GOOD EVENING.” MYLES SALUTES THE LONE SOLDIER in front of us. “I’ve asked the captain here to attend me on the eleventh-hour roundsss.”
The man frowns and lifts the hilt of his sword from its sheath as I shoot a nervous glance at Myles, only to watch the air around him fluctuate again. Abruptly his dark-haired, pasty-skinned self has transformed into a Bron general. I shake my head. Blink. And look down as my own black cloak and female form are replaced by captain’s clothes and a boy’s physique.
The soldier releases his sword and straightens. Despite the perplexity crossing his features, he snaps his heels together. “Of course, sir. My apologies for not recognizing you.”
Myles nods and keeps his grip on my elbow as he steers me past the man and through the metal door to a spiraling case of stairs that descend.
As soon as the door shuts behind us, I peek down at myself again, focusing in until I see the edge of my cloak beneath the visual blur. And try not to allow the panic to seep up my throat.
“You’d be wise to quit ogling yourself and watch the stepsss.” Myles releases my arm to lead the way. “I didn’t pull you from a host of guards merely to watch you break your neck.”
“You keep turning me into a fourteen-year-old boy with sweaty hands.”
“Not nearly as fetching, I’ll admit. But less likely to invite questionsss.”
“What about that boy back there—the one Sir Gowon had punished? Do you think he’ll be okay?” Even thinking about it makes my heart hurt.
“Eventually. I suggest you concern yourself with minding your own business from now on.”
I shiver. What kind of society trains its children to kill and then punishes them when they don’t? Even for as broken as the laws are in Faelen and for as poorly as slaves are treated, they don’t teach violence. They don’t require it. “What about the delegates? Are they safe or—?”
“I doubt Draewulf’s foolish enough to do anything toward the delegatesss while the Bron Assembly is in turmoil over whether to trust him. At least not yet. Now would you please keep that despicable conscience of yours reined in while I try to remember the way?”
I bite my tongue and follow.
After a moment he peers back, as if surprised I’ve obeyed. He blinks. “Here, by the way.” The atmosphere around us both shimmers just before our façade of being a captain and general falls away, revealing our black hooded cloaks and Faelen clothes. He turns and descends faster.
I take the steps two at a time to keep up and try to refocus before my anger at the Bron soldiers and Gowon boils over for what they’ve just done to Kel. “So that’s how you do it—create a mirage out of air.”
He shrugs. “A mental mirage perhaps. It’s merely a matter of using words to manipulate the untrained mind.”
“But it worked on me.”
“Because you heard me suggest something as true to the guard. Thus, for a bit, you saw it as such.”
“Except I could see through it.”
His voice lowers. “Hmm. Yesss. Better than most. Still haven’t figured out how.”
“Can Rasha see through your mirages?”
His answer is simply a face contorted in irritation as he stops and waits for me at the staircase base. He opens another door, this one unguarded, and leads us into a hall lit by those same curious hanging lanterns.
“What do you think Rasha’s guards needed her for?” I whisper.
He snorts. “No idea, but let’s hope her royal wretchedness is putting those Luminescent curvesss to something sensually useful.”
I glare at him. “Don’t talk about her that way.” And walk faster to shove down my guilt that I’m doing the very thing she asked me not to. Not to mention I’ve no idea where she even is.
“Hmm. You’re in a rather testy mood tonight.”
“I just think that rather than being a pig about her, perhaps you could’ve used your abilities to help her. Or to help the man killed in that blood sport, or the boy Sir Gowon just had beaten, for that matter.”
“You and I both know that man was already dying—his opponent merely ended it quickly. And having spent your life as a Faelen slave, you should know better than most that people worship their own lawsss and tradition—and flouting them will always inflict a penalty.”
“Which is exactly why if I’d had my abilities, I would’ve stopped them both.”
“And started another war. As for my abilities, I prefer to keep them hidden as long as possssible, if you can manage that for the time being.”
“Nice justification.”
“Saysss the girl still keeping Draewulf alive.”
He halts in front of a door and waits for me to catch up before we’re slipping outside into a small moonlit alcove where two palace watchmen are standing. Even though I nudge the metal shut without a sound, they turn and peer in our direction, hands on their swords. I press against the wall in the overhang’s shadow, instinctively thinking to squat and feel around for a rock to toss in distraction. But Myles takes my elbow again and steps into the light.
“Merely making the roundsss, gentlemen.”
“Ah, very good, sir.”
Without another glance, they wave us through the alcove before returning to their discussion. Ducking around them, we step out into one of those wide streets that make up the spindle city.
I gasp.
It’s foggy and serene and cast in a dreamlike glow, lit with torches mounted in perfectly distanced rows along the walkways.
Myles’s cold fingers press over my cloaked arm, his chill creeping through my skin as he pushes me to the left walkway and begins hurrying from one street to the next through the organized maze of matching buildings.
It’s not until we’ve gone down four of the streets that I notice the quiet. A shiver runs across my shoulders, because even though we’re doing our best to hide in the shadows as we go, there seems no need for it. The place is empty. Not just empty, it’s silent even inside the houses.
“Where is everyone?”
He glances down an alley. “It’s past curfew. Those who are not part of the banquet are asleep.”
I raise a brow. “And that’s not eerie at—”
A small movement catches my eye, bringing me up short. At the end of the alley ahead of us something’s huddled under a cloak. A child? A man? I crinkle my brow and step hesitantly toward it but stop after five paces. The smell. It’s gagging and vaguely familiar in a way that reminds me of that one section in Litchfell Forest with Colin. The bodies. Even the bolcranes had left them alone. It smells like the plague. “Something’s wrong,” I whisper.
“For bleeding’s sakesss, girl—do you ever stop talking? I can’t imagine even Eogan finding it endearing.” But he’s looking down the alley too as I glare ice picks up his thin nostrils.
“Probably someone whose lover threw them out for talking too much.” But he flips around and backtracks us up one of the side streets we just walked. I’m tempted to argue, to go see if they need help, but . . . that smell.
“So this woman we’re going to see—what kind of abilities will she give me?”
“That, my dear, is something to ask her.”
“But will they be like yours?”
“No one’s are like mine.” He gives a sniff.
“When did you get yours?”
“None of your businesss.”
I stop. “I’m walking with a man I trust less than half of my previous owners, on my way to consume powers in an act that for all I know is illegal and dangerous. So I’ll thank you to answer my blasted question.”
“Sixteen,” he growls.
“By the woman we’re going to now?”
He nods.
Right. “And how old are you?”
His tone falls as he slows. “Why do you want to know?”
“Just wondering how you can know she’s still here.”
He steps in front of me and stops. And leans in. “There are no guarantees of anything except I’m risking my neck to help you. So if you’re interested in having second thoughtsss, please say so now and let’s be done with thisss rather than when we’re standing on her bleeding doorstep. Are you in or not?”
I chew my lip. Stare at him. “I’m in.” I tip my head. “But let me make one thing clear. You are helping me, so I thank you for that. However, I’m not doing this for you or to help you accomplish whatever alternative reason you have for assisting me. I’m doing this for Eogan. So perhaps the better question is, are you in or not?”
His reply is simply to smirk and turn down the street toward wherever it is we’re headed.
I hurry to catch up and try to shove down the sick feeling brought on by his smile as Eogan’s and Rasha’s voices fill my head with their invasive warnings not to trust Myles.
I’m not trusting him. I’m simply . . . doing what needs to be done.
For whatever reason though, I lower my voice. “What if Eogan’s block can work against these abilities too? Won’t Draewulf just use it to cut them out like my Elemental ones?”
“Not if he doesn’t know you have them until it’s too late.”
Good point. But the nausea stays.
We’re nearing the outer edges of the city. I can tell not only because of the general direction we’ve been moving in under the cloud-covered sky, but also because of the buildings. This is the older, more embellished area. Curious. Is this mystery woman one of their elders?
He points toward a house. It’s got an old wooden door and no windows, and it’s sandwiched between two larger, fancier buildings. How he remembered this was here, I can’t imagine, but my legs suddenly feel like the chewy bread we’ve been eating. “What’s she like?” I almost ask but don’t.
He raises his fist to the door, but just before knocking, he turns and looks me up and down. “You can still change your—”
I shove in front of him and bang on the door myself.
He grins and follows up by tapping five times in some kind of rhythmic signal.
The door is opened to reveal a well-lit interior behind an unbelievably old woman nearly as short as Allen the tallish dwarf. Gray hair, gray robes, everything about her looks aged and clean and impeccably neat and, more than that, especially beautiful. A whoosh of incense puffs past her into our faces—it smells of embalming powder and fish.
My lungs gag up my throat.
“You are here for my services?”