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But her voice died in her throat, the words turning to ash in her mouth. Instead, Corayne forced a bow, and turned to leave.
“I did not see the Amhara. Nor your Elder bodyguard,” Isadere called after her. “I am sorry for your loss.”
Corayne faltered but did not stop. She would not let the Heir see her frustration, or the weariness threatening to split her apart.
She wanted to retreat to her bedchamber, which she now shared with Lady Farra. Instead, her feet carried her through the receiving hall, past the long feasting tables crowded with soldiers, and up the dais of the empty throne room. Isibel’s carved seat stood out against the other assembled chairs. Like its lady, the throne stood cold and distant, apart from the rest.
Corayne glared at it as she walked, continuing into the hall behind the dais. It led to the Monarch’s private wing of the castle, the only part of Tíarma that did not teem with life.
The passage was frigid, lined with archways on one side, all open to the valley and the elements. Corayne shivered to think what it would be in winter.
She expected a guard to stop her, but no one came.
She crossed into a gallery hung with tapestries, its windows facing themisty north. There were maps on the walls like none she had ever seen, and a pair of tables drawn together to form a massive desk. Parchment covered the top, covered in scribbled notes and drawn lines. It reminded Corayne of her sea maps and charts, used to track the paths of the stars. But these used no stars that she understood, the constellations unfamiliar, the writing indecipherable.
She glanced at the map on the wall again, narrowing her eyes.
Glorian, she realized, tracing the strange coastlines of the Elder realm. As she did in the vaults, she felt a low pressure ripple against her skin. It seemed to tremble through her flesh, down to her bones.
She felt it in the Spindleblade too, the steel straight against her back.
Her spine turned to ice. Again, she thought of the Spindle, burning somewhere, leading to only the gods knew what. Her stomach twisted.
Does Isibel know?she thought, trembling. Her fingers shook on the parchment and she shoved it away, turning from the table with a sick feeling.
Only to find the Monarch of Iona staring at her, silent as a ghost. Corayne’s heart leapt up in her chest, her body buzzing as if struck by lightning.
“Curse you Elders,” Corayne bit out, trying to calm herself down.
Isibel only quirked her head, a curtain of silver-gold hair falling over one shoulder. As always, she carried a glow in her, alive in her pearl eyes and pale skin. The Monarch was cruelly beautiful, like frost on a flower.
“Corayne of Old Cor,” she said, enunciating the letters sharply.
Her skin crawled.That is not my name, she wanted to snap.
“Are you lost,” Isibel pushed on, “or did you intend to intrude upon my private chambers?”
Swallowing hard, Corayne set her feet. In another life she would have felt shame upon being caught, but not anymore. Too much hung in thebalance for such things. There were too many obstacles in their way, one of them being Isibel herself.
“You said you saw hope in me,” Corayne said, her eyes on Isibel’s face. She watched every small tic and pull, trying to read her expression. “Hope for what?”
The Monarch looked past her, to the books on the shelves and the windows filled with golden light. The sun set early in the valley, slipping behind the high peaks of the Monadhrian. Shadows pooled across the floor.
“I am afraid I do not know,” Isibel muttered, shaking her head. “I wish I could tell you. I wish— I wish I could give you what you ask for.”
Corayne set her jaw. “Why can’t you?”
She did not miss the minute flicker of Isibel’s gaze, almost too quick to see. They wavered from Corayne, only for a moment, spearing a spot on the wall behind her.
The map, Corayne knew, her insides twisting.
“The price is too great,” the Elder lamented. Her white hands clasped together, fingers wringing. “And now I have no heirs to my enclave. There is no future for my people in this realm.”
Isibel’s voice broke, but Corayne could not pity her. Even if they mourned the same dead.
Her stomach twisted again, this time with terrible realization. The truth buzzed in her skin like the sensation of magic, like the touch of a Spindle somewhere close.
A Spindle only Taristan would dare open.
