fingers open, revealing the marks on my palm.
“I’m not worth it.” I was so tired. “I’m done. Just go.”
“Some would disagree with your assessment of your worth.” He released my hand. When he scooped an arm under my knees and lifted me, I groaned. My skin bristled with broken glass. “This is not your time.”
He carried me through the ruins, pushing the pistol into my limp hand. The fight wasn’t over. As he opened the door, I caught sight of Hildred Vance in the corner. Her body was angled away from us, but I could see that she was as broken as I was. She bled just like the rest of us. I wanted to tell Alsafi to turn back, to make sure she was dead, but I blacked out before I could.
When I came round, Alsafi was almost at the bottom of the stairs, and my cheek was pressed against his doublet. When he entered the corridor with the black carpet, I lifted a hand to his shoulder.
“Dreamscape,” I whispered. My gift had been weakened, but I felt it. A Rephaite. “Nashira.”
Alsafi stopped in his tracks. There was no other way out of the corridor.
“Stay quiet.” He spoke quickly. “If anything happens to me, go to the Inquisitorial Office. There, you can access a tunnel that will take you out of the Archon. I have a contact—they are waiting for you there.”
“And tell Arcturus—” He paused. “Tell him I hope this . . . redeems me.”
I had so many questions, and no time to ask them. Nashira had already swept into view. The hilt of a sword gleamed over her shoulder.
When she saw me, her eyes turned to hot coals. She looked as if she had walked straight out of hell; as if she carried its flames inside her.
“Alsafi.”
“Blood-sovereign,” he said evenly. “I have come from the tower. The Grand Commander is critically injured, and Senshield is destroyed.” He must have been using English consciously, allowing me to follow the conversation.
“I am more than aware of Senshield’s destruction.” She didn’t raise her voice, but something in it terrified me. “The Archon’s medical staff will attend to Vance. Bring 40 to the basement at once.”
I started to tremble. Alsafi remained where he was, and I felt, rather than heard, the deep breath he took. When Nashira turned back, he lifted his gaze to look her in the eye.
“Is something wrong, Alsafi?”
His muscles were tensing. Nashira took a step toward him.
“I must confess,” she said, “I did think it extraordinary that one human, especially one who is in Inquisitorial custody, should be able to cause so much destruction in such a short period of time. 40 has done many things she should not have been able to do. She was able to escape from London as martial law was being implemented. She was able to travel between citadels without detection. She was able to reach the core of Senshield.” Another step. “She could not have done any of it without a contact.”
Alsafi didn’t hesitate. He gathered me close and ran.
Red carpet. Wood-paneled walls. Pain all over my body, tiny sunbursts of pain. His hand tore away a tapestry, turned a key, opened a panel; thrust me into the pitch-black tunnel beyond. My left side crashed against a wall, and a shard of glass penetrated deep into my arm, drawing a scream that seared my throat. Sobbing in agony, I pressed my hands against the door.
“Alsafi, don’t!”
A key card came spinning into the tunnel. “Run,” Alsafi barked. I dragged myself back to my feet. There was a spy-grate in the door; through it, I saw him draw a sword from underneath his cloak. Nashira’s came to meet it. “Go, dreamwalker!”
“Ranthen,” Nashira whispered.
Their swords clashed. Iridescent blades, like shards of opal. I leaned heavily against the wall, unable to take my eyes from the grate. Spirits were rushing to join the war-dance of the Rephaim. Immobilized by the fire in my arm, I watched Alsafi Sualocin fight Nashira Sargas.
I could see at once that Nashira was faster. She moved like spindrift around Alsafi, as fluently as Brașoveanu had danced her death ballet. Alsafi used sharper swings, and stayed rooted to one spot, but he was no less elegant. The blades chimed like bells as they collided. Quick as she was, he parried each of her strokes, never changing his expression. I had seen Rephaim fight before, in the colony, though never with swords. I remembered the way their steps resonated through the æther; how the proximity of two rival Rephaim drank all the warmth from the air around them. As if the æther understood their hatred, intensified it, nurtured it.
They circled each other like dancing partners. Alsafi let out a low growl, while Nashira was silent. She struck again, faster and faster, until I could hardly see her movements; just the glint of her hair, the flash of the sword. When it caught Alsafi’s cheek, and ectoplasm seeped from the cut, I flinched.
She was toying with him.
Alsafi’s next swipe was harder, and he broke from his position. His blade slashed down, across, up, but never touched her.
Nashira raised her open hand. The rest of her fallen angels came to her from wherever they had been wandering, drawn back to her tarnished aura.
Alsafi spat at her in Gloss. For a long time, neither of them moved.
When the poltergeist attacked him, a tear streaked down my cheek. Slashes appeared across his face, the marks of an unseen knife. He lashed out with the sword, making the thing recoil, before all of the spirits converged on him. Alsafi let out an eldritch sound—a sound of pain—as they tore at his aura like a flock of birds. As his blade clattered to the flagstones, Nashira lifted her sword high. I caught sight of his eyes for a last time, afire with hatred, before she sliced straight through his neck.
I turned away, one hand over my mouth. The heavy thud was all I needed to hear.
Nashira stared down at the corpse for a moment—it must have been a moment, but it lasted forever—before her head whipped around, and hellfire flooded her eyes again. And I knew, I knew from that look on her face that she would dog my footsteps for the rest of my days, even if I could escape her tonight. A decade could pass from this moment; a lifetime—but she would not stop hunting me. She would not forget. I snatched the key card from the floor and ran.
Dark stars erupted in the corners of my vision. Hot jolts came shooting through my feet as I hobbled across stone, breathing in bursts. I tasted salt and metal on my lips. The throbbing in my arm was making me retch. My legs gave way again, and I curled in the darkness, listening to my fitful heartbeat.
“Rise from the ashes,” I whispered to myself. “Come on, Underqueen.”
When I rose, my hands left red prints on the walls. I couldn’t take much more of this. I would die before I reached the Inquisitorial Office.
Then I saw it. Frank Weaver’s Inquisitorial maxim was printed above the doors: I SHALL CAST OUR BOUNDS TO THE EDGES OF THE EARTH. THIS HOUSE FOREVER GROWS.
There was one dreamscape inside. Dewdrops of sweat were forming on my brow. Blood soaked my shift, I was light-headed, and black gossamer was spidering across my vision. I wouldn’t stay conscious for much longer. I fitted the card into the lock and shouldered the door open.
The Inquisitorial Office was an ornate room, watched over by portraits of previous Grand Inquisitors. An oak desk, which housed a wooden globe, sat before a floor-to-ceiling bay window. Weaver himself was nowhere to be seen. Silently, I stepped across the carpet.
Someone was standing beside the bookshelf. Red hair flowed down her back, red as the blood that plastered my skin. When she turned, I swung up the pistol. In the faint light from the citadel outside, her skin was waxen.
“Mahoney.”
I didn’t move.
Scarlett Burnish stepped away from the bookshelf and raised a hand slightly. “Mahoney,” she said, her cool blue eyes seeking mine, “put down the gun. We don’t have much time.”
Those were the lips that told their lies.
I had threatened the Grand Inquisitor once. Now it was the Grand Raconteur who stood before me, at the mercy of my bullet. Back then it had been about leverage, but I didn’t need that now. This was about self-preservation.
Burnish lifted her other hand, as if to surrender, and said:
“Winter cherry.”
At first, I didn’t understand. It made no sense for her to be using the language of flowers. But then—
Winter cherry.
Deception.
Alsafi’s contact.
Scarlett Burnish, the face and voice of ScionEye, who had read the news since I was twelve years old. She was Alsafi’s contact in the Archon. Scarlett Burnish, a Ranthen associate. A professional liar. The perfect double agent.
Scarlett Burnish, a traitor to the anchor.
Golden light flared into the office. In a movement so fast I almost missed it, Burnish had the letter-opener from Weaver’s desk in her hand. It whistled past my head and punched through the Vigile’s visor, splintering red plastic. The handle jutted grotesquely from his forehead. Blood wept down the bridge of his nose. He teetered before his dead weight thumped to the floor.
In the clock tower, the bells struck one. The æther heaved with the reverberations of another death.
“Quickly, Mahoney,” Burnish said. “Follow me.”
More dreamscapes were already closing in. Something made me look up at the surveillance cameras. Deactivated. Burnish pressed the back of the bust behind her, that of Inquisitor Mayfield, opening a gap in the wall. “Hurry,” she said, and chivvied me into the space beyond it. She had barely closed the wall behind us before more Vigiles thundered into the Inquisitorial Office. Her hand clamped over my mouth.
We waited. Muffled orders could be heard through the wall for some time before their footsteps retreated.
Burnish uncovered my lips. A crack split the silence, and her face was illuminated by a tube of light, making her red hair shine like paint against her skin. Wordlessly, I followed her through a long, unlit passage, just wide enough for us to move in single file.
She hurried me down a winding flight of steps. At the bottom, she held her light toward my face.
“Who do you work for?” I rasped. “The Ranthen? Which—which government, which organization?”
“Good grief, Mahoney, the state of you . . .” She ignored my question, taking in the streams of blood, the glistening crystals lodged in my arms. “All right, stay calm. I can give you medical attention. Where’s Alsafi?”
“Nashira.” I couldn’t control my breathing. “I told him to leave me, I told him . . .”
“No.” She started back up the stairs, then seemed to think better of it. Her fist struck the wall, and her face contorted in frustration. “That son-of-a-bitch—” The rest of her thought was lost as she seized me by the shoulders. “Did he mention me? Did he implicate me?”
Her grip was like iron. “No,” I said. “No. He didn’t even tell me.”
“Did she capture him, or destroy him?”
“He’s gone.”
Her eyes closed briefly. “Damn it.” One long breath, and she was back to business. “We have to be quick.” She whipped off her silk scarf and used it to stanch the flow of blood from my arm, careful not to push the shard in any farther. “Weaver’s bloody whiskers, you’re freezing,” she bit out, but pulled my other arm around her neck. “You had better be worth all this, Underqueen.”
A few hours ago, I wouldn’t have followed Scion’s sweetheart anywhere, but if Alsafi had trusted her, I would have to do the same. It was her or whatever brutal death awaited me in the basement.
We set off into a concrete passageway, me leaning on her as little as I could, but my strength was leaving me. “Stay awake, Mahoney,” she said. “Stay awake.” As we walked, she took what I thought was a handkerchief from her pocket. As she stretched the thing over her face, it molded to her features, recasting them into those of a woman twice her age. She tapped two drops from a bottle into her eyes and hid her hair inside a woolen beret. I couldn’t process this. She was clearly a spy, but who had planted her, and when?
After what felt like years of staggering, Burnish stopped and entered a code into a keypad, and a pair of doors opened. We stepped into a coffin-like elevator that stank of mold and made an anguished death-rattle as it trundled to the surface. When we reached what it told us was street level, Burnish went to a wooden door and unlocked it.
We emerged into thick snow in a dead end just off Whitehall. I wouldn’t have given the door a second glance if I’d passed it.
I was out of the Archon.
I had made it out alive.
A truck was parked just outside the cul-de-sac. Burnish opened its back door and helped me climb inside. I registered hands taking hold of my elbows just before I passed out.
“. . . was right. She was alive, all that time. I just can’t . . .”
The floor shivered beneath me. There was pain at the top of my arm, but it was nothing compared to the sick, steady throb above my left eye.
“Nick,” the voice whispered. “Nick, I think she’s waking up.”
A hand brushed my cheek. As if he were swimming up through deep water, Nick Nygård came into focus.
My senses were still drowsy; it took me a moment to realize, to see him. A cut vaulted above his eye, and his face was greased with sweat, but he was alive. I reached out to touch him, to convince myself that he was real.
“Nick.”
“Shh, sötnos. We’ve got you.”
He pressed me gently against him, resting his chin on the top of my head. The awareness of everything that had happened hit me like a punch to the gut. I tried to speak, but a gate had given way. All I could do was weep. Hardly any sound came out; just broken, straining rasps, punctured with frail sobs. With each shock, my ribs ached and my head pounded and the water beat my lungs apart again. I could feel Nick shaking. Maria rubbed my back, shushing me, speaking to me like you would to a child: “It’s going to be okay, sweet. It’s going to be okay.” I cried until I could no longer feel the pain.
My eyelids lifted again. Now I was on a threadbare blanket, and I couldn’t see a thing. My ears felt stuffed with cotton wool, but I could just hear the low hum of nervous conversation.
My arms and legs were a collage of dressings. Someone must have removed the glass. I drifted off again, riding the last wave of whatever sedative I had been given, which soon broke. When my eyes flickered open, I felt more clear-headed, but at the cost of the anesthesia. Most of the left side of my body was smarting.
Arcturus Mesarthim sat beside me, like a sentry.
“You are a fool, Paige Mahoney.” His voice was darkest velvet. “A headstrong fool.”
“Aren’t you used to it by now?”
“You exceeded my expectations.”
I sighed. “I exceeded Vance’s, too, I think.”
He had made questionable choices of his own. It was he who had said that war required risk, and I had chosen to risk my own life.
“Sorry for pointing a gun at you,” I rasped.
“Hm.”
He glanced down at me, his eyes burning softly. With effort, I moved my arm and laced my fingers between his knuckles. His thumb lightly caressed my cheekbone, skirting around the cuts and bruises. In the darkness of the Archon, I had thought I would never see his face, feel his hands on me again. And I hadn’t truly realized, until now, that I treasured being touched by him.
“What did they do to you?”
His voice was a low rumble. I shook my head.
“I don’t think I can—” I breathed in. “I’m all right.”
But I wasn’t all right. Anyone could see it. I was trembling like someone yearning for a fix of aster.
His hand stroked across my hair, where it wouldn’t hurt my wounds. I leaned into it. “You will be pleased to know,” he said, “that Adhara, the erstwhile Warden of the Sarin, has come to a decision. Seeing that our human associate had won such a significant victory against Scion, she concluded that human beings may have matured just enough to merit her renewed allegiance to the Ranthen. Consequently, she has decided that her loyalists will be ready to fight for us. We need only call.”
I tried to still the heaving in my chest. At last, I had proven to Terebell that her investment in my leadership had been justified. It had all been worth it.
“Where are we?” I murmured.
“We are on our way to Dover.”
“Dover.” My head felt so heavy. “The port.”
“Yes.” His hand kept moving over my curls. “Sleep, little dreamer.”
I slipped away before I could ask anything more. When I woke again, it took a while to remember where I was. I was lying opposite a fast-asleep Maria, and my head was on Nick’s lap. We were close to the back door of the truck. Pain swelled and ebbed in all my wounds with each shunt of the vehicle.
“. . . orders at some point in the next few weeks. In the meantime, Mahoney needs to convalesce. Alsafi made a great sacrifice to get her out of there. I expect you to ensure it doesn’t go to waste.” Burnish.
“Alsafi was my Ranthen-kith.” Warden. “I will always strive to honor his memory, but I suspect that Paige will not want to be absent from the war effort for long, even to convalesce.”
I stayed still.
“If she doesn’t rest, she’s going to be too weak to contribute to that war effort.” Burnish’s voice held a note of vexation. “That won’t please my sponsor. She was tortured in the Archon, God alone knows what she had to do to break Senshield, and on top of that, I doubt her injuries have fully healed from the scrimmage. Honestly, I’m surprised she’s able to stand up.”
“She is possessed of extraordinary resilience. It was part of why we chose her to be our associate.”
Burnish made a noncommittal sound. “She’s human. Our sanity is a little more brittle than yours. As are our bones.” Silence. “She won’t see her twentieth birthday if she doesn’t rest. She’s a vital player in this game, Arcturus. Leaving aside her gift, she has come to . . . stand for something. Hall and the Sargas won’t rest until they have her.” The truck skimmed over a bump. “My sponsor needs what they call ‘fire-setters’ to generate waves of revolution in different parts of the empire. They’ve identified her as a key one. If she wants to keep fighting the Sargas, joining us is her best shot.”
“And you think your . . . sponsor is a suitable alternative to Scion.”
“Possibly. What matters is that they want Scion gone, and so do we.”
“The Ranthen will need to meet them. Whoever they are.”
“All in good time. They could be just as far round the twist as Scion, but I’m willing to gamble. I won’t watch us hand global power to Nashira Sargas.”
Warden didn’t reply for a while. Then he said, “I will do my utmost to persuade Paige of the sense in resting for a month. But in the end, she must make her own choices, even when they hurt her. I am not her keeper.”
“Of course not. But you can be her friend, if you know how. She’ll need plenty of those.”
One side of my ribcage ached. I shifted my weight off it, hoping they wouldn’t notice.
“What will you do next, Grand Raconteur?”
She laughed slightly. “Come morning, I’ll be in the Archon’s medical room, being treated for shock, having hidden for several hours from the murderous Paige Mahoney.”
“That seems a great risk. Someone will suspect you.”
“The wonderful thing about living in a morally bankrupt world is that every human being can be bought in one way or another. Everyone accepts a currency. Money, mercy, the illusion of power—there are always ways to purchase loyalty. Trust me: no one will accuse me.”
Warden was silent after that.
When the vehicle stopped, a light switched on inside. Scarlett Burnish roused us all and handed me a bundle of clothes. With help from Nick, I eased a dark-blue sweater, an oilskin, and a pair of waterproof trousers over my dressings, flinching at the pain when the sweater covered my left arm. The oilskin was embroidered with Scion’s maritime symbol: the anchor wrapped in rope. The hard-wearing fabric felt coarse on my skin, but I could bear it—someone must have topped up my dose while I slept.
“Where’s Eliza?” I said.
Nick wouldn’t meet my gaze. “She’s not here.”
My heart quickened.
“Don’t say it,” I said. “Nick—”
“No, no—she’s all right, sweetheart. She’s alive.” He hitched up a reassuring smile. “She’s just . . . with the Mime Order.”
“Why isn’t she with us?” When he still didn’t look at me, I grabbed his chin. “Nick.”
It was only now I was this close that I noticed how raw his eyes were. “Burnish made her stay behind, to continue running the Mime Order with Glym. She has more knowledge of London than she does of anywhere else—it made no sense for her to leave,” he said quietly. “We had no choice but to comply. Burnish’s sponsor wants the Mime Order intact in London and the three of us joining them somewhere—in Europe, I imagine, given that we’re going to Dover.”
“To do what?”
“To work for them. To continue what we’ve started.” He pulled on his own sweater. “You’ve done what you set out to do here: united the syndicate and deactivated Senshield. You’ve given them a chance to survive—more than any other leader has. It’s not safe for you to be in the heartland now.”
“Scion told the world I was dead,” I said. “It should be safer than ever.”
“The rumor that you never were will soon get out, and then tracking you down will become even more of a priority. You’ll be an embarrassment to them as well as a liability.” He zipped up his oilskin. “The Ranthen agreed to send Warden with you, so he can report back to them on what we’re doing.”
“So we’re being shipped off. Because it’s what the Ranthen and some . . . sponsor of Burnish’s want.”
Everything had changed so quickly. Eliza would be distraught at being separated from us. We were her family, and I hadn’t even been able to say goodbye. For the first time, I realized how much control I had lost when Scion had broadcast the news of my death.
“Paige,” Nick said softly, seeing the set of my jaw, “it might be the best way. Eliza’s going to rule jointly with Glym. They can handle things here now Senshield is gone.”
It was the end of my reign. I was no longer Underqueen. I had known it, but now it felt real. At least they would have strong leadership—Eliza and Glym were two of the few people I really trusted, and who I knew would keep the Mime Order together in the months to come. If I’d had a say in the matter, they would have been the replacements I chose.
The door lifted, and Burnish returned to the truck, letting in a flurry of snowflakes. She stood and crossed her arms.
“Congratulations.” She smiled at us all. “You are now part of the Domino Program, an espionage network acting within the Republic of Scion. Thanks to your newfound employment, you’re now on your way out of the heartland, into mainland Europe.”
Maria had an impressive bruise on one cheek. “Who exactly are you working for, Burnish?”
“All I’m at liberty to say is that I’m sponsored by a free-world coalition—one that has a vested interest in preventing the expansion of the Republic of Scion.” Burnish reached into a briefcase. “Either you do as I say, Hazurova, or I’ll just shoot you. You know too much already.”
She handed Maria a thin leather dossier.
“There’s your new identity. You’re going home, to Bulgaria,” she said. “You’ll receive instructions within the next few weeks.”
Maria leafed through the documents, her face tight. The next folder Burnish handed out was mine. “I hope your French is up to scratch, Mahoney,” she said. “You and Arcturus are taking a merchant ship to Calais. A contact will meet you there and take you to a safe house in the Scion Citadel of Paris, where the army isn’t stationed.” She handed me a phone. “Take this. Somebody will be in touch.”
Paris. I didn’t know what Burnish’s sponsor wanted from me, but if there was one place in Scion I could have chosen to go next, it was there. Jaxon had told me that was where Sheol II would be constructed, and that meant a new gray market.
I could stop both.
I opened the folder, which was embossed with the seal of the Republic of Scion England. My alias was Flora Blake. I was an English student who had taken a year out for research. My subject of interest was Scion History, specifically the establishment and development of the Scion Citadel of Paris.
At my side, Nick drew his knees closer to his chest. “I’m not going with Paige?”
“I’m afraid not. I’m sending you back to Sweden, where you’ll be of most use to us. You have the language, the local knowledge—and personal experience of how Tjäder runs things there.”
He looked through his dossier with a knitted brow. I gripped his hand.
Warden said, “I suppose I am to keep out of sight.”
“Correct. And you’ll have to think of your own cover story.” She checked her watch. “Right on time.”
One by one, we emerged from the truck. I looked out at the English Channel, not quite believing that I was heading toward it.
The five of us walked to the seafront, where ships were docking and vehicles were being unloaded. The majority of the ships were ScionIDE property, boasting names like the INS Inquisitor’s Victory and Mary Zettler III. Some of them must have brought the soldiers here from the Isle of Wight. There were merchant vessels, too, freighters that carried heavy cargo between Scion countries and to a small number of neutral free-world states.
“Burnish.” I walked alongside her, holding my jacket as close as I could without setting fire to my skin. “Will you do me one favor?”
“Name it.”
“One of the Bone Season survivors, Ivy Jacob, is somewhere in the system of sewers that the River Fleet runs through. She’s with a woman named Róisín. Can you get them out—subtly, if at all possible?”
After a pause, she said, “If she’s a Bone Season witness, I’ll make it my priority.”
It was all I could do for them now.
After eleven years, I was leaving the Republic of Scion England. I had visualized this as a child, when I was in school or trying to sleep; wished on stars that one day, I would climb aboard a ship and sail into a future ripe with possibility. I just hadn’t thought it would happen like this.
Burnish led us into the shadow of a colossal container ship. Letters spelling FLOTTE MARCHANDE—RÉPUBLIQUE DE SCION loomed above us.
“This is yours, Mahoney,” she said. “And yours leaves first.”
I looked up at it with a pounding heart. It was time. Maria gave me a small smile and held out her arms.
“So this is goodbye, kid.”
“Yoana,” I said, embracing her, “thank you. For everything.”
“Don’t thank me, Underqueen. Just tell me something.” She pulled away slightly and grasped my shoulder. “Did you see Vance in there?”
I nodded. “If she’s not dead by now, she won’t be getting up for a while, at least.”
Maria’s smile widened. “Good. Now go and cause some havoc in Paris, and don’t let all this have been in vain. And if you possibly can,” she added, “try not to get killed before I can see you again.”
“Likewise.”
She kissed my cheek and went to join Burnish at the next ship. Nick looked at me, and I looked at him.
I felt as if the ground was slanting. As if my center of gravity was changing.
“I remember when I first saw you.” His voice was steady. “In a vision of the poppy field. A little girl with blonde curls. That’s how I knew how to find you that day, all those years ago. I remember stitching up your arm after that poltergeist tore it open. How you said you hoped I hadn’t sewn it funny.”
A weak laugh escaped me.
“I remember,” I said, “missing you every day. Wondering where you’d gone. If you remembered the little girl from the poppy field.”
“I remember finding you.”
My eyes were misting over. “I remember when you told me you loved Zeke, and I thought I would die, because I didn’t think it was possible that anyone could love you more than I did.” I squeezed his fingers. “And I remember realizing I couldn’t possibly die, because you were the happiest I’d ever seen you. And I wanted to see you that happy for the rest of my life.”
We had never acknowledged that night out loud. Nick laid his palm against my cheek.
“I remember you being crowned in the Rose Ring,” he whispered, and tears spilled onto my cheeks. “And I remember realizing what a wonderful, courageous woman you’d become. And I felt privileged to have been at your side. And to be your friend. And to have you in my life.”
He was as much a part of me as my own bones, and now he would be gone. I cried as I hadn’t since I was a child. In the shadow of that merchant vessel, we clung to each other like we were ten years younger, the Pale Dreamer and the Red Vision, the last two Seals to break apart.
Warden and I were escorted into the ship by Burnish’s contact from Calais, who showed us into one of the freight containers and promised he would be back once we arrived in France. All too soon, a long blast from the ship’s horn announced that it was leaving Dover. I sat with Warden among the crates and boxes. Waiting. Trying not to think about Nick, and the ship that would carry him far away from me.
We would find each other. I would see him again.
London would always walk with me; it would live inside my blood. The place my cousin had told me never to go; the place that was my chrysalis, my damnation, and my redemption. Its streets had won my heart, had turned me from Paige Mahoney to the Pale Dreamer to Black Moth to Underqueen, and then unmade me again, leaving me irrevocably changed. One day, I would return to it. To see this land unchained from the anchor.
When we were some way from the port, Warden opened the door of the container, and together, we stepped on to the deck. Brutal wind hacked at my curls as we approached the railings at the stern.
The merchant ship crashed through the English Channel, churning the waves to lace. My hands came to rest on the railings. The ice-cold wind tore at my cheeks, as if it wanted to expose a second face beneath my own, as I looked back at the southern coast of Britain.
I had freed this country from Senshield; I had weakened Hildred Vance’s hand. For now, voyants were safer than they had been. They could disappear into the shadows again; they could walk the streets invisibly. But I could do more for them. I would cast off my crown and take up my sword, and I would go to battle. Soon, an unknown woman named Flora Blake would arrive on the streets of Paris, and the theater of war would open again.
And we would meet our new allies. Whoever they were.
“All this time, I thought we were the ones driving this revolution, but this is bigger than we could ever have imagined,” I said. “Someone once told me I’d always be a puppet . . . never holding my own strings. Now I’m starting to think they might have been right.”
“We all have our strings,” Warden said. “A dreamwalker should know better than most that all strings can be cut.”
“Then promise me this.” I turned to face him. “Whatever orders Burnish or her sponsor sends us, we don’t follow them without question. We find out what kind of game we’re playing before we show them our own cards. And we stay together.” I sought his gaze. “Promise me we’ll stay together.”
“You have my word, Paige Mahoney.”
He stood by my side as we left England behind us. It was the first day of January. The beginning of another year, another life, another name. I looked back once more at the cliffs that loomed along the coast, at the white cliffs of Dover, limned by the promise of dawn.
And I waited for the sun to rise—as it always had, like a song from the night.