“It’s the Sending,” I said, standing and turning toward him. “I need your sword now.” I held my hand out, waiting.
Raek scoffed, chuckling, but the pirate lord held my gaze.
“Cast your weapons down,” Astraeus repeated the strange verse. “Not aside.Down.”
His dark eyes slid to the stone door and the slices I’d examined. He stepped forward, unsheathing his curved blade. Kneeling before the eight-pointed star, his fingers slid over the little cluster of five stars, the symbol of the Celestyn power. He plunged his curved blade into the slice next to it. A perfect fit.
A wry smile formed on his lips as he glanced at his men, jerking his head toward the door and ordering them to insert their blades in the door.
The fletching of the arrows and hilts of the blades stuck straight up in the air, and nothing happened. I cocked my head.
“There’s no handle,” Vienah murmured. “Even if it’s unlocked, how do we open it?”
That was it.
“Handles,” I clarified to Vienah, feeling smug, and gripped the top of Astraeus’s blade and one of the opposite arrows. I pulled and pushed, attempting to twist the door counterclockwise.
I grunted as I pushed. Ronan reached around me, adding his strength. Nothing.Dammit.
Astraeus edged around the blades, his finger grazing the shallow center of the star. He let out a soft chuckle.
“We’re missing a piece, Bonscaíh,” he said quietly. “Honor.”
“Well, there’s not much of that in this group,” I snapped.
He turned toward me, a wry smile on his face. “Your dagger,” he said, jerking his chin toward my boot where I’d concealed Talon. So, he hadn’t forgotten I still had the blade.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“The name of your blade isHonor.”
I pinched my brows, shaking my head, and he leaned down and snatched it from the inside of my boot, his hand gripping the back of my calf.
He held the dagger, almost reverently, between his hands, as if weighing the perfectly balanced blade.
“Onoiren,” Astraeus murmured, his finger sliding over the barely perceptible script on the length of the dagger. “Honor, in old Votruvian.”
I blinked. This was aVotruviandagger that had somehow ended up in the Crystal Castle, in Cyril’s hands. My mind didn’t have time to process what that could mean as Astraeus took the blade and placed the hilt, its golden gem a soft glow against the white stone, at the center of the eight-pointed star. A softclicksounded.
“Honoropens more than doors,” Astraeus murmured, turning back to me, his eyes soft. He motioned toward the door.
We gripped the blade and arrow once more and barely nudged the door before it twisted smoothly in a full circle. Air whooshed, followed by the squelch of sandy lake bottom as the door lifted open.
Lord Astraeus let out a low whistle, eyeing the dark staircase spiraling into a deep chamber beneath the lake. “After you, Bonscaíh,” he motioned me forward with a wink.
Vienah threw an encouraging nod in my direction, and I stepped into the darkness.
My hand slidalong the dry, chilled stone wall as we spiraled below the lake through a vertical tunnel. A dry, loamy breeze floated from its depths. Astraeus’s men lit two torches that they’d brought along. I held one in front of me as I slid Talon, or ratherHonor, back into my boot. Astraeus noted the movement, curiously keeping his mouth shut. The other blades and arrows above were stuck, the price of this tomb.
Lord Astraeus ordered his men to seal the gate above us should Carina’s powers falter, insisting the creators of this tomb would have built a second exit. Her sweet, lilac wind vanished as the stone gate thudded against the top of the tunnel, sealing us in.
The constant buzzing in my ears drowned out the bickering that had begun several steps behind me. Beneath the wall of whatever magic this cuff wielded on my wrist, my powers seethed.
My foot finally met the hard, frozen stone of the base of the stairs. My eyes went wide as I took in the bare, circular white chamber.
In its center, a large round sarcophagus rested. Its cover was adorned with images of a fierce battle. Elves, evident by the pointed ears, and humans, fought side by side on various winged animals.
Fire and ice clashed in the skies above. Creatures of death and pain, the likes of which I’d never seen before, snaked across the tomb. Scales and talons tore apart the winged warriors. And at the bottom of the tomb, an ocean of nightmares stalked the ships. I glanced at Astraeus, whose eyes were narrowed on aparticularly vivid depiction of a hydra, the same creature carved on the front of his ship.
My eyes snagged on a simple round symbol in the center. A circle with two lines cutting across the center. So strange and simple, yet something about it reminded me of Enya’s tomb.
I stepped forward, vaguely aware of the others shuffling off the staircase behind me and inching around the large casket. There was little more than a few feet of space between it and the walls. I ran my fingers over the etchings as I studied the lid.
“How are we going to get the top off?” Kresida asked as she hopped off the final step of the staircase. Her movements were quick and energetic despite her injured shoulder.
I eyed Astraeus, opposite of where I stood. He’d grown quiet since entering the chamber, not taking his dark eyes off the constellations that lined the outermost edge of the sarcophagus. He lifted his torch, leaning over the lid, pupils dilated, as he reached for that simple symbol in the center.
“You won’t.”
