Page 110 of Elysian

She clicked her tongue.

Damien caught my eye from where he sat across the chamber. He had yet to leave Vera’s side.

Piper would have approved. Emotion thickened in my throat. It was quite clear he cared deeply for Vera. I could not bring myself to look at her bound leg.

“Do not worry,” Branwen said. “The healing salve you brought helped break the fever she battled. She has begun to regain color in her cheeks.”

I exhaled slowly. Lucinda had taken charge of Vera’s care, and I had purposefully avoided asking questions. I was scared. Losing another friend . . .

Swallowing took effort. I cleared my throat and returned to the passage I had been reading. Wait a moment. I squeezed my eyes shut and opened them, the moving words focusing.

In the days before the Barren rose, the first of the Warlords bled upon the Cenote, and it drank, and it remembered.

Ever after, the stone has known its kin.

Within such blood, the old magicks stir.

Not every Beta carries the slumbering dark. Not all who wake can live.

Only before the Woken does the Cenote wake; to any other, it sleeps unseen.

I straightened.

“What is it?” Branwen asked.

I lifted a hand and forced myself to continue reading in spite of the unbearable throb at my temples.

Seek the heart of the wound, where the world was first cleaved. There, where the Barren runs deepest, the Cenote lies hidden from all eyes.

It will not show itself to the seeking.

Let the Woken bleed upon the barren ground. Where the scarlet falls, a path shall rise—hidden from all eyes but the Woken’s—and lead to the mouth of the Cenote where more will rise.

But the deep places are not empty. What the dying thresholds birth shall gather there, and not all who walk the hidden path return from it.

Only an Awakened redblood could find it. My pulse jumped and forced me to my feet. The quill went clattering across the stone ground.

“I know how to Awaken Warlords,” I breathed. Excitement widened Tabby’s eyes. “Where is Cassiel?”

“Archer told me Morak, him and Liadan were meeting with him.”

“They must be in the study.” I was already on my feet, bolting past the chamber entrance. I almost collided with Lucinda.

“What is it, Amara?”

“I found it!” I shouted.

I ignored the pinch in my hip, hurrying down the dirt and stone path, weaving through with the frail memory of the way. Steps followed me as I wove through the halls, past my chamber, and reached the study. Jude stood at the entrance and straightened upon seeing me.

“Private meeting.” I slowed.

“Private meeting?” Tabby scoffed. “Grab my husband.”

She angled herself to the side. Jude faced her, arms crossed, with a thunderous look crossing his face. I shoved through the door while Jude was distracted.

“I could not care less if all of you die.” Cassiel propped the bottom of his heel on the table.

“You’ve made that very clear,” Archer growled. “But there needs to be someone for them to follow. And that is you.”