Page 69 of Lady of Starfire (Lady of Darkness #5)

They moved among the tables, Scarlett scanning the items as they went. Empty vials. Empty cauldrons. Books. Some closed, some lying open. She paused and blew the dust off one, studying the page. A book on herbs and plants. She moved to another, her head tilting as she studied it.

Then she flipped the book closed and sent it to a pocket realm.

“What are you doing?” Sorin asked, his tone wary.

“It seems silly to leave such interesting reading material just lying around,” Scarlett quipped, sending another book off in a puff of shadows.

“You are going to steal from the Baroness?”

“A dead Baroness,” Scarlett corrected. “And isn’t that what we are already here to do?”

There was a long pause before, “I suppose you are right.”

She picked up a vial, holding it up to the flame above her. A reddish-gold liquid swirled inside of it.

“Stop touching everything,” Sorin said, snatching it out of her hand and placing it back on the table. “You heard what Rayner said. The last thing we need right now is to deal with a curse of some sort. Or for you to summon some ancient city.”

She stuck out her tongue at him, continuing to browse the tables and shelves. One cauldron had residue in it, as though the potion inside had long since evaporated. Another made her wrinkle her nose when she found solidified brown sludge inside.

“Do you remember what I said the other night? About us being gods?” she asked after several minutes of silent searching had passed.

Sorin looked over at her from across the room where he was rifling through a cupboard. “Of course I remember that.”

“Would you want to be one? If you could?”

He turned back to the cupboard, pulling out small drawers and shoving them shut again. “What would I be the god of in this scenario?” he teased.

“Hmm. Since fire is already taken by Anala, I suppose you’d have to be the god of mother hens,” she retorted, sending another book to the pocket realm.

He threw her a dry look over his shoulder. “And what would you be? The goddess of wicked tongues?”

“You would certainly benefit from such a thing. Just think of the possibilities,” she sighed wistfully.

He barked a laugh, returning to his searching. “Let’s focus on getting out of here today, then we can discuss your tongue and its various possibilities all you’d like.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fine. Help me push some tables back.”

Carefully, they slid several tables off to the side until she had a decent-sized space in the center of the room.

She pulled a dagger and pricked her finger before crouching down and beginning to draw in the dust and dirt covered floor.

It was a locating Mark, but one she had been working on altering in small ways based on the differing texts she’d read and notes in the Sorceress’s spell book.

When it was done, she stood back, making sure it was perfect. Sorin had been quiet while she’d worked, flipping through more papers and books. She was fairly certain he’d sent a few to a pocket realm of his own.

“Are you ready?” she asked Sorin, shaking out her hands to ease some nerves.

“Not even remotely,” he replied, looping an arm around her waist and leaning in to kiss her soundly.

She smiled up at him when he pulled back. “What’s the worst that could happen, right?”

Golden eyes narrowed. “Let’s get this over with.”

He stepped back as she raised her hands before her. Shadows and starfire in one palm. Fire and ice in the other.

Powers of the gods and of the Fae. All in one vessel.

That’s what Saylah had said. Why it had to be Scarlett and no one else. One born of the gods who could harness the elements of the Fae.

She brought her hands side-by-side, letting the powers merge, and then she sent them to the Mark on the floor where her blood was still drying. It flared so brightly that Sorin was dragging her back, tucking her head into his chest to shield her eyes.

After a moment, she peeked out, and then she sighed. “I don’t think it worked.”

“It did something,” Sorin said, his hand still resting protectively on her back. “Magic does not react like that for nothing.”

She stepped closer to the Mark once more. It was still glowing faintly. She reached for it, her fingers nearly touching her blood when she heard it. A faint chiming? No. A lilted whispering? It was constantly changing.

Her head cocked to the side. “Do you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“That …”

She didn’t know how to describe it. It wasn’t a song, although it reminded her of music. It was a beckoning of her soul.

“Is someone approaching?” Sorin asked, hand on a sword and eyes darting to the door.

“No, it’s not—”

It had gotten a touch louder when she’d pushed to her feet. The lilting had become a humming so deep it felt as though her very essence was vibrating.

“Scarlett, what is wrong?” Sorin demanded, tense and worried.

She waved a hand to shush him, taking a step forward. The humming became a lulling melody, then the sound of waves lapping at the shore. She took another step, then another. When she moved to the left, the sound lessened, fading away.

So she followed it, that ever-changing sound she could barely hear.

She let it guide her across the expanse of the room, the sound fading if she veered too far off course.

She followed it to a rack full of instruments, scales, and other contraptions.

Dragging her fingers along the various shelves, the sound became a lover’s caress.

In the center of a shelf was a model of some sort. Scarlett didn’t have the faintest idea what it was supposed to be depicting, but next to it? She knew in the depths of her being what that was.

It was a sphere as dark as deathstone. Symbols and glyphs were fading in and out, moving across the surface in varying colors. Symbols that matched those on the door and those in the Runic Lands.

“Sorin?”

Her voice sounded odd. Mesmerized. Entranced.

“I see it, Love.”

He was right beside her, and she hadn’t even noticed.

Her hand lifted, reaching towards it, but Sorin brushed it aside.

“If anyone is going to get cursed by the thing, it’ll be me,” he muttered, hand closing around the sphere before Scarlett could argue.

The moment he came in contact with it, the symbols faded away. He was left holding an ordinary light grey orb, nothing more than a weight to hold papers in place.

“Anything?” Scarlett asked, eyes fixed on the sphere.

“No, but that does not ease my worry of what will happen when you touch it.”

“It’s why we’re here, right?” she said, holding out her hand.

“You believe this is it?”

“Even if it’s not, it’s clearly something important.” She saw his fingers tighten around the orb. “It has to be me, Sorin,” she said softly, extending her hand. “It’s always had to be me. Fate and all that nonsense, right?”

He huffed a harsh laugh before his other hand came to her chin, tilting her head back. “All the way through the darkness, Love.”

He set the orb in her palm as he spoke. They both sucked in a sharp breath.

And nothing happened.

The sphere remained an inanimate object held between them.

“You have to let go, Sorin.”

“I know, Love,” he replied, his other palm sliding to cup her cheek. “But I also know that this is about to set so many things into motion.”

“The end,” she whispered. “It sets the end of all this into motion.”

His thumb swiped across her cheek before he inhaled another deep breath and stepped back from her.

The moment his fingers fell from the orb, the glyphs reappeared, brighter than stars.

The sphere became warm in her hand, and the entire thing darkened back to the darkness of deathstone.

Shadows seemed to swarm among the glyphs, and she could see …

She didn’t know what she was seeing in its depths.

Whatever it was, it was moving and shifting too fast for her to decipher.

“How do you feel?” Sorin asked tentatively.

“Fine,” she said after a moment. “I feel fine.”

“You are sure this is the lock?”

“Sure as I can be,” Scarlett said. “Let’s go. Rayner and Kailia must be almost done by now.”

Scarlett took one last look around the apothecary room, making sure they hadn’t overlooked anything. There would be no second chances.

When they were both satisfied after sending a few more books and papers to a pocket realm, they stepped from the room, the heavy doors thudding shut behind them.

Scarlett had tried to send the orb to a pocket realm, but it wouldn’t go.

Her shadows couldn’t take it, nor her starfire.

Her Fae gifts couldn’t touch it, and none of her pockets on the tight-fitting witchsuit were large enough to hold it.

So she was left clutching it tightly in one hand, which wasn’t an easy task.

It fit easily in Sorin’s large palm, but it was awkward in her smaller one.

Sorin grabbed her other hand, leading her down the stairs once more.

This was the way Rayner had directed them to go.

He’d told them there would be a hidden door at the bottom that would lead to a chamber.

From that chamber, they could follow a small stream out of the cliffs without having to use the main entrance …

assuming the boats there weren’t rotted away to nothing from disuse.

When they reached the bottom, Sorin sliced his palm, drag ging it along the stone wall until it hit the enchanted doorway.

They rushed through it, heading straight to the dock where several small boats were indeed tied off.

They didn’t have time to take in the chamber.

Not if everyone had completed their tasks.

Finding the lock was the least dangerous part of their mission here.

Sorin was inspecting the boats to see which one was safest when a voice had them both whirling.

“Sorin? Scarlett?”