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Kage chuckled and pressed a quick kiss to her cheek. “Put us to work, My Lady. We’re at your mercy.”
Theclick,clickof spikes, a hatchet, and a mallet resetting Gaina’s sunk-in ceiling rattled through the knoll. Inside breathed of sage and damp soil with a touch of clove in the woven rug underfoot. One wall was made of stones and broke off from the natural slope of the earth, the rest was sealed with clay and wooden laths to keep the damp soil from caving in entirely.
But gilded flowers had grown through the cracks and coated Gaina’s walls in a glittering vines.
“Underblooms,” she said, brushing a thumb over one of the satin petals once she caught me staring.
“I . . . think I knew that,” I admitted and leaned in the buttery scent of the bloom. “They thrive in dim lighting.”
“Add beauty to the darkness.” Gaina winked and set about offering a hot tea to the lot of us once we returned.
When Kage, Asger, and Cy finished sealing the roof and washed soil from under their fingers, they sat with us near a cozy inglenook.
Gaina rocked in a wooden chair, silent for a drawn pause. “Well, let me have it. What brings you here?”
I let out a sigh. “Because of a dream. A nudge to return to the beginning when we have no hope. You were the first person I met upon my return, Gaina.”
“In your beginning, you have found glimpses of the past. The past is powerful, Sweet Iron. For it makes the stones that build the path of our future.”
“Exactly,” I said, voice hardly more than a breath. “I have much of my past now, and more than ever we must find a way to stop the degeneration of Kage’s magic and restore the crowns.”
Kage sat in a velvet chair across the room from me, but I took note of the way he shifted, the way he studied the marks on his hands instead of looking at me.
More silence, thick enough it felt as though each ticking thought in our heads could be heard.
Gaina set the cup of tea to a small wooden table at her side. “I am glad you’ve come. I’ve no weapons, no spells to offer, but I do have a great many seasons worth of trinkets I keep at the ready for such occasions as this.”
“What sort of occasions?” Asger asked, a twitch of a grin in the corner of his mouth.
“Occasions when we do not know what in the hell we’re supposed to do.”
With another wink, Gaina gestured for us to follow. Back outside, down the hill, and to a small supply hut she’d built near a thick, ancient oak.
A hatch door took up the center of the supply hut. Gaina snapped her fingers and the lock clicked, granting us entry.
The woman knelt with a few sighs and grunts, rummaging through the hatch. “I’ve kept a few curious and interesting things over the weaves. One never knows what one might need. But I take abit of stock in the nudges of fate—some call it the goddess, but she and I are not on speaking terms, you see.”
I chuckled. “Why is that?”
Gaina paused, swiping a lock of her silver hair from her brow. “Now, I’m not certain, Sweet Iron. Only know I’m rather irritated with her.” Back to rummaging, Gaina’s voice was muffled when her head ducked below the hatch. “But I do find it a bit like fate that you, House Ravenwood, came to me in such a time. For, as it happens . . .”
Her words trailed off, leaving the rest of us silent, yearning for more.
Gaina straightened, a weary gasp slid over her lips. In her grip was a parcel wrapped in brown parchment. With a knowing glance, Gaina held it out to me. “Have a look at the inscription.”
I swiped my tongue over my bottom lip and took the parcel with care. My breath stuttered. There, written in the corner was a scrawl:For when all seems lost.
“Adira,” Kage whispered. “The symbol beneath it—that is your house seal.”
I could not catch a deep breath.
“What do you think, Sweet Iron?” Gaina’s voice was soft. “Shall we look inside and see what fate has in store?”
CHAPTER 39
Kage
Wrapped in the linen,with pages edged in soil and dust, was a grimoire of House Ravenwood.
