Page 74 of Turncloak

Yes, they had the dragons on their side.

But would those things be enough to conquer such an enormous swath of land? Bellandry stood between Nyrøth and Vallin, but Bellandry was a peaceful, pious country under the rule of Queen Vune—not too difficult for a wielder corps and a dragon infantry to ravage.

And once they had Bellandry…

The border between Bellandry and Vallin was long, porous, mostly unmanned, almost entirely blanketed by the Havenwood. The Nyrøthi could cross en masse without much resistance. The Great Wards of Atherin, however, were all but impenetrable. King Quintan had almost bankrupted the throne to make it so.

All at once, it became very clear what the Bloodmoons might have to offer the Steel King: the power to destroy Atherin from the inside while external forces laid siege to the wards.

The ice trickling down Saffron’s spine intensified.

Perhaps it didn’t quite make sense. The Bloodmoons wanted the Vallish crown for themselves, to install the late Lorissa Rezaran in her purportedly rightful place, so why would they cede it to the Nyrøthi? Unless the Nyrøthi didn’t want the throne, but rather to ensure its holder’s interests aligned with their own.

Though this might simply be an exercise in wild conjecture—Lyrian could have been conversing with the Steel King about their favorite brands of bivkar—Saffron’s blood hummed with adrenaline. If she could prove the Bloodmoons were colluding with a foreign power against their own throne…forget organized crime.

This was treason. Enough to destroy the scarlets forever.

Would she expose such a thing, if she had the opportunity? If she found that letter from the Steel King, would she hand it over to the Silvercloaks and let the Bloodmoons burn?

Until a few weeks ago, nothing would have given her greater joy. Yet in doing so, the Bloodmoon fortunes would be seized by the government. She would lose access to the vast quantities of ascenite that would make it possible to wind back the decades and save her parents.

All the threads of possibility braided and knotted together.

Maybe she could seize the letter from the Steel King and take it back in time with her. That way she could save her parents, then take down the Bloodmoons in that alternate version of reality. If she did it before Levan came of age, became involved in their affairs, he might well be spared. Taken into care. Saved.

As she rose from her chair, tucked the conch shells into her pocket, and nodded farewell to the new kingpin, her vision pitched sideways, vertiginous from lingering blood loss and the scale of the decisions ahead of her. What started as a personal vendetta was quickly spiraling into a series of events that could shape wars, could skew the fate of the world.

And truth be told, she enjoyed the feeling of power at her fingertips.

Saffron’s break-in plan depended upon three assumptions.

First, that Nissa’s condition was precarious enough to still be in the hospital wing.

Second, that the first thing she would’ve done upon waking was demand a freshly rolled achullah, which the Healers would expressly forbid.

Third, that this would fuel Nissa’s ire to such a severe degree—hers was an anger quick to flame and hard to douse—that the Healers would eventually relent, under the condition that the window remained propped open and Nissa hung out of it to smoke, so as not to fill the lungs of the other patients.

As Saffron arrived outside the hospital wing in the dead of night, she couldn’t help but smile at the sight of the window standing ajar.

Levan watched Saffron enter the precinct from a hundred yards away.

Grimly, he lifted the third conch shell to his ear.

He’d pursued Saffron to the Cherrymarket that morning—had been compulsively watching her ever since the Vari Merkt, partly in case she needed his protection, partly because he still did not trust her. After she’d left the stall selling the enchanted shells, he’d paid the merchant an unsaintly amount of ascens to cast the same magic on another conch, to link it with the two he’d just sold the silver-haired mage.

Through its ear-like shape, Saffron’s quickened breathing was crisp and clean and unmistakable. Whatever happened in that hospital wing, he would be listening.

36

• • • •

The Patient

Inside the hospital wing, homesickness broke through Saffron like a wave. The scandalous murals, the stalking velvines, the scents of clove disinfectant and fresh bed linen. The last time she’d been in this room, she and Tiernan had sat by Auria’s bedside, chattering under their breaths about the prophecy Saffron had foreseen during their final assessment. Everything had smelled of Auria’s ginger tea, brewed for her waking by her doting betrothed.

Now the world had changed. Tiernan was dead—such a crude, permanent word—and Auria loathed Saffron. This place was no longer her home, no matter how much it might feel like it.

The sight of her dragonesque former lover wrought both relief and guilt. Nissa represented a steady place to plant a foot when the ground beneath Saffron was so uncertain, her last living ally in a world where enemies lurked around every corner—yet it seemed unfathomably selfish to draw Nissa deeper into this vicious web.