Grabbing an old, rolled-up map of Cascadia—from before the revolution, when this fort had been abandoned—he spread it out across the table. To lay it flat, he pinned one edge with his lamp and the other with Rune’s knife, lodging the tip into the wood beneath.
“If I were Cressida,” he murmured, scanning its lines in the lamplight, “where would I hide my sisters?” Close to the capital, where she could easily replenish the spell preserving them? Or as far from the Blood Guard as she could get?
It was only a matter of time before Cressida figured out who Rune was. So long as Elowyn and Analise’s corpses were outthere, fully preserved, Rune’s life was in danger. No matter where she ran, she would be hunted.
But if he found the bodies and destroyed them?
Rune would be safe.
Gideon’s gaze traced the map, following the roads leaving the capital and pausing at Thornwood Hall, Cressida’s former summer home.
Would she hide them inside Thornwood?
After growing up there, Cress would know the house and its grounds intimately.
It was a place to start. If he found no trace, he’d move outward from there.
Leaving the map, Gideon went to the supply room. Grabbing an empty rucksack, he started filling it with sticks of dynamite. He couldn’t disable whatever spells preserved the sister queens, but with any luck, the spells would have weakened considerably in Cressida’s absence. A few sticks of dynamite might be enough to blow them to bits.
He had no idea if it would work, but he had to try.
And if he couldn’t destroy them, he would hide them somewhere else. Somewhere Cress would never find them.
Gideon looked to the windows, where the moonlight poured in. The sea was a black expanse in the distance.
He hoped Rune was on it. Hoped she was safely away.
Slinging the pack over his shoulder, Gideon grabbed the lamp and Rune’s knife—the only remnant of her he had left—and turned for the door.
A silhouette stood in the frame, blocking his way.
Gideon frowned into the shadows, trying to make out who it was.
“Itrustedyou.”
The voice sparked like a fuse.
Laila.
“You said you knew her exact plans. That it would be tonight. That she would use theArcadia!”
She stepped into the room and the orange glow of his lamp.
Gideon stepped back. “Laila, I—”
“The hounds couldn’t pick up a scent,” she said, staring at him like he was a stranger. “We checked every cargo hold on every ship in the harbor. There’s no trace of any witch.”
Here, at the end, this was all he was sorry for: the look on Laila’s face.
She was his friend, and he’d betrayed her trust.
“Why would you lie to me?”
Gideon remembered Rune’s knife pressed to his throat. Remembered the tears in her eyes as she fled.
Because I love her.
Gideon dropped his sack full of dynamite to the floor.
