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The hobgoblin nodded. “Aye. This ‘ere, the crystal it’s etched in, it’s meant to be as dead as a stone in a swamp. But now it’s like a starvin’ beast. Can ye feel it?”

He extended it toward Skye.

A sharp pulse of something wrong crawled up his spine, and he leaned away. Even without touching it, the thingbitat him.

Grizzlethorn gave a hideous little laugh. “He feels it.”

“Would one of you please explain?” Skye asked a bit testily.

“Watch this.” Ivain plucked a water crystal from the desk’s clutter. It burned blue at its center, a basic purifying enchantment etched into its surface. He placed it near the collar.

There was no surge, no violent pull—just a flicker. Then, slowly, the glow inside the water crystal dimmed, wavered… and winked out entirely. It took seconds.

Skye blinked. “What?”

“What indeed,” Ivain murmured. “It’s draining the magic… somehow. Everything I’ve thrown at it so far gets eaten up too fast to figure out how.” He shook his head, his expression grim. “I’ve never seen hyaline behave like this.”

“Hyaline,” Skye echoed. “That’s… that’s impossible.” Hyaline wasdeadcrystal. Inert. Unenchantable.

Ivain rubbed at his eyes. Maybe the smell was getting to him too. “At this point, I know only two things for certain—this collar is made of hyaline, and it has been enchanted to somehow… alter magic. Kato described it as a drain on his aether, but this? This is something else.”

Skye reached for the crystal. Dust coated the smooth surface, gritty beneath his fingertips.

Ivain turned back to Grizzlethorn. “I need to know if your great lady has any knowledge of this. The enchanter, the method, anything.”

The hobgoblin’s sharp ears twitched, but he nodded.

“I was also hoping you’d be able to help me with this.” Ivain withdrew another object from his pocket—this time, an amulet. The same one Azura had taken from Vaughn’s body. The same one Skye had, rather stupidly, inserted into that strange console in the woods.

Grizzlethorn’s eyes widened. He lunged for it with greedy anticipation, but Ivain jerked it back.

“This isn’t for sale,” Ivain said. “I’m trading for information only.”

“Yes, yes,” Grizzlethorn panted, fingers flexing like he might snatch it away. “Let me see.”

Ivain dropped the amulet into his waiting palm.

Grizzlethorn turned it over, inspecting it closely. Then, with a sharp little cackle, hebitthe stone. When it didn’t give, he giggled.

Ivain asked, “You know what it is?”

“Aye. ‘Fore the Schism, there was a hidden passage system. A way of flittin’ ‘cross the isle in the blink o’ an eye. Meant for fancy folk, nobles, and such.” He trailed his claws over the surface, grinning wide. “This ‘ere be a key. And keys have doors.Match the key to the door, and that’s when things be getting’ right excitin’.”

“I wouldn’t call it a door so much as a one-way portal into hell,” Skye remarked dryly.

Grizzlethorn’s ears perked. “Ye found one?”

More like tripped directly into it, but Skye nodded.

Ivain held out his hand. Grizzlethorn reluctantly placed the amulet back into it.

“I remember the rumors,” Ivain said. “That’s all they were. Of a secret network of sorts that spanned the island that the Crystal Guard used to move the Queen securely. Half the island collapsed during the Schism, and then with all the looting during the Hunt, I figured that even if ithadbeen real, it was one of those secrets of the island lost to time. Certainly wouldn’t be the first. And it would explain why our enemy has been so impossible to pin down. Sometimes, the scouts swear it’s as if they’ve transported—one moment there, the next, gone without a trace.”

Ivain pocketed the amulet. “Thank you, Grizzlethorn.”

“Ten thousand gold,” the hobgoblin said quickly, eyes darting between them

“No.”