Page 43 of Sonnets and Serpents (Casters and Crowns #2)

From the moment of Yvette’s arrest, Eliza had felt a threat brewing inside, like gray clouds gathering on the horizon. She ordered herself to focus on the task at hand. With the uncontrollable all around, she had to seize what she could control.

They couldn’t speak to Kerem yet because he was with the dean and Yvette. Although Eliza wanted to storm right into that meeting, she realized the best approach to proving Yvette’s innocence was not pleading an impassioned case hinged on, “But, sir, Yvette has always been kind!”

Silas’s approach to proving it was a little more . . . terrifying. He dragged her and Henry all over campus, experimenting on the bone-box Artifact like he was determined to destroy it: He submerged it in bubbling liquids, stabbed it with sharp objects, even doused it in oil and set it on fire.

“Is this what magic normally looks like?” Henry asked, pale in the orange light.

With a long iron poker, Silas prodded at the mass on the stone table, turning the box onto its side.

“Magic in a research setting,” he said, flashing a wide, serpentine smile.

The flames burned down quickly, leaving the white box untouched. Silas muttered about a lack of heat retention and made more notes in his journal.

“Your leg’s going to give out before you learn anything,” Eliza scolded, noticing his limp had grown more pronounced and that he leaned heavily into his uninjured side.

He waved her comment off like a gnat.

“I’ve already learned things, apta.” He gestured at his journal as if she could read it from ten feet away. “This test confirmed that this is composition warlockry.”

He said it with a sense of triumph, and when he made his final note, he flourished his pen.

“Composition warlockry,” Henry deadpanned. “Just as I suspected.”

Eliza laughed, and although Silas huffed, he didn’t seem genuinely annoyed. The excitement of discovery brightened his dark eyes.

“Composition warlockry,” he said, “means the involvement of more than one magical person. The easiest compositions are made by Casters of the same type—for example, a triplet of Fluid Casters working together to direct water in the university pipes. Much harder is the coordination of non-identical magic types, like a Fluid Caster and a Stone Caster manipulating water and silt to create quicksand. Based on the box’s resistance to fire, this is one of those trickier compositions. ”

Eliza stepped forward, pressing her hands to the soot-streaked table. “Havva and Yvette are both Stone Casters, so you’re saying this couldn’t have been made by just them.”

But he dashed her hopes. “Ceyda was right about the venom; I can sense my own magic, however faintly. That could be the factor creating a composition.” He paused, hefting the Artifact almost reverently. “This might be the first of its kind—Affiliate and Caster magic.”

“Affiliates have never worked with Casters before?” she asked.

“We’ve tried. We’re incompatible, or so the research has always shown.” His voice quieted. “Until now.”

“If you can tell it’s your magic, can’t you tell if it’s Yvette’s too?”

Silas shook his head. “It doesn’t work that way, although I have confirmed the presence of Stone Casting. That was fairly evident from the use of bone, but I tested it to be sure. At least this explains how the bind and unbind don’t negate—they must be linked to different magic sources.”

Pushing back from the table, Eliza tried and failed to wipe the soot from her palm. She felt that same dark streak marring her hopes. Why couldn’t magic just have a voice? If the box piped up and said, “I wasn’t made by Yvette,” that would be that.

Unless magic voices could lie like human ones.

She shook her head, frustrated that she couldn’t help with this. Silas would figure it out, but she needed a task for herself. Something she could do.

The storm inside rumbled with distant thunder, and she willed herself to hold it back. Now that she’d found Henry, she wasn’t about to lose control in front of him.

“I wonder . . .” Silas pursed his lips, then pressed on.

“I’ve tried to identify Fluid Casting, but that’s harder to test than Stone Casting, and I can’t tell for certain.

I need a strong Fluid Caster to read the Artifact.

Unfortunately, the strongest we had on campus was Iyal Mazhar.

But if this is a composition between all known magic types, it might be more groundbreaking than I ever imagined. ”

Something about the way he said it made her shiver, like he’d awakened to a new, dangerous ambition.

“And deadly,” she added, in case he’d forgotten the boneless bodies.

“And deadly,” he agreed, though it didn’t seem to deter his enthusiasm.

He tucked both Artifact and journal in his bag, but when he took a step away from the table, he hissed sharply, pressing his hand to his thigh.

“Time for a break?” Henry suggested.

Silas shook his head, speaking through gritted teeth. “We have to find where Iyal Havva was killed.”

“What’s your plan for that?” Eliza folded her arms, staring him down. “Are you going to wander the city, knocking on doors and asking, ‘Was anyone killed here lately?’”

“Think we’ll have more success searching for murders in the inns and birahans? Or should we skip straight to underground tunnels?”

“First, you sit. Then we figure out the rest.”

Aided by Henry, who made himself a nonnegotiable crutch, Silas limped out of the building and onto a bench beneath a shady tree.

They were on the south side of campus, looking down the hill over the bustling spread of Izili.

In the distance, a ship left the harbor, pointed toward the horizon.

Eliza tried not to think of home, but Henry’s words stuck like sap in her mind.

I can’t go home. Not yet.

Eliza hadn’t intended to stay away forever . . . had she?

She’d declared as much in her runaway note to Aria—If exile is to be Henry’s sentence, I choose to bear it as well—but she’d always known her sister would grant him a pardon as soon as she could.

Not only that, but as soon as Eliza had arrived in Pravusat, she’d missed home.

She missed the shadow of the mountain and the crisp winter cold. She missed her sister and her mother.

There was the matter of duty as well. Eliza was crown princess now, though she’d never wanted to be, and it was her responsibility to share some of the burden Aria was currently carrying alone.

She’d let her sister down in so many other ways, and while the search for Henry had kept that guilt at bay, now it pulled on her like a rope, trying to drag her where she belonged.

If Henry decided to stay, would she return home alone? Was that the right thing to do, and was she even strong enough to do it?

Not so long ago, she would have said the right thing was always choosing love.

But matters didn’t feel simple anymore.

“We need to speak to Ceyda again,” Eliza said. “She has the best chance of knowing something that can help us retrace Iyal Havva’s steps.”

Silas started to rise, but she ordered him sternly back down.

“You’re going to have to climb all the stairs in the Yamakaz,” she said, “so take ten minutes to rest first. Besides, I need to speak to Henry. In private.”

“I’ll plug my ears,” Silas drawled, settling back on the bench.

Eliza drew Henry off as far as her bracelet would allow. He tensed, as if expecting an accusation. Honestly, she wasn’t certain what she wanted to say. It only felt like the storm was growing, and she needed to find a clear heading before the waves turned unmanageable.

“Do you think your horse misses you?” she blurted.

She winced as soon as the question was out of her mouth. In lunging to avoid any uncomfortable topics, she’d instead landed on a silly one.

But Henry relaxed, breaking into his warm smile.

“Tidalwave?” He gave a small laugh. “To be honest, he was never particularly loyal. Downright grumpy, too, if he’s not in the arena at least once a week.

I’d be delighted to know how many times he’s thrown Hugh by now.

I’m sure between all the Wycliff boys, Tides is well taken care of and has never given my absence a second thought. ”

Eliza smiled but shook her head. “I highly doubt that. I find it unthinkable that you could disappear from anyone’s life without them feeling a profound absence, even if that person was a grumpy horse.”

“He certainly didn’t carry enough concern to chase me.” Henry came a step closer, then halted, scuffing his boot across the dirt path. “What I mean is, I still haven’t found a way to properly thank you, Eliza. I doubt I ever could.”

She could think of a few romantic gestures, and yet he made none of them, just slid his hands in his pockets and continued shuffling his feet.

A dangerous question tumbled from her lips. “Henry, what are we to each other?”

He lifted his shoulders, more shield than shrug. “I don’t know.”

Inside, she felt the helm slipping from her fingers. She gripped tighter.

“Well, you could make a few guesses, at least,” she said hotly.

If anything, he looked more pained. “I know I made promises, and I meant all of them at the time, I swear. I still mean them. Or at least I . . . I want to. Eliza, you deserve so much, but the truth is—right now, I don’t know who I am. Do you understand?”

She wanted to, really, but her heart was all tangled up in the weeks without him, and the dreams she’d created crashed around her like thunder on the deck.

Not just the romantic dreams—Eliza had convinced herself that whatever was broken inside from the curse would be fixed when she found Henry. But she wasn’t fixed.

Did that mean she never would be?

She was lost in uncertainty, and while it wasn’t his fault, she couldn’t help blaming him anyway.

“I left home for you,” she snapped.

He never asked you to, said a voice inside.

But that only made the storm worse, because she felt foolish. Because she saw her father’s looming shadow in the clouds, and she heard his mocking voice. Romantic whims.