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Chapter fifty-one

HYACINTH

Landers was already dressing as the last words fell from my lips. I could see his mind racing, already formulating some kind of plan.

“We go see Cain first, then talk to Pri and see if she knows anything about what Wren said to you. Those two had no secrets, if there is something she hasn’t told us already, it is because she was trying to protect him,” he said as he strapped his sword to his side.

I only nodded, as I slipped into my leathers. My hands couldn’t move fast enough as they strapped my daggers to my chest. I pulled my hair to the side, braiding it over my shoulder then felt it. Felt the weight that was now missing from around my neck.

“My necklaces—both of them—they’re gone.” My voice was frantic as my eyes darted around the room.

Nothing.

I sprinted to the bathing chamber before Landers could speak but found nothing there.

My stomach plummeted.

I felt as Landers stepped into the room behind me, his presence heavy as his hand fell to my waist.

“It’s gone,” I whispered, turning to look up at him. “That stone has Higher Magic in it. If Ammord has it, if daemons have that power . . .” Realization settled into the base of my spine. “That’s why they lured me there. That’s what they were trying to get.”

Landers’s teeth clenched as he dragged a hand over his face. “If they do have it, there is nothing we can do about it now. We need to go see Cain, find out what he is not telling us. And if he will not break, he dies.”

There was no question in his tone, it wasn’t even a threat. Only resolution sounded there as he reached his hand out to me. I took it, stepping to his side, and in the next breath we were tethering, slipping through the ether toward the prisons.

Something in my gut coiled as we drew closer, twisted into a sickening knot as the tether pulled against my limbs.

The damp chill of underground stone bit into my skin before my boots even hit the ground.

Landers released my hand as the ether spat us out into silence.

Not even the echo of dripping water or scurrying rats haunted the prison’s hollowed belly.

Landers’s grip tightened on his sword before it cleared its sheath—a rasp that sliced through the stale air like a serrated warning.

There should have been guards here, should have been a hoard of men standing watch at this entrance.

But there was no one.

Silver light glittered to life in my palm, my other hand pulling a dagger from its sheath as Landers pulled the gates to the prison’s entrance open and took a step inside.

I could smell the acrid air as it seeped through the open doorway and up the steps to the clearing about us. I swallowed back the gag racing up my throat as I followed him through the archway.

The corridor stretched in front of us, my glowing palm the only light. But even my magic recoiled from the dark that clung to the walls like tar.

“Blood,” Landers muttered, his blade tilting toward smears blackened against the cobbles. It wasn’t fresh—aged maybe hours—but was crusted in jagged trails leading deeper into the narrow opening.

The first corpse came into view ten paces later.

He lay face up, fingers clawing at his own throat as if he’d tried to tear out whatever had stolen his last breath. My lungs constricted at the sight, the hair on the back of my neck standing to a point at the fear forever frozen in his open eyes.

I dipped down as we stepped around him, placing my fingers on his eyelids and pulling them shut. I had given the order to place Cain here, he was the only prisoner in these dungeons that they were guarding.

He shouldn’t have been able to kill any of them. He shouldn’t be able to use his magic at all, not with the wards that were built around the cells. Landers’s shoulder brushed mine as we rounded the corner. Mangled bodies emerged from the dark, littering every inch of the prison floors.

Every single guard was dead.

Landers took an instinctive step in front of me as my hand flew to my mouth, my eyes blowing wide as they fell to Cain’s cell.

The obsidian door wasn’t just open—it was gone .

Molten edges dripped from the archway like candle wax, glowing faintly in the dark. I pressed my hand tighter against my mouth, choking on the stench of sulfur and seared flesh.

Landers cursed under his breath as we stepped through the wreckage into what remained of the cell.

The ruins carved on every surface, that were meant to ward the prison, looked as though they had been burned away.

Remnants of confinement spells throbbed faintly in time with my racing heartbeat, giving only spurts of magic now—not nearly enough to keep anyone in.

A glint caught my eye from the corner of the room, something tucked underneath the rubble. I took a few steps toward it, the toe of my boot pushing away the crumbled stone.

“This wasn’t a rescue,” I breathed, cold unfurling down my spine as I crouched to examine the shattered vials. “Someone else didn’t want him talking.”

Landers lowered himself beside me, picking up a shard of glass still dripping with a thick fuchsia liquid. I recognized the color from my studies at the academy.

“Isn’t that a poison?” I asked, studying it.

“Yes. It is called Digitalis Purpurea and is extremely poisonous in large quantities, but in small doses it can cause temporary paralysis and hallucinations. The flower used to make it only grows in Redelvtum.” He dropped the broken glass, his gaze sweeping over the ruined cell as if it might spit answers from the shadows.

Dread breathed down my neck as I pushed from the ground. “We need to find Mara. If she knew about this, she would have come to us immediately.”

Landers rose beside me, his jaw clenched tight as his head dipped in agreement.

“I know.” There was an edge to his voice that hadn’t been there just moments ago. “I can feel it grating against my skin. Something is coming, and it is not an army.”

I felt it too and couldn’t shake the feeling that whatever it was, may already be here. His hand slid into mine, clasping it so tight our knuckles turned white as we made our way back through the corpse-strewn corridors. I forced myself to look at them, to look at every face I had failed.

Rain crashed against us as we ascended the steps from the prison’s hole and I sucked in a sharp breath of fresh air. The House of High was just on the other side of the clearing.

It was so close.

Too close for them not to have seen something— heard something. I took a step toward it but Landers pulled me back, stepping in front of me as he raised his sword toward the tree line.

My body went rigid, freezing in place as two figures stumbled from its front doors. My magic flared as they sprinted toward us, readying to strike as shadows coiled around Landers and me. Static bloomed between my ears with every step they took, power pulsing brighter against my skin.

I raised my palms, just as they fully came into view and every ounce of power fizzled out at the sight of them.

Blood soaked Asrai’s hands, Yenne’s face devoid of color.

“What happened?” Landers demanded, rushing forward to steady Yenne.

Asrai swallowed hard. “There has been a massacre at the House of High. The elders, Mara—they are all dead. All of them.”

The world tilted for one jarring second as if the ground had been pulled from under me, before straightening on its axis and snapping me into motion.

We had to get to the war camps.

We had to get the others and get to our army.

“Rilius and Sashi?” Landers asked, the edge in his tone giving away his own fear.

Yenne shook her head. “Gone. We dinna know if zey escaped or were taken.”

I met Landers’s gaze, the same realization reflected in his eyes as Nithra’s voice boomed down the fastening.

Run, child. Something is coming.