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While I’d only meant to spend the evening with Gideon and Brigette reconnoitering the Council’s island and assessing their security measures, it now seemed we’d skipped that step and were steaming full speed ahead. The shortened timeline for executing our plan to liberate Jackie made me edgy and nervous. I joined my companions on the balcony, slumped against the railing, and rubbed my eyes. My short interaction with Taviano had worn me out. How would I manage to endure a whole night with him, especially if he might betray us any moment?
So what are you going to do about it? Grandfather asked.
Be as prepared as possible.
A backup plan?
Something like that...
“I have another request, Niffin,” I said.
He glanced up, eyebrow arched. “Your wish is my command, my lady.”
I glared at him but otherwise ignored the mocking tone in his voice. “Tonight’s, um, adventure, only requires the four of us.” I pointed at Brigette, who stood in the balcony’s dark corner, still puffing at her cigarette. “Brigette, Taviano, Gideon, and me.”
“I do not trust that Magician.” Malita’s nose wrinkled as if she’d smelled something foul.
“Neither do I, so here’s what we’re going to do about it.” Quickly I laid out a list of duties for Malita and Niffin to complete. After repeating the list back to my satisfaction, they withdrew from the balcony, leaving me alone with Brigette.
“I don’t know exactly what to expect tonight.” I stared at the starlight flickering on the bay’s flat surface. “I’ve said before, though, that I won’t force anyone into service for me. If you want to back out, say so now.”
She joined me at the balcony’s edge, bracing her forearms on the railing. “You’ll just let me walk away?”
“Give you money for a train ticket and travel expenses too.”
“And if I took you up on your offer, then what? What would you do?”
“I’d cross my fingers and pray to every one of the elemental gods and goddesses that ever existed that they work their ways with fate and bring me another solution. Without a Magician, I don’t stand a chance. Not against Jackie and certainly not against Le Poing Fermé. I know you have an affinity for sugar, Brigette, but I won’t coat my expectations in honey to make them sweeter. The things you may be called upon to do tonight...” I let my meaning drift in the silence.
“Tonight won’t even be the worst of it,” she said. “Assuming we succeed and manage to free Jackie and get him back to Inselgrau—”
“Getting him to Inselgrau will be the easy part. I have a feeling he’ll be very eager to get there.”
She raised a finger. “But keeping him from exerting control over you during that journey could be a full-time job.”
“Can you make another charm for that?”
Her lip twitched. “Perhaps.”
“You’ve already been working on something, haven’t you?”
She stubbed out her cigarette on the balcony railing and returned the unsmoked portion to her tin. “I don’t want to raise your expectations prematurely. But if I do manage keep him from influencing you and the rest of us on our way to Inselgrau, there’s still a terrifyingly powerful cabal waiting for us when we get there.”
“Brigette, the pain...” I swallowed. “I’m not asking for self-sacrifice. If it becomes too much—”
She pressed a hand to my shoulder. “Let me be the judge of what’s too much.”
I winced, regretting my next question. “But what if the moment you decide it’s too much is the moment that brings my defeat?”
“I don’t know what to tell you, Evie.” She pushed away from the railing, retreating toward the interior door. “Pray to those ancient gods that seem to be so fond of you, and beg them not to let that happen.”
“Why are you doing this?” I asked as she walked away.
She shrugged. “Maybe it’s to find out which is stronger, me or the pain. Maybe I’m doing it just to prove to myself that I can.”
Her answer didn’t reassure me, but it seemed unlikely she could say anything that would. If she promised success and pledged unfailing strength, it would’ve been worse—then she would’ve revealed herself to be untrustworthy and a liar.
I followed her into the sitting room, knelt beside our box of supplies, and picked out the items I needed. “Taviano says the Council’s guards have weapons. They aren’t Magical, though.”
“So now you’d like me to make you bulletproof on top of everything else?”
I glanced at her and held my breath, waiting.
“Fine.” She rolled her eyes. “I can work up something fairly quickly for that.”
“I’ll also need an out. I don’t trust Taviano a bit. He’s going to betray us, and I can’t afford to get trapped on that Island.”
“I thought I was your backup plan.”
I glanced at the mordid pipe resting on a side table. I would have destroyed it already if I thought she wouldn’t simply go out and buy another. “Can I depend on you?”
“You can, or you can’t. Either way, I’m all you’ve got.”
That was no answer. I harrumphed at her.
She shrugged. “Anything else?”
“Maybe one more thing.”
She exhaled loudly. “One more?”
“If it all falls apart, if everything turns to ruin and chaos, I need you to look out for Gideon.”
She coughed a startled noise.
“He’ll sacrifice himself for me. I want you to stop him before he does. No matter what, you’ve got to save him.” I rose, clutching my collection of items, and faced Brigette. “Promise me?”
Her brow crinkled. Her throat worked. “Are you sure? What if saving him means sacrificing you?”
“I can take care of myself. Jackie Faercourt will do everything in his power to make sure nothing happens to me, and you and I have already planned for Jackie. I need someone to look out for Gideon the same way.”
Brigette shrugged. “I make no promises.”
Somehow, I suspected she would say that. “Midnight will be here before we know it. I’m going to get dressed and go down to the garage to see if Gideon needs anything.”
“I’ll meet you there as soon as I can.”
In my room, I changed into black pants that fit like a second skin and stretched, allowing free range of movement. I tugged on a long black blouse and wrapped a length of dark rope around my waist several times, wearing it like a belt. After letting my hair loose, I ran a brush through it, smoothing snarled and knotted strands, and braided it back into a tight queue. Finally, I slipped on my Thunder Cloak, a plain black mask, and a pair of black gloves.
Our hotel suite was quiet and empty when I slipped out of my bedroom. I gathered the basilica’s blueprints, rolled them into a tube, and stuffed them into an interior pocket. No one remarked on my strange attire as I hurried down the hotel’s main stairway. The Season of Magic meant the rules of fashion and propriety no longer applied after sundown. Again, I savored the freedom of my momentary anonymity. If I successfully returned to Inselgrau and reclaimed my throne, my days of going anywhere unrecognized would swiftly come to an end.
But maybe I’d find an excuse to throw an occasional masquerade party of my own.
I found Gideon in the garage, applying a final coat of paint to the boat’s hull. Once bright white, it was now as dark and dull as a cloudy night.
“I need to paint the canopy too.” He gave me a quick glance, lips twitching with an inscrutable expression. “But I haven’t gotten to it yet.”
I removed my mask and pointed at the paintbrush in his hand. “You get changed. I’ll finish the boat.”
He disappeared into a shadowy corner while I smeared black paint over the canopy’s gaudy blue and white stripes. Harsh and acrid, the paint’s fumes tingled in my nose, and my eyes watered. “I’m not sure I want to know what’s in this stuff. Smells like it could peel your skin off.”
“Take my advice and don’t get any on you. It stains, and I have a feeling it won’t come out with regular soap.” He emerged from the shadows dressed in attire similar to mine. Snug black pants hugged his long legs, and a knitted shirt clung to his chest and shoulders.
He slid his mask on, shoved it up so it perched atop his head like a cap, and slipped into a long midnight-colored cloak. He looked dashing and dangerous. He was dashing and dangerous, and unbelievably appealing. I thanked the gods for fabricating the fate that had brought us together.
Giving me an arrogant grin, he gestured to his costume. “Like it?”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t get cocky.”
With the grace of a wraith, he ghosted to my side. “The boat looks good. But that was the easy part.”
Crouching, I tapped the lid onto the paint tin and stowed everything under a bench in the boat. “Did Niffin find you?”
“He did. He passed along your message.”
“What do you think?”
“I think we’re better safe than sorry.”
I stared at the boat, watching it rise and fall in a hypnotizing bob. “Would you think less of me if I told you I don’t want to do this?”
“No, I would think you were smart.” He squatted and took my hand, tracing a finger along the line running through the center of my palm. “I don’t want to do this, either. Jackie Faercourt is exactly where he deserves to be.”
“We could still run. Just you and me. We could go find some secret hideaway and start a new life.”
“How long would that last before you started hating yourself? Before you started resenting me?”
Cutting him a sharp look, I fisted my hand, trapping his finger. “I’d never resent you.”
“If I let you talk me into walking away from this, you would.”
“What does, or doesn’t, happen tonight is not your responsibility. The hardest part of what we’re about to do isn’t fearing what might happen to me, but what might happen to you and Brigette and anyone else with the unfortunate luck of getting swept up in my hurricane of trouble.”
Gideon had considered me impetuous and rash, and he hadn’t been wrong, but there was nothing like taking a bullet through the heart to make a person second-guess herself. I’d been afraid before, but my fear had been a quiet voice, easily drowned out by the roar of my thunder and my need to prove myself. The lightning and I had become a loop of cause-and-effect, me feeding my will into the storms while the storms cycled their brazenness back into me. But for now, the thunder was far away, and my fear was screaming, refusing to be silenced.
He folded his other hand over mine and squeezed. “The burden of a queen is to be the one who makes those difficult choices.”
“And be the one who must live with the consequences.” Justina had said something similar. Hearing it again from Gideon’s lips made it no easier to accept. I closed my eyes, inhaled a deep breath, and let it out, long and slowly. “You said Le Poing Fermé rules Inselgrau with lethal force, right?”
He nodded. “Anyone who has stood up to them has died.”
“Then I can’t walk away from my people and abandon them to that fate.”
The sound of someone clearing their throat echoed through the garage. Brigette, also in black pants, shirt, and mask, had joined us. Hands on her hips, she gave us a wry smile. “Are we ready to go find our destinies?”
Swallowing, I nodded. “Let’s just hope we aren’t readying ourselves to go find our deaths. Or something even worse.”
“What’s worse than death?”
I stepped into the boat, careful to avoid the awning still glistening with wet paint. “Quite a few things, such as being enslaved by Jackie Faercourt.”
***
The boat’s boiler puffed and hissed as we motored into the bay. I drew in clouds to blot out the moon and obscure the stars. The lack of light concealed our approach in the event anyone happened to be watching. The gloom also made it harder for us to see where we were going, but we had a Magician helping us navigate. Already Brigette had expended some of her energy obscuring the sound of our chugging engine—an issue I hadn’t considered when formulating this portion of our plan. I just hope that the other flaws in my plan are so easy to fix.
Other flaws? Grandfather asked.
There’s bound to be mistakes in a scheme that’s basically being made up as we go along.
Aren’t queens supposed to inspire their followers with confidence?
Ask me again after I’m sitting on the throne.
As we drifted closer, the black-shadowed silhouette of the Council’s islet and domed basilica seemed to rise from the waters like a primordial beast surfacing from the deep. Gideon turned the wheel, aiming the prow toward the narrow opening between the Sea Goddess’s promontory and the Council’s islet.
Brigette lit a ball of red light bright enough to illuminate the necklace pooled in her palm.
I squinted at the fragile gold strand. “So this is it? The future of me and my nation woven into one thin strand of gold.”
“I’ve keyed it to react specifically to Faercourt. It should do everything you’ve asked me to make it do.” A pained look crossed her face, and she rubbed her temples. “I hope it’s enough.”
I pinched up the fine chain and hooked it around my neck. “You work fast.”
“I haven’t had much else to do other than play dressmaker to you and tour guide to Malita and Niffin.” She plucked two coins from her pocket and gave one to Gideon and me. “Keep these on you at all times. They should protect you against bullets, but I’m not so sure about swords, so try to stay away from pointy objects. They’ll also allow me to track you if we get separated.”
“When we’re finished with tonight, we should talk about your salary.”
She snorted. “You couldn’t afford me, Stormbourne. I’m here because I want to be, not because of money.”
“Tell that to our purse.”
“Just because I’m not looking to get rich off you doesn’t mean I intend to live like a pauper.”
“We’re almost there,” Gideon said in a harsh whisper. He leaned on the throttle, and the boat’s engine shuddered and growled, struggling against choppier waters and stronger currents.
“Do you see Taviano?” I asked.
“I can’t see a damned thing in this gloom.”
“Hold on.” Brigette closed her eyes, raised her hands, and wiped them across the darkness as though she were rubbing frost from a windowpane. Her gesture created a streak of brightness, and she peered through it. “There’s a figure on the beach. It could be Taviano.” She snapped her fingers, and her windowpane flashed, giving us a closer view, as if we were looking through a telescope. The figure on the beach wore a dark cloak and hood, but his sharp nose and hollow cheeks were unmistakable. “He’s here.”
She swiped her hand again, and the bright streak faded.
Gideon turned the wheel, and our boat swung about, prow pointing at the islet’s southern shoreline. Waves crashed on the beach in a steady bass beat. “I’m going to take us around and beach us on the bay side where the water’s calmer. We’ll meet up with him on foot.”
“He told us to meet him at midnight,” I said.
Gideon nodded. “We have plenty of time.”
After running our boat aground in calmer waters, we disembarked and dragged the cruiser higher on the beach—a pale strip of land that rose sharply into dark, limestone cliffs. Pausing, we waited while Brigette smoked a preemptive dose of djageesh.
“How’s the pain?” I squeezed her shoulder.
“Barely a whisper,” she said, already stubbing out the cigarette’s flaming tip. She tucked it away in her tin.
“Remember, you’re the backup plan when Taviano inevitably betrays us. No matter what, I need you to stay on this beach. If things fall apart, we’ll be depending on you to break the wards and get us out.” Depending on Brigette made me feel as confident as depending on Taviano, but of the two, I thought Brigette would be the least likely to deceive us.
“Let’s go,” Gideon said.
A briny ocean breeze hissed in my ears as we hurried to Taviano’s rendezvous point. He marked his position by igniting a small orb of light that died as quickly as it had appeared. He spoke low and quietly, his voice barely rising above the cacophony of wind and waves. “Let’s get off the beach.”
He led us through loose, boot-sucking sand toward the cliffs. The bluffs were dark, and Taviano steered us to an even darker opening carved in their base. The shallow limestone cavern amplified his voice. “Well, we’re all here. What now?”
Brigette formed a red light ball and floated it above us. I dropped my cloak hood and slid my mask off. “There’s no need to fight if you can stop one before it begins.”
Taviano cocked his head. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“I mean it’s my intention to get through this with no violent confrontations.”
“Why, though? Why not use your lightning to blow open the basilica, march in, strike down any opposition, and take Faercourt?”
“I am not a warlord who’s all right with making excuses about collateral damage if people get hurt because of my actions.” Never mind that I had been in such a battle before, and the collateral damage had been me. “I already have enough enemies, and I’d rather not make another one out of the Council of Magic. My intention is to get in and release him without anyone noticing until we’re long gone.”
“I’m not sure that’s possible,” Taviano said.
I clenched my teeth. “We’re going to try to make it possible.”
He sniffed, rolled his eyes, and mumbled something about unreasonable expectations.
“Why does it have to be so impossible, Taviano?” Brigette asked. “You want to make it difficult so it seems like you’re accomplishing some major feat, but really it’s a couple of invisibility and muting spells. That’s beginner’s Magic.”
“Maybe, if we weren’t trying to break into a godsforsaken fortress of Magic surrounded by warding spells designed to protect against those very things.”
“I can handle a few warding spells.”
“A few—” He choked. “You are not breaking into some bourgeois children’s’ playroom in downtown Isolas. You are breaking into the holiest temple of the most powerful governing body in all of the Magical world.”
She balled her fists. Her lips screwed into a snarl. “That doesn’t matter to me.”
“Well, it should. If you break those wards, every Magician on the Council will know it. You’ll bring their sentries down on us faster than Stormbourne can fling a bolt of lightning. The Council will mostly likely lock you up and throw away the key—their understanding of habeas corpus is nonexistent.”
“If you’re not going to help us,” I asked, “then why did you come?”
Folding his arms over his chest, he snorted and peered down his nose. “I had hoped you had formed a better plan.”
“Our original plan had been only to reconnoiter,” I said. “Then you came along, demanding to participate. We assumed you had something to offer. That’s usually how blackmail works.”
He maintained his imperious posture. “Reconnoiter what, exactly?”
“You said there were caves under the basilica. We were hoping to find an entrance from the beach. Maybe some backdoor entry that was vulnerable and easy to exploit.”
He opened his mouth, and by the look on his face, he was primed to say something harsh and critical. But he paused. His brow crinkled. His haughty expression eased. “There may be something...”
“So there is a cave entrance from the beach?”
Taviano’s face scrunched into a reluctant grimace. “Not an entrance, as such.” He crooked his finger, beckoning us.
We followed the cliff line eastward, moving toward the staircase at the basilica’s front entrance. From our position, I could make out only the highest point of the cathedral’s domed roof above us, yet I felt its presence, almost as if it were a living creature hunched at the cliff top, poised to attack at the first sign of threat. My blood chilled, and my stomach roiled, not that it hadn’t been upset most of the evening. A steady diet of anxiety had a way of doing that.
Taviano stopped us in another depression at the base of the cliffs. This time he lit his own ball of light, glowing an iridescent blue-green. “There is not much to this islet, as you can see. The basilica takes up most of the land at the top of the cliffs, not more than four or five thousand square feet, and it is the only way to access the caves, as far as anyone knows. If another entrance exists, then it is at the bottom of one of the pools in the caverns.”
“So we’re screwed,” Gideon said.
Taviano gave him an arrogant look and continued. “Most cave-dwelling fish tend to be pale and blind, but one pool often has other varieties of fish in it, ones that can be found swimming about in the bay.”
Not comprehending his meaning, I frowned. “What’s your point?”
“Those fish must be able get inside those caverns somehow. I theorize they are using underwater tunnels that would most likely not be warded.”
“Load of good that does us.” I motioned to my companions. “Last time I checked, none of us has fins or gills.”
He raised a finger. “But what if you did?”
My breath caught. Slack-jawed, I gaped at him. “What are you saying?”
“A few fins and gills would be a lot easier to arrange than breaking through the wards. A lot quieter too.”
Too stunned to speak, I said nothing. Was it possible? It seemed so absurd.
More absurd than your arrangement with me? Grandfather asked.
Brigette flapped a hand. “No way. I don’t swim, especially not in underwater caves at night.”
Taviano sneered. “Your participation is not required.” He shifted his weight and glanced at Gideon. “In truth, this plan only requires Stormbourne and me. You two can stay and make sure the beach remains secure.”
“No.” Gideon stiffened, clenching his fists. “If Evie goes, I go.”
“I’m perfectly capable of protecting her.”
“But who is going to protect her from you if you decide to betray her?”
“And I’m perfectly capable of speaking for myself,” I said. “Gideon goes with me.”
Taviano bared his teeth. “If I was going to betray you, I would alert the Council now. Your presence on their sacred island in the middle of the night would be enough to warrant punitive action, but that does little to benefit me in the long run.”
“He’s right,” Brigette said. “He’s more likely to call the guards after you break Faercourt out. That’s when he’d look like a real hero. That’s when you’ll be most vulnerable to his betrayal.”
“So that only further justifies my participation,” Gideon said.
Taviano sucked a tooth and sighed. “Fine. But once we’re inside, you have to follow my lead. Stormbourne, did you bring the blueprints?”
I slipped the rolled drawings from my cloak pocket, crouched, and spread them open on the sand. Taviano knelt beside me. “The caverns we’ll come into are not where the prisoners are kept.”
I snorted. “Of course not. That would be too easy.”
“The Council uses that space for storage, and the exit will take us into a small vestibule, here.” He drew his finger down a long corridor. “We’ll have to make our way along this route to reach the entrance to the prison caverns. Night sentries patrol these corridors. This is when we’re most likely to be caught.”
“How do you know so much about the basilica if you’re not actually on the Council?” I asked.
“DeLaguna encourages my interest. He thinks my curiosity is a sign of an eager student.”
“But you’re really just arming yourself with information for a hostile takeover?”
He sniffed. “You never know when even the most obscure information could come in handy. Tonight is the beginning of my master’s undoing. Soon, I will take his place on the Council.”
“And then you’ll set your eye on ruling that too.” Brigette pursed her lips. “Can we get on with this? Evie might enjoy adventure, but I prefer books and tea and reclining on soft surfaces that don’t leave me coated in salt and sand.”
I glanced at Gideon. He nodded.
I swallowed, relieving my dry throat. “So how do we get Jackie back out once we’ve freed him?”
“The same way we came in,” Taviano said. “The wards are in place not only to stop people from breaking in but also to keep prisoners from breaking out. If Faercourt tries to leave the basilica by any route other than these caves, the wards will stop him.”
I paused in the middle of shedding my Thunder Cloak and considered whether it made sense to leave it behind.
He must have noticed my hesitation. “Leave it. Your cloak won’t work in there.”
My already-upset stomach sank lower, but I stripped off my cloak, boots, mask, and blouse, leaving me in a tight knit undershirt. Although I’d discarded most of my possessions to make swimming easier, I retied the rope around my waist and slipped my knife into it. Even if Magic wouldn’t work inside the basilica, I was willing to bet a blade would.
Gideon undressed down to his pants, but Taviano remained in his dark silk shirt. The lanky Magician eyed Gideon’s bare chest and broad shoulders with a look of disdain. Or jealousy, perhaps.
“I assume you know how to swim.”
Gideon said nothing, giving Taviano a What do you think? look as he fastened Sephonie to his back and adjusted the strap across his chest.
“Salt water won’t harm it?” I asked.
Gideon grimaced. “It’s a risk I’ll have to take.”
Taviano strode to the water and stepped into the fizzy surf. Gideon, Brigette, and I joined him.
“Brigette, if anything goes wrong—”
“I know.” She squeezed my shoulder and glanced at Gideon. “I haven’t forgotten what to do.”
Taviano raised his hand, and a blue-green glow exuded from his fingertips. “I apologize in advance, but this may sting a bit.”
He touched my chest, and the air in my lungs fled as though he’d reached inside and ripped it out. Choking, I dropped to my knees and gasped, but no relief came.
“Get her into the water,” he ordered.
Strong hands gripped me and tugged me into the waves.
“Relax, Stormbourne. Fight against your instincts to hold your breath. Let the water in.”
Panicking, I ignored Taviano’s instructions and flailed, kicking and fighting as dark waves crashed over me.
“Stop, Evie.” Gideon’s voice broke through my terror. “It’ll be all right. I’ll be with you the whole time. Relax.”
At the moment I was certain I would suffocate or drown, a subconscious reflex kicked in. I inhaled water... and exhaled it like air, drawing precious oxygen into my starving bloodstream. A shadowy figure appeared beside me and took my hand. Gideon. My blurry vision cleared as a blue-green light illuminated his face and Taviano’s as well. The Magician kicked and stroked into deeper water before turning back and motioning for us to follow.
Sting a bit? That’s the understatement of the century. I wondered if Taviano had gotten a thrill from watching me struggle.
After taking a few more experimental breaths, assuring myself I wouldn’t drown, I mustered my courage and swam after Taviano, stroking hard against the currents.
