Page 152 of Lana Pecherczyk

“Imagine what I could do with me own magic.” Blake’s lips trembled when she smiled.

“Don’t worry about that,” he promised. “The first thing we’ll do at the Great Murder is visit the Donna for a reading. We’ll figure out what’s happening with your mana.”

She pulled at a pleat on her windways, avoiding his gaze. “It might not work.”

“Until we get your elemental affinities tested at the Order, it’s our best option.”

Feathers rustled softly as he shifted his wings away. He considered finding a portal stone at the Great Murder and returning to the Order with this new information about Cloud, but Clarke needed the cryptex. He had to trust her reasons for sending both him and Ash after it.

He scrawled a greeting to Ash on the triad tattoo:

Princeling.

As the welt sank into his skin and disappeared, another message written in Ash’s familiar masculine scrawl appeared.

Kelpie didn’t eat you then.

River’s lips stretched, and he replied,

I’m not that easy to get rid of.

Blake?

It warmed River’s heart that Ash was already inquiring about Blake’s health.

She’s good. You at the Great Murder yet?

A few minutes later, Ash’s handwriting appeared.

Yes. As is the cavalcade. The Corvus didn’t want to risk ground travel and portaled them immediately.

Even better. Time to get out of this place.

Tell Sera to wait for me near a private body of water. We’re coming through.

Not your messenger bird.

River’s smile faded when he scratched in the next bit.

After that, meet us at the Donna’s. We need to talk.

Half a turn later,River and Blake stood in a forest clearing with water dripping from their clothes. The pond they’d emerged from was filled with tadpoles and mosquitoes, but otherwise, they remained incident free.

River’s parents, Talo and Ravi, waited with pinched, worried faces. Sera had sent them instead, probably hoping they’d reconcile, but he wasn’t ready to forgive them for the nesting caravan incident. Even if everything turned out fine, forcingBlake into a situation like that without her consent was unforgivable.

He quickly dried Blake with his mana, drawing every ounce of water from her clothes and hair before he dried himself.

Wings overhead cast fleeting shadows on the ground. Beyond the shelter of their trees, hundreds of crow shifters in various forms swooped through a valley between evergreen mountains. The ruins of an ancient dam loomed in the near distance, its abandoned concrete forms defined against the blue sky. Water trickled from the top of the dam’s wall and gathered in sporadic pools on moss-covered ledges, raining down streams that caught the sunlight and sparkled like diamonds.

Hundreds of caravans were camped in the valley in murder districts, and within them, kettle congregations. Some had flown up to the concrete and grass ledges, camping with colorful tents. Winged fae were in the process of festooning the dam and trees with bright banners and intricate decorations that fluttered and twinkled in the breeze, transforming the eyesore into something alive and beautiful.

Finally, they’d arrived at the Great Murder.

Chapter

Forty-Seven

“Invitations.” The sentinel’s wings mantled wide, blocking Blake’s path.