Page 130 of Witchshadow

And always, always stay the night for Baile’s slaughtering.

Stix came out of the memory gasping for air. Unlike the violence of other memories, this one had felt so calm. So simple, sorealwith Rhian besideher. One of the Six, Rhian had been a mothering type who had died the same day Baile had, when the Rook King had killed them all.Six turned on six and made themselves kings. One turned on five and stole everything.

“I understand,” Stix said. Then she pressed her head against the stone and thanked the past lives for finally answering her call. “I understand.”

“What happened?” Ryber asked beside her. “Did you see something?”

“Hye,” Stix murmured, and taking Ryber’s hand into hers, she glanced down at the tabby. “Are you ready?” The cat purred, and Stix smiled. Then she raised her foot and stomped once. Twice. Thrice.

The floor beneath them vanished. They dropped once more into the Ring—into a clashing of sound and humidity and rumbling rodent feet.

The flames of the Ring burst against Stix. So hot her heart compressed beneath them, her ears and skull felt pummeled in two. Or perhaps that was the rats, now surging toward her, climbing over her toes, up her body. But the night’s clouds had dispersed, revealing moonlight.

Revealing midnight.

Which meant it was time to follow the rhyme. Time to become the Lady Baile whom Stix was meant to be. Not just the saint’s chosen, not just a vessel for memories a thousand years past, but Baile herself. A Paladin. Someone as strong as Kahina, if not stronger. Because this was her palace, and her water-filled home.

Fangs cut into Stix’s legs. Bright bursts of pain punctuated by squeals that claimed all hearing. Bodies covered her with warmth and fur and claws to draw blood. She had to ignore it though. Just for a moment, she had toignore itand pray she had interpreted the writing correctly.

Slaughter Ring, slaughtering. Slaughter Ring, slaughtering. Always, always stay the night.

Her arms stretched long. She was done with seeking answers. Done with the timeless existence of the voices. She was done picking at an open sore and wondering what Vivia must think.

Stixreached.She knew what her magic felt like. It had been a part of her for almost a decade. An organ, a limb, a piece of soul that not even flames could contain.

Come,Stix told the tide rising in a river below.We are one, and I need you. Come.Power wove through her muscles, even as her vision wavered.Come this way, keep coming.The Ring and Ryber and all the rats hazed away. Stars sprayed across Stix’s eyes, but the water listened. Her oldest, dearest friend.

It slithered as she needed it to slither, wringing from the very air itself and squeezing into the gaps between flames. It obeyed and rejoiced andsank until the flames had no more fuel, no more will to live. And as the conflagration paled, ice rose up from the earth to claim each rat, to freeze them one by one.

Power surged over Stix. All of it, straight from Noden. So vast and full and entirely her own. She saw almost nothing. There was only darkness and flashes of weary light. But for now, while she revelled in the true edges of her magic, she didn’t need her vision. The slaughtering was done.

Fingers gripped her shoulder—so much like the memory of a Paladin named Rhian. But it was Ryber’s voice who said, “We’re safe. You can stop now.”

“Hye,” Stix answered, a sound both ragged and elated. Then: “I can’t see. The magic is… everything.”

“It will recede,” Ryber assured her. “Kullen’s lungs always failed him when he used too much power.”

“I can’t wait for it to return, though, Ry. We need to get to the harbor. Can you lead us there?”

“Why?” Ryber asked, even as she scooped an arm behind Stix. Water rushed around their feet, rivulets melting off the rats. “What’s at the harbor?”

“What your cards were pointing us to all along: the Queen of Hawks, the Queen of Foxes, and the Giant.”

FORTY-THREE

It was a good dream. Yes, Safi was back in the Loom, but this time she wasn’t slowly fading while Zander held her aloft. This time, she floated and flitted and followed the sound of Iseult’s voice.

Then she found her Threadsister. She wasright there,flesh and blood, standing before her. “Weasels piss on you!” Safi laughed, a trilling sound that seemed to vanish as soon as it left her lips. “You’re not supposed to be here.”

“Safi,” Iseult said in that special way she had: inflectionless yet somehow carrying a thousand emotions. She reached for Safi, and Safi, formless though she was, tried to reach back.

But a shadow came. It spread behind Iseult, liquid and alive, before solidifying into a man. Gold winked at his throat, and he crooned something in Nomatsi—something Safi couldn’t quite hear and wasn’t sure she’d understand anyway. Iseult turned away.

“No,” Safi tried to say. “Stay.” But Iseult didn’t hear. She spoke to the shadow man, a cold, detached version of herself. The one that sometimes frightened Safi.

Whoever the shadow was, he was bad. Iseult needed her help. Yet right as Safi brushed forward to speak again, to reach again, Iseult rounded back. Arms outstretched and fingers long, she grabbed for Safi as if to embrace. So Safi swept into it.Yes, yes, I am here!

Then the pain began. Safi shattered awake.