“He’s possessed.”
The man who spoke was Baron Winter, a Court of the Woods delegate. He was one of the few Royals who hadn’t fled to the edges of the room.
“It’s witch magic,” Marquesa Ana spat.
Several sets of eyes turned to Petra, the only witch in attendance. The three Crimson Court sisters turned on her like a pack of wolves, wrestled her to the ground with violent whispers, and held her in place with spells. Tablecloths bound themselves around Petra’s wrists and stopped her from reaching for her flask of lavender ash.
“It isn’t me!” she cried.
Before she could get out another word, the tablecloth wedged itself in her mouth as a gag.
Anouk clutched at the bell, wanting to rip it from her neck. She was useless! The Lunar King’s contorted body rose higher. The ribbons of smoke poured out of his mouth. Black tears rolled down his face, dripping into a puddle of tar. Suddenly she was back in the flames, having her body pulled apart, burning without burning at all, and sweat broke out on her brow.
“Let her go,” Rennar ordered the Crimson Court sisters, motioning to Petra. “She wouldn’t do this. She’s a new witch, anyway. It takes decades to master a possession trick.”
“It must be her,” Marquesa Ana insisted. “She’s commanding that smoke. There’s something unnatural about it—I can feel it making my skin prickle. It’s poison.”
The smoke twisted toward the Marquesa as though drawn to her voice, and the Marquesa recoiled.
A chill ran up Anouk’s back. She grabbed Rennar’s arm and dragged him a few feet away. He frowned when he saw how her hands were shaking.
“Anouk, what is it?” Concern laced his voice.
“It’s the Coven.” She gestured toward the puddle of black tears. “I saw all of this in a vision during the Coal Baths. I thought it was just delusions, but the Oxford witches were there, somehow, in the flames. A group of them were summoning smoke that curled just like this. It rose so high that I couldn’t see them anymore.” She shivered. “They were crying black tears too.”
He pursed his lips. “You’re certain?”
“I know I disappointed everyone before, but I’m positive. They’re here.”
Although she sounded crazy, he didn’t argue. Before he could act, Prince Aleksi shoved to the front of the crowd and touched silver powder from the vial around his neck to his lips. He began to whisper. Threads of magic wove themselves together into golden ropes that wound around his father’s limbs and tried to pull him back to the floor. The king’s head twisted unnaturally to observe him. Blankness filled his eyes. Something was looking through them, but not King Kaspar.
The threads of golden magic pulled the king back, but each inch was a battle. The Lunar Prince was straining under the pressure. Rennar reached for his own powder vial, but then the king’s eyes began bubbling with tar. His mouth hinged open and a blast of bright light bolted out. Prince Aleksi was struck. He fell back into a chair, clutching at his chest.
Words began pouring out of the king’s mouth along with more ribbons of smoke. They grew from low, unintelligible hisses into fragments spoken in the Selentium Vox.
“Previso . . . rivet . . . morfin . . .”
“What’s that?” Viggo grabbed her shoulder. “What’s he saying? I don’t speak that damn language.”
“Get back, Viggo,” Luc snapped. “Don’t breathe in the smoke.”
The Royals and Goblins who hadn’t yet fled the room all listened uneasily. Anouk translated for Viggo in a hushed voice. “It’s strange—he’s speaking as ‘we,’ not as ‘I,’ like the witches are a collective voice speaking through him. His words are broken. He’s threatening an . . . an impending darkness. A deathless death.”
Rennar lowered himself to one knee beside Prince Aleksi, who still clutched his chest. Queen Violante knelt at his other side. They helped Aleksi stand.
“You see?” Rennar yelled to the crowd. “The Coven of Oxford is upon us. They’ve even found their way into our midst. There can be no more doubt about the threat they represent.” His face grew serious as he looked to Aleksi and Violante. “We must cast them out, them and their poison smoke. A kindred spell.”
They nodded.
The three of them began whispering in unison. Anouk had heard of kindred spells—the kind that took two or more magic handlers working in unison—though Mada Vittora had always preferred to work alone.
As they cast the spell, the smoke seemed to tremble and flow toward their voices. The possessed king shot out more light from his mouth but the Crimson Queen cast a spell to cloud the light while Rennar and Aleksi worked spells to cast out the witches. Powerful energy surrounded them and the king, making the few remaining dishes shatter. A marquesa from the Minaret Court stepped forward and joined in the kindred spell. Baron Winter joined next.
The king’s body began to jerk and twist in mid-air. The ribbons of smoke curled tightly, constricting around his body.
“It’s working,” Petra said as she finally managed to shimmy out of her tablecloth bindings. She shoved herself to her feet and cast her own whisper into the mix.
Anouk’s arms hung at her sides. She’d never felt so helpless. Petra fought alongside the others. Luc and Viggo were helping Hunter Black, who was still disoriented from his transformation. Even the Goblins were spitting whispers to keep the witches’ magic at bay.
But Anouk could do nothing.
She felt hollow inside. She turned her hands palms up and then curled them into fists. Her nails dug painfully into her palms. Useless!
Someone cried out behind her. She spun around. The Royals had managed to surround the possessed king with a sphere of glass cobbled together from broken pieces of crystal and stemware. It trapped the bursts of light, but a thin thread of smoke still snaked out and oozed around the room in the direction of the Goblins. The king continued to cry black tears, which now pooled in the bottom of the glass sphere. Rennar, Violante, and Aleksi redoubled their efforts, but their brows were heavy with sweat. Violante looked on the verge of passing out. The vitae echo prevented them from outright killing the witches or the king; the best they could hope for was to banish the witches’ astral projection from the king’s body, but even that was proving to be an impossible feat.
Anouk let out a frustrated cry. She could kill a witch. She wasn’t bound by the vitae echo. If only she hadn’t lost her magic! But was she totally helpless? A line of black smoke snaked toward her, drawn to her cry, and she flinched and moved away. It came from a small hole in the glass orb. The Royals had enchanted the glass shards to melt together with no gaps or cracks, but the tip of the king’s little finger was caught in the glass, leaving the tiniest opening for smoke to escape.
Here, at least, was something she could do that didn’t take an ounce of magic.
She grabbed a butter knife.
In a few strides, she was at the glass sphere. It took three slashes to sever the king’s little finger. The finger fell with a gush of blood. With a flash of light, the barrier was sealed, the glass sphere complete, the smoke trapped inside where it couldn’t poison anyone.
Rennar threw a look over his shoulder and gave her a nod of gratitude.
The sphere started to glow. The king began screaming, his voice as contorted as his body, and with a flash of light, the glass barrier shattered. Shards of crystal rained down. Rennar, closest, took the brunt of it. It carved deep gashes into his face and chest. He threw out whispers to seal his wounds but smoke, now freed from the orb, was snaking into his body.
When the last of the smoke dissipated, slithering out through the window or into Rennar’s cuts, all signs of the witches were gone.
So was the king.