Larkin stared gratefully at the blanket West had placed over her as the sleep draft and gilgad venom leeched from her system. Little by little, she felt more awake, and her body regained its strength. It was almost painful not to shift against the bruising wagon. To pretend to sleep whenever West looked in on her. She was bored and hot and starving.

They paused around supper time. This time, they offered her applesauce and dry, crumbly biscuits. She wasn’t sure what of any of it she could trust. Perhaps Nesha would tell her. “I need to relieve myself first.”

West got her out of the wagon. Nesha waited to help her, Garrot at her side. They found another log for her, then left her with Nesha to hold up her skirts.

Nesha instantly pushed the waterskin to Larkin, who drank hidden in the fold of her sister’s divided skirts. “They’re giving you a stronger dose tonight. Pretend to be sound asleep, no matter what.”

“Is the food safe?”

“Eat a little and wait to be sure.” She leaned in. “Mama, Sela, Brenna?”

Larkin’s mouth compressed in a thin line. “They were fine when I left them with Denan.”

Nesha shuddered. “Fine until one of those pipers marries my four-year-old sister.”

Larkin’s first impulse was to spout back something hurtful. Her second impulse was to defend the pipers. Neither would do any good. She needed Nesha on her side. “That won’t happen.”

Nesha made a noncommittal noise in her throat.

“Do you know anything about Iniya, Harben, and Raeneth?” Larkin asked.

“Why do you care about any of them?”

“Just answer the question.”

“I saw them released into the forest. That’s all I know.” At least Garrot hadn’t lied about that.

Nesha took a damp rag and cleaned Larkin up, which was humiliating.

“Why, Nesha? You were my best friend. The person I trusted the most in the world. Why did you betray me?”

Nesha huffed. “You were always everyone’s favorite. Mama and Papa. Even Sela. But you couldn’t see it. You wanted your freedom. It’s all you ever wanted. You never saw that you already had it. You could run and dance and marry and escape while I … I could have none of those things. I was the one trapped.”

Larkin had never known this—never known how deep her sister’s jealousy went.

Nesha sniffed. “All I ever wanted was to marry Bane and be a mother to his children.” A sob hitched in her throat. “But you had to take that too. You took everything I ever wanted.”

“So you wanted me dead?”

Nesha’s hands shifted to fists. “I wanted to hurt you. I wanted you to suffer as I had.” She shook her head. “But I never wanted you dead.”

Larkin pulled down the collar of her shirt, revealing the horizontal scar across her neck. “Hunter tried to slit my throat. He would have succeeded if Denan hadn’t killed him, hadn’t saved me from that mob.”

Nesha shook her head as if trying to deny the proof right in front of her. “Garrot swore to me—he swore on his life—he wouldn’t let any harm come to you. Hunter must have been acting on his own.”

“I’m sure Garrot was very sorry the mob got out of control. And very sorry weeks later when he locked me in a room and tried to force me to marry Bane.”

“It was for your own good! You were enchanted!”

“I was never enchanted!”

“Then why keep the pipers’ secrets? For decades, the pipers have terrorized us, and you did nothing but defend them. At least Garrot is trying to stop them!”

“Nesha,” Garrot said from behind her, his brow drawn. He motioned for West.

Nesha hurried to make Larkin decent. West picked her up. Nesha brushed the front of her dress as if rubbing off Larkin’s touch. Garrot saw her wounded expression and pulled her into his arms.

She sank into him, her head tucked in the crook of his neck. “I can’t make her see, Garrot. No matter how hard I try. I can’t get through the enchantment.”

Garrot’s hands stroked up and down her back—the same hands that had wrestled Bane to the gallows and forced the noose around his neck. Bile rose in Larkin’s throat. Bile and hatred strong enough to choke on. Plant the seeds of truth. Wait for them to take root.

“Ask him who killed Bane, Nesha.”

She started and looked at Larkin. “Bane killed seven druids, Larkin. He was sentenced by the courts. Garrot spoke for him, tried to defend him.”

Larkin barked a laugh. “Ask him who put the noose around Bane’s neck and shoved him into the abyss.” Garrot glared at her. She glared right back. Let his own actions condemn him. “And when you’re done with that, ask him who killed our grandfather and all his councilors. Ask him how much blood stains his hands.”

Garrot wrapped his arm around Nesha’s waist and led her back to the horses. “Washerwomen follow the company. I’ll hire one of them to see to your sister’s needs.”

Larkin wanted to fight free of West’s arms, but she forced herself to move slowly, sloppily. “Ask him why he’s turning me over to the wraiths to be tortured, Nesha. Ask him what he plans to do with Bane’s baby once it’s born!”

Nesha’s head came up, and she looked back at Larkin, one arm wrapped protectively around her belly. The first seeds of doubt clouded her expression.

Garrot motioned to West. “Gag her.”

“Garrot,” Nesha protested.

“No,” Garrot said firmly. “I won’t let that woman fill your head with lies.”

West set her down and tried to shove a cloth into Larkin’s mouth, but she bit his hand and spat it out. “The marks on his skin, Nesha. They’re from the shadows! He’s made an alliance with them.”

Cursing, West covered her mouth with his hand. “Stop talking.”

She couldn’t stop talking—not until Nesha knew the truth. “I’m not the one enchanted, Nesha. You are. And Garrot didn’t have to use a bit of magic to do it!”

Another soldier came to help West. He pinned her head while West shoved a rag in her mouth so deep that she gagged. The man tied it down. All of West’s weight was on her. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t stop gagging.

Garrot lifted Nesha into the saddle. “I will not allow your sister’s lies to ever harm you again. I swear it.” He took the reins in his hand, mounted his own horse, and led her away.

Larkin screamed through the gag. For she finally understood. Garrot’s touch was every bit as poisonous as the wraiths he served.

 

 

Straddling her, West waited until Garrot was far out of sight and cut the gag. Larkin rolled to the side and gasped for breath.

“You shouldn’t—” the soldier protested.

“Let her holler if she wants.” West smoothed his mustache. “As long as Garrot and his pretty mistress aren’t anywhere to hear.”

Larkin looked up at him. He watched her, his expression unreadable. “Time for lunch, Larkin. And you’re going to eat all of it.”

He watched as she ate and handed her the water skin. She filled her mouth, then pretended to wipe her mouth while instead spitting it down her sleeves, which dripped onto her skirt. She must have managed to swallow some of it, for she slept sound and deep, waking stiff and sore in the morning. A morning in which they abandoned Cordova Road for the wilds of the Forbidden Forest.

 

 

Tucked away in a large tent, Larkin swore she could feel the sun sinking into the horizon. Night was coming. And darkness. Her heart kicked in her chest, and her stomach tightened into a fist. She should be high in the trees. She should have sacred weapons to protect her. Instead, she had West. All he could do was die—or worse.

And for Larkin … Worse waited for her.

Sweat dripped from Larkin’s temple into her eyes, making them sting and burn. Unable to bear it a moment more, she pushed to her feet.

West started. “You’re supposed to be drugged.”

She backed toward the tent flap. “Just let me sleep in the boughs. Please. I swear I’ll come down in the morning.”

West gripped her arm. “Larkin, what are you so afraid of? You’re in the midst of an army. You’re going to drink your draft and wake up perfectly safe in the morning.”

She laughed—a laugh full of sharp, jangled edges. “You don’t have any sacred weapons. You’re as helpless against the shadows as I.”

Not letting go of her, West bent down to a waterskin and held it out to her. “Now. Drink all of it.”

“When they come, don’t try to fight them. You’ll only get yourself killed. Or worse.”

“Larkin, I—”

Wrongness and death swept over Larkin. She shoved West and lunged for the tent flap. Shadows like writhing snakes condensed right in front of her. Ramass had come. As he’d promised.

She staggered back into West and held her bound hands up to him. “Cut me free! It’s your only chance.”

Instead, West drew his sword and shoved her behind him. “Breech! Guards! Breech!”

Ramass solidified, his crown as sharp as the shadow-wreathed blade he carried. Sickly yellow eyes glared down at her, trapped her.

“It is time, Larkin,” came his dry rasp.

“No,” she whimpered.

West stayed firmly between her and the wraith. “My orders are that she doesn’t leave this tent.”

The wraith drew his sword.

“What are you?” West asked.

“Don’t,” Larkin said. “You’re no match for him.”

“I am a wraith. You should have listened to her.” The wraith charged. West tried to counter. The wraith’s sword flicked out unnaturally fast, cutting through West’s sword at the hilt like a twig. West collapsed around his bleeding hand, screaming.

The wraith moved toward her, the wrongness growing so thick she choked on it. She couldn’t move away as his hand wrapped around her throat. She fell into that nothingness, dissipating into shadow and chaos. A moth-eaten veil filmed her vision, revealing a tree of solid black, glittering against a turquoise lake.

All her plans, all her efforts had failed.

“No!” a voice shouted.

Ramass released her. She came back from somewhere far away. Crumpled into a boneless heap on the ground. Remembered how to draw breath into her starving lungs.

“She is mine!” the wraith hissed.

Garrot stared at the wraith without freezing, his dark sigils seeming to suck in all light. “Not until Denan sees her, she’s not.”

Denan was being lured into a trap. She coughed. “He won’t risk his men.” Her voice sounded ruined. “Not even for me.”

Garrot’s gaze narrowed at her. “You’d be surprised what a man would do to keep the woman he loves.”

“She’s mine,” the wraith chittered.

“After the battle,” Garrot said firmly.

The wraith made an inhuman, hissing wail. “If she is not in my hands then, Garrot of the Black Druids …”

“She will be.” Garrot gestured back the way they’d come. “Come to my tent. I have maps I want you to look at.”

Ramass stared at her before following Garrot beyond the tent. The sense of evil slowly faded. A strange, metallic taste spread across her tongue—she’d bit her tongue and hadn’t realized it—but she was not taken. Relief speared through her, so sharp she curved her body around it and took a breath. Two.

On the other side of the tent, West moaned. Larkin crawled to his side. He held his bloody hand to his belly.

She pried away the fingers of the opposite hand. “Let me see.”

He finally released his left hand. The tips of the three outer fingers were gone. Already, the wound was black, the poison spreading. Larkin had seen this before—the poison slowly crawling up the victim’s skin. Seen the mutilated pipers who were only alive because their limbs had been removed.

Really, a few fingers didn’t seem so bad.

She grabbed his sword with her bound hands and gestured to the ground. “Lay your hand flat.”

West recoiled.

“If I don’t cut out the poison, you’ll be—” Her voice choked, unable to say “mulgar.” “Dead by morning.”

West watched her, his face bloodless. “The forest take me, they’re giving you to that thing?”

The poison passed his second finger joint. There wasn’t time for this. “Do it!” Larkin barked.

Sweating, West laid his hand flat on the ground, his index and thumb curled in tight. He closed his eyes and turned away. She lined up the sword and chopped. West’s eyes rolled up, and he collapsed in a jumbled heap.

A pair of guards burst into the tent, took one look at her standing over West with a bloody sword, and charged.

Larkin dropped the sword. “No. You don’t—”

The first one bowled into her, knocking the wind from her. Garrot stepped back into the tent. “You are not drugged.”

“West needs a healer.” Had she cut away all the poison?”

Garrot didn’t even glance the man’s way. “Force her to drink all of it.” He turned to leave.

“Send Nesha back to the Idelmarch.”

He turned toward her, outrage sparking in his eyes. “Don’t dare tell me what to do.”

“She doesn’t understand the monsters you’ve made an alliance with. I do. Send her to safety.”

“She is perfectly safe.”

“Now you’re lying to yourself.”

He stepped closer. “The only reason you’re still alive at all is because I know what the wraiths will do to you.”

She bared her teeth at him. “Make me a wraith, and I’ll come for you.”

He smiled a wicked smile. “Become a wraith, and you’ll do exactly as I say.”

He turned on his heel and left. The two guards shoved the tip of the waterskin into her mouth and plugged her nose. She could swallow or she could drown. She considered it. But there was still time, still hope. She chose to swallow.