They all looked at each other.
At last, Kiyan’s mother clutched her chest and whispered, “Kiyan?”
I nodded fiercely, pointing to the inscription on the top of the door. “He took your place.”
Kiyan’s brother straightened from the wall, his eyes wide, his jaw clenched. “What?”
His mother swung her head to the inscription, reading it aloud to herself. Her eyes narrowed; her face contorted with rage. “Damn Azari. That fucking bitch.”
“We’ll just have to open it again,” his sister said, her tone helpful. “Do you have the crown?”
“I do.” I handed it over to her, hope flaring in my heart. “The inscription says the door can only be opened with a royal blood trade, and only once.”
His mother looked back at me, her eyes narrowing. “You can read ancient peri?”
“Not even I can do that very well,” Kiyan’s sister said with an arch of a dark eyebrow.
“Yes, I can. My mother taught me.”
His sister placed the crown on her head, trying the door once more.
“It won’t open,” she said, a desperate edge to her voice. “Are you telling me he’s going to be trapped in therealone?”
“We barely survived and at least we had each other,” muttered Kiyan’s brother, a fierce tic in his jaw that reminded me so much of Kiyan it made my heart ache.
“Why were you here with him?” his mother asked, her voice gentle, taking in my distress.
I wiped my tearstained face, realizing what I must look like.
“I... we...” I trailed away, unable to form words to describe what had happened, unable to comprehend it myself. I exhaled heavily and tried again, steadying my voice.
“I helped him find the door to the Mountain. The curse meant that the door moved constantly and couldn’t be found. My magic,”—I held up my hands in an attempt to show them—“it finds lost things. After Kiyan killed Reza, we came straight here. He wouldn’t listen to any other option; he wanted to get you out of the Mountain.”
I knew I was babbling, I knew they didn’t understand half of what I was talking about, but I couldn’t seem to stop. It helped to talk, to focus on something else besides Kiyan.
Besides my heart breaking in two.
“The battle is over now that King Rusul’s crown is destroyed, and River’s powers have returned.”
“Reza’s dead?” growled Kiyan’s brother, flexing his fist. “Shame, I would have loved to meet him on the battlefield.”
I nodded. “He is. The rebels are down below, in the valley.”
The Queen looked back at the closed door, despair on her face.
“He’ll be okay for now,” said his sister, placing a hand on the Queen’s shoulder. “We’ll find a way to properly lift the curse on the Mountain.”
The Queen nodded, biting her bottom lip hard.
“He won’t starve, and he’ll be at the palace. You know it will take care of him.”
“Yes, but he’salone.” The Queen wrung her hands together, her face pinched.
I didn’t want to tell them that he’d been alone much of the past ten years, that he’d gone through things they couldn’t possibly have imagined. But that was something they’d discover very soon.
Sorrow gripped me for everything they had lost, for all that their Court and fellow peris had been subjected to.
They would have to start rebuilding soon, start living again, but the impacts of what had happened would be felt for generations.
