Page 77 of Sun, Moon & Shadow

“You’re in Lunar territory,” Lucan reminded him with a half-hearted smile. “They’ll be bedding down at dawn. Besides, it’ll be dark in the caves no matter the hour.”

Callan nodded in silent agreement. He followed Lucan down the hill to where their horses drank from a splintered bucket beside a crumbling well. Callan hoisted himself into the saddle on Frost’s broad back, looking east where the sun would soon be rising. Everyone has to rest eventually, he told himself. Catching Nova’s abductors while they slept in a few hours would be their best opportunity to strike. He only hoped they weren’t too late.

Thirty-Seven

Nova’s head throbbed in time with her heartbeat. She reached her hand to her right temple, the source of the pain, but discovered she was shackled at the wrists. Her eyelids fluttered weakly before opening fully.

The ground beneath her was hard and damp, the ceiling above, rough-hewn stone. Forcing several deep breaths through her nose, she rose slowly, pausing when her blood surged in her veins, briefly worsening the pressure in her skull. She sat in a small cavern lit by a single torch fixed to the wall beside an opening that led out into darkness. Another torch burned further down at the bend in a narrow tunnel. A simple wooden stool sat against the far wall beside the entryway. There was no door, though one was hardly necessary with her chained up.

Bending her arms, Nova examined her wrists. Only then did she register the searing pain there, the sensation previously eclipsed by the ache in her head. The skin beneath the shackles was raw and blistered. Iron cuffs, she gathered.

Once, when she was a child, she’d grabbed the handle of an iron skillet sitting on the worktop in the kitchen. Her palm and fingers had been badly burned. Agnes scolded her as she loosely wrapped a bandage around the scalded skin, warning Nova not to touch a pan straight out of the fire. But Nova had read countless faerie stories that told of the Fae’s vulnerability to the dense metal. She’d kept her distance entirely afterward.

A drop of liquid landed on her forearm, and she twisted her neck to inspect the ceiling. After a moment, she realized it was blood. Her blood. She pressed her fingertips to her temple, crimson coating them when she pulled her hand away. The iron was suppressing her ability to heal.

Nova lifted her hands once again, but they halted in midair before she could raise her arms above her head. The cuffs were fixed to the stone floor with a length of chain secured by a thick pin hammered deep into the solid rock. She shifted her position so she rested on her knees. Clasping her hands together, she wrenched her arms upward several times. It was no use. Her head swam with the effort, and she collapsed onto her back on the uneven floor.

Dragging deep breaths in through her nose, she battled the waves of nausea crashing down upon her, one after another. As black dots began to dance at the edges of her vision, she thought suddenly of Idrian. The terrified look on his face, illuminated in the ghostly glow of the moonstone, as he shouted for her to run. She rolled onto her side and pushed herself up into a sitting position.

What had happened to him? Was he being held in another cell?

She rose up onto her knees again, the soiled train of her nightdress tangling around her ankles. Gripping a section of the gown near the hem where the thread had already started to come loose, she tugged hard, rending the seam and removing the excess fabric.

Nova groaned as she pulled against her restraints again, the iron rings cutting into tender skin. She fell onto her backside with a grunt. Holding her hands aloft, she kept the chain taut and kicked at it over and over. The pin didn’t budge, and the chain held fast. Nova threw herself down flat and roared through clenched teeth, the sound bouncing off the walls of the small cavern.

Her chest heaved as the steady thud of boots sounded in the dark passageway outside her cell, growing louder as they neared. Nova sat upright and scrambled back as far as her restraints would allow. She hadn’t seen the faces of her captors, but she vividly recalled the pain they’d inflicted.

Finally, the footsteps drew close enough for her to hear the scrape of sand under leather soles. A tall cloaked figure stepped through the darkened entryway and into the flickering torchlight. The hood was pulled low, the face hidden. The visitor’s movements were unhurried, almost casual, as they dragged the stool away from the wall and took a seat.

Nova reached deep within herself and slipped on her practiced mask of detachment, disguising the fear threatening to consume her entirely if she’d only let it. She held her breath as the figure lowered the hood, revealing a crown of black hair. A single streak of silver ran like a bolt of lightning through the inky strands.

Nova pressed her lips together.

Idrian. Her friend.

Nothing about his appearance had changed, but his manner was wholly different. The slate-gray eyes, once so open and seemingly sincere, sat narrowed and calculating beneath his full brows. His lips curled up on one side in a cruel sneer.

“Don’t look at me like that, Mouse,” he mocked, clicking his tongue at her. “I told you I enjoy defying expectations.”

“I trusted you.”

“Yes, and it was quite foolish of you, wasn’t it? Though I can’t say I expected much from a vapid female who spends her time lounging about in fancy gowns and reading all day.” His nose crinkled, as if he found her very existence repulsive.

“You deceitful prick,” Nova spat. “Your toast to Nox—it was all lies.” Tears stung her eyes at his betrayal. At her stupidity for trusting him even as her body repeatedly tried to warn her something wasn’t right.

“You’ve got quite a mouth on you. And I never lied to anyone.” He lifted his chin proudly. “Silvergard is no longer what it once was. It was once a force to be reckoned with, a formidable power feared throughout the Realm. Now, thanks to that feckless uncle of yours, this once-mighty territory is a joke.”

Nova flinched at the word uncle.

“That’s right,” Idrian said, chuckling low in his throat. “I knew Omen’s heir had arrived at the Estate. Though, even if I hadn’t, one look at you would have given it away. The two of you thought you were so clever, skirting the truth. But you’re the spitting image of your father.”

Nova didn’t respond right away. She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from losing the sliver of composure to which she desperately clung.

“Why the charade? Why pretend to rescue me when all along you were abducting me?”

“Honestly, it was such fun deceiving you. Seeing how far I could go. Wondering if you’d ever catch on. Certainly, I’m biased, but I’d say my performance was damn near perfect. Who knows, I might have made a good actor if I believed any of Nox’s ‘art over conquest, creation over destruction’ horseshit.”

Idrian dragged a hand through his hair, preening like a cat taming its fur. Nova’s resolve flared. She’d be damned if she let this arrogant ass see the fear and dread crackling just below the surface of her skin.