Page 154 of A Thief Among Fae

Olin’s all-teeth grin widens. “Prince of Death. I have long looked forward to meeting you. Do not be unwise with this arrow, or you spell your own doom.” The glint in his luminous eye is wicked, as if he’s wishing that very fate upon Desmond.

I gulp, those words as unsettling as Olin himself.

“My duty has been fulfilled.” With one final breath, Olin disintegrates. His flesh and bone turn to ash that rains down like sand on his robes. The crown falls atop it all.

“Well, that was far from pleasant,” Finnian quips. “Swell that we get to keep the crown, though.” He darts through the smoke up the dais and grabs it, then holds it over his own head. “How’s it look?”

“Finnian, step away from the coffin,” Desmond warns. He draws his sword as the smoke billows, swarming the coffin. My skin prickles as the mage lights overhead dim, their glow streaking toward the smoke as if being consumed by it.

We back away. Desmond swears as he tracks the smoke’s serpentine crawl down the dais. “Olin’s soul has moved on, and his death has released the curse,” he says, each word as heavy as a death knell.

Gods, I want him to be wrong, but the well of magic inside of me trembles. Pain throbs in my chest, stuttering my pulse so hard I gasp. It feels like my magic is being ripped out of me.

“We have to run,” Auri gasps out, her chest heaving like she feels it, too.

“But the treasure!” I argue. “We can’t just leave it!” Yet even I know how vain that sounds as we all struggle to back away from the coffin, gasping and staggering in agony.

“We’re getting out,” Desmond orders. “Now!”

I fumble my knives into their sheaths, then reach around my back to grab the enchanted rucksack. My hands tremble as I pull the cinched opening wider.

“Cynthia!” Desmond yells. “Go!”

I don’t make him say it again. My feet pound against the marble as I run, weaving through the maze of treasure. Holding the sack wide open, I strain my magic to its breaking point, untethering the goblets and vases and jewels that I pass. They clink one after another into the sack, and I don’t stop. Not even as my head throbs so hard that my vision edges with black. Not even when I trip, catch myself on one hand, and let Desmond pull me back onto my feet.

This can’t all be for nothing. Everything I take is another meal for my family, another coin to pay for a healer so Evie won’t suffer from my mistakes.

Glass baubles pop. Marble cracks. The cavernous ceiling above us shudders, banners knocked free and fluttering down.

Auri and Finnian watch us from the doorway of the nobility’s chamber, their eyes wide with terror. “Hurry!” Auri shouts.

Smoke brushes against my neck, cold as a winter squall. Desmond runs behind me as though he can protect me from it. I reach the nobility’s chamber, a cloud billowing around my chest, and Auri shoves me toward Finnian, away from the door. Her palms crackle with lightning.

“Don’t!” Desmond shouts. “We don’t know what magic does to it.” To my horror, he faces the king’s chamber and stands inside the doorway. Black pillars of smoke swirl before him. As we all stare at the indomitable, dark energy, there’s no denying it.

This is the power of the gods. And none of us can stop it.

Desmond grabs the door and tries to shut it, but the force of the cursed magic fights him. The smoke swells faster. Tendrils that are colder than ice snake around my feet, and a hissing scream fills my ears.

I throw my body against the door to help him. Auri and Finnian join us, and we move step by strained step. “Almost there!” Auri yells, her voice echoing over the shriek of the curse.

With one final shove, we slam the door shut.

Silence snuffs out the scream as though it was never there. The only trace is the ringing in my ears.

We pant for breath as we watch the curls of smoke slink toward cracks in the walls, spiral into them, and vanish. Our gazes meet, a thousand questions jumping between us. Not one of us expected the curse to be real.

“I don’t know why. . .” Desmond smooths his curls out of his eyes. He scans the Old Avedoran writings in the chamber again and again, as if he can’t fathom what he’s reading. “The warnings are here, but why do ghosts never speak of it? Why didn’t I know about this?”

He paces, his words as quick as his steps, more talking to himself than us. “Does Olin expect us to believe that the Avedoran monarchy created an army of undead to guard the very curse inflicted upon them for creating the undead? Then, to hide any evidence, they execute all the necromancers, but let the siphons live. Because of course the royalty wouldn’t execute themselves, despite having the power to control the curse for their own use.”

“The siphons are needed if the curse ever needs to be contained again,” I add.

Desmond whips around to face me, and I catch a flash of pain that he quickly masks.

“But they shouldn’t have killed all the necromancers,” I tell him, both meaning it and hoping that’s what he needs to hear. Gods, even though I’m still pissed at him, at all of them, I still care what he thinks of himself.

“Should we have second thoughts about killing a siphon?” Finnian asks. “Assuming that is Queen Orla’s Gift.”