Page 54 of Witchshadow

Leopold offers his arm, but before Iseult accepts, she grabs a burgundy cloak off the worn armchair in the corner. A matching scarf too, for outside of Owl’s room and her own, she dares not show her unnaturally pale skin, her unnaturally golden eyes.

Being the Cahr Awen earns her gifts, but it does not earn her respect.

Once her arm is tucked into Leopold’s—he is always so warm to the touch—they enter the passage outside. This is a newer corner of the palace built for the servants. Everything is simple wood and narrow halls.

“You look lovely,” Leopold murmurs as they march toward a distant stairwell. Hell-Bards stomp before and behind. “Such colors suit you.” There is that lilac shade in his Threads again. Desire on anyone else. On Leopold, it is an enigma.

And Iseult is grateful for her scarf, now wound about her head, for there is no doubt that her flush is quite visible. “No need to waste your charm on me, Leopold.”

“You say ‘charm’ as if it is a bad thing.” They have reached the stairs. Hell-Bard boots clomp and clatter.

“What is charm other than lies coated in sugar?” Iseult must lift her voice to be heard. The steps creak.

“It is truth coated in sugar.” Somehow Leopold makes himself heard without shouting. And he grins his winning grin. “It tastes so delicious, you do not realize you are being fed something you did not want to hear.”

“You think I don’t want to hear that I am lovely?” The stairs end, giving way to a covered walkway.

“I think,” Leopold says, his grin turning sly and Threads turning darker, “that you do not want to find yourself lovely. It raises too many possibilities.”

Iseult scowls—a real scowl that she does not have to emulate. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“For a woman always outside peering in, possibilities are confusing.”

“You are confusing.”

He laughs, but it is fake. He knows he has hit some truth Iseult avoids. He knows his words and his Threads discomfit her. And not for the first time, she wishes she had the easy rapport he and Safi share. Ever since their arrival in Praga, Leopold has become a Trickster version of himself. He plays with words and dons too many masks for Iseult to keep track of. Safi has no trouble navigating them; Iseult wishes he would just be himself.

Then again, she finds conversation withanyonedifficult here, and though she does her best to emulate Safi, she always, always fails.

She will never be like her Threadsister. She will always be trapped in shadows.

Fortunately, Leopold offers no more flattery, hollow or otherwise, that Iseult must wade through, and soon they have reached a carriage that will transport them to the opposite end of the palace—and to the next step in the girls’ careful plan.

TWENTY

Safi awoke when the carriage stopped. Or maybe it was Caden’s arms moving under her that startled her back into consciousness. Either way, there was pain.

“I’m going… to be sick,” she slurred as he scooped her up and out of the carriage.

“Please don’t,” he replied. His face swam over her. She tried to hold on to his neck, but for some reason, her arms weren’t in the mood to cooperate.

Distantly, she heard horse hooves and stamping feet. Bellowed orders and Hell-Bard chain mail. And distantly, she noticed the Keep spanning before her. Safi had seen it from afar as a child. It was not a tall fortress, with its cross-shaped alignment and wide battlements, but it didn’t need to be tall to dominate. Made from a dark granite unlike anything else in the city, it absorbed all light, all warmth.

One of her greatest fears as a child had been that she would be caught for a Truthwitch and brought here. Now, she had not only come here willingly, but she’d gotten stabbed on purpose just so she could get in.

That thought made her laugh.

Or maybe it wasn’t a laugh, but a sob.Bat tits,make it stop hurting.

“We’re almost there,” Caden said.

“Liar,” Safi mumbled against his shoulder. Even in her half-delirious state, she could see they were only just entering a shadowy hall. Archways into new halls sliced off in different directions, but Caden’s course aimed onward, ever onward down a seemingly endless stretch of exposed stone.

It reminded her of Leopold’s tower.

The farther Caden stepped through the Keep, Hell-Bards marching severely around them, the more cold crept into Safi’s body. It made no sense to her knife-addled brain—how she could be ablaze, yet frozen to her bones. And what little color remained in this world was being sucked dry. Soon, there would be no color left at all. Just shadows and light and frost inside the flames.

Eventually they reached an open area framed by balconies and stairs. It was strangely beautiful: a graceful circle with three curving stairwells that rose to different floors and branching hallways. At the center of the high-ceilinged room stood a statue of a shrouded woman staring down at her chained hands.