Page 127 of Bloodwitch

Safi whooped. She couldn’t help it. The Hell-Bards were alive. Habim hadn’t killed them. The flames hadn’t ended them.

Zander stumbled from the fire first. His golden noose glowed. His face was red with heat. Then Lev raced out behind, and finally Caden staggered out last.

“Fancy meeting you here,” Lev said between coughs, but Safi just grabbed her arm and roared, “Come on!”

Without being asked, Zander scooped up Vaness and tossed herover his shoulder—which meant Vaness’s injury must be grim indeed. Safi couldn’t see it, though. Not so long as the glamour ruled and her magic failed.

Together, Safi, Vaness, and the Hell-Bards ran. Up stairs that boomed beneath their feet in time to explosions that definitely weren’t fireworks.

“Wait!” Safi screeched as they charged past a hallway. She recognized it. It led to the storage room filled with fireworks, and at the end, there was access to the lake.

“Your Majesty.” She pushed in close to the Empress draped over Zander’s massive shoulder. But Caden shook his head. “She’s out.”

“I can wake her,” inserted Lev. “It won’t be pretty, though.”

Safi nodded. “Do it.”

“All right, Domna, but later when she wants to kill me, you tell her it wasyouridea.” Without preamble, Lev stabbed her finger into Vaness’s injured eye.

And the Empress awoke shrieking.

It was horrible to see, horrible to hear—an expressionless face emitting a sound of absolute, bone-rattling agony. But Safi needed Vaness awake, and pain was a better alternative to death.

“A boat!” Safi flung her voice over the screams, over the flames. “Is there a boat beyond this storage room?”

“YES!” Vaness screamed. Then Lev released her, and the Empress toppled limp against Zander’s shoulder.

Hollering for the Hell-Bards to follow, Safi shot out of the stairs and into the hall. Caden stayed close at her side, while Zander followed with the Empress, and finally Lev took up the rear. They crossed the hall and no one stopped them. No soldiers or fire appeared.

They crossed the storage room, and still no one interfered. They crept past crates of spark-candles—except they weren’t spark-candles at all. Which meant as soon as the fire chasing behind them reached this room…

“Faster!” she urged, and the Hell-Bards obeyed.

They reached the doorway at the end. As she’d seen earlier, it led to a cavernous boathouse that opened onto the lake. Naval vesselsappeared to float harmlessly, but Safi knew, even if her magic did not, that it was all a lie. The battle echoes spoke otherwise.

And there, at the end of the boathouse, was a ship. Small, flat-bottomed, clearly meant for transferring goods off larger vessels, it was the only option, so without discussion, everyone aimed for it. Caden and Zander maneuvered Vaness in, then Safi followed while Lev untied the boat.

“Oars,” Zander said. “These aren’t going to get us far.”

“Not with what’s out there.” Caden stared at the lake, face screwed with concentration. Whatever he saw, Safi couldn’t.

“Guide me.” A ragged voice listed up from the Empress. Safi hadn’t realized she was awake again, and when she looked down, she only saw closed eyes and peaceful sleep.

But then Vaness tried to rise—and Zander helped her into a weak, slumping seat that even the glamour could not hide. “Tell me where to go,” she repeated, “and I…” A shaking breath. “I will send the boat where you command.” As if to prove that she could, she knocked her wrist sideways and the boat slithered away from the dock.

“You’re not well,” Safi protested, but at the same moment, Caden declared, “Forward.” Then his eyes met Safi’s, holding hers in that grim, unrelenting way he had. “It’s our only chance, Safi.”

She knew he was right. Smoke now plumed from the storage area. Any moment, the flames would hit. The explosion would tear the flesh from their bones and boil it straight to the Void.

So without another word of protest, Safi reached down, gripped Vaness’s other hand in hers, and said, “Forward.”

FIFTY

Aeduan went to the clearing with the tallest mountain pine. There his father waited, a group of women and men clustered to him, and twelve horses stamping and snuffing just beyond.

Ragnor met Aeduan’s eyes amidst the throng. He nodded, and Aeduan thought he almost caught a smile on the edge of his tired lips. Approval, maybe. Or relief.

Two years ago that would have given Aeduan pause. Even two weeks ago, it would have stopped him in his tracks and warmed the blood in his veins.