Try.
My hand slips.
A blaze of sting sears my knuckles as I grate them across the ravaged stone. Hissing, I whip my hand back and shake it out, the chisel thumping into my lap. I shuffle around and lean against the wall.
Using my sleeve to wipe my face, I give the tapestry a shove with my leg, allowing fresh air to waft into the tight space with a rush of golden light from my lantern sitting just beyond the hole. Drawing deep, relieved breaths, my gaze coasts across the back of it. Across the swirling lines of pale thread and jagged black stitches that look angry enough to transcend the material.
I frown.
The woven threads bear no resemblance to the image on the front.
I untangle my bunched limbs and cleave free of the tight space, a litter of stone shards scattering onto the ground with my chisel as I ease past the heavy weave.
Standing in the dim, dusty hallway, I lift my lantern and study the tapestry mounted with a rod of wood, the ends strung with a single length of rope hooked over a nail. I set my lantern aside, grab the bottom border, and walk backward, lifting it away from the wall before I flip the thing, eyes widening when it thumps back into place with the back matter facing forward.
I stumble a step, hand whipping up to slap my mouth.
A volcano almost erupts off the magnificent piece of art, but it’s not lava spewing from the crater. It’s a storm of steam dashed through with cracks of lightning. It’s a swarm ofbeastsprowling down the craggy slope, their fur gray and pallid, stumpy maws locked in ferocious snarls that bare their ivory sabers.
Vruk.
I swallow the swell of bile burning the back of my throat as my gaze rips from the tapestry and drifts to the one just right of it. I dart forward and grab it by the hem, flipping it.
Release a little sob.
I scour the brutal scene of Vruks shredding across the weave—muzzles splashed red, bits of their savage kills scattered about.
Severed hands, arms, heads …
At the center, a woman with black eyes and hair the color of fire is stretched over a boulder, her fiercely beautiful face caught in a twist of anguish.
I gasp at her extended canines. The tapered tips of her ears.
Unseelie.
Her gaze is lifeless, her broken body at the mercy of the haunched beast feasting on her abdomen. Its paw rests on her chest, an extended talon punched through the spot where her heart would lie, blood leaching from the wound.
I’m struck by the mental vision of Rhordyn walking amongst the Irilak, his ears sharpening. Canineslengthening.Then his unseeing eyes while I burn beneath the feel of a phantom kiss pressed against my forehead.
Don’t cry …
My knees threaten to crumble, an ache surging in my chest that buckles my spine.
With a shuddered breath, I shuffle to the right in uneven steps, doing what little I can to brace my heart before gently flipping another tapestry.
The shape of Arrin is woven upon an otherwise black background, and within the borders of the lost territory is a mound of bloodied roses. Most are red, but some are the haunting hue of the roses that sprout from my shoulder, threaded with a sparkly string that glimmers in the firelight.
Standing atop the mound is a man dressed in a green cape;Arrin’scolors.
I can tell he’s Unseelie by the points of his pierced ears and the harsh cut of his beautiful face. By the opaline blood dripping from his extended canines.
A broad-shouldered silhouette dwarfs him from behind, his menacing presence making the hairs on my arms lift.
My fingers twitch to reach forward and rub away the blackness so I can see his face.
His eyes.
My gaze drops to the tapered tip of a sable talon protruding from the Unseelie’s chest. Blood has seeped through his green cloak, as though the man behind him just stabbed him through the heart.
