Page 159 of The Thief and the Traitor Bride

She frowned, looking back at the other list. “But the marriages,” she said. “Power follows the marriage. So therefore…”

“Power,” Caspian said, reasoning it through, “follows marriage, yes; but let’s assume that marriage follows favor. Previously, the favor of the whole family. But there is no family left. Only her.”

“So power follows her whims, for now.” Nore tried to work through it, certain there was something obvious she was missing. She flipped a page, uncovering something that had been grouped with Gail’s letters: Celestine’s annotated list of Lindle nobility. She recognized many of the names—most were those who were trustworthy allies of Celestine, or close friends.

But why…?

The answer came to Nore in a sickening rush. She jumped to her feet so quickly that Caspian startled, nearly knocking over an inkpot. He turned to face her. “Finch?”

“Lochan power follows favor,” Nore said quickly, “which can be forged by… alliances. Or marriage. Something official. Which—we should return to. But Celestine, Cas. Why would Celestine care about any of this?”

“Genuinely,” Caspian said, dropping his chin to his hand as he watched her move back and forth across the small cabin, “I have no idea.”

Nore stabbed a finger at the collection of pages on the far side, the transcription from the Lindle spellbook. “We were thinking about it wrong. Idistran power is an inherent system, yes, but it follows influence—and you know what is historically interesting about Idistran power and Lindle magic?”

Caspian stared at her blankly for a moment, and then he, too, grabbed the spell sheets, flipping through them, the calculations adding up in his head. Nore saw it in his face when it clicked. “All Lochan power is,” Caspian said quietly, “is the Lindle system made inherent, with the power shifted. Idistran mages—it’s as if they don’t have to calculate because that part is not theirs in the first place, if the calculation itself is what generates power. They merely draw the power and provide the solution.”

“Yes!” Nore said, spinning on her heel. “I was wondering—why couldn’t Celestine ask me for whatever spell she so clearly needed from Gail? Why did she send us for the artifact but not the spell that we could easily locate beyond it? And the answer is—if we found out what the spell was for, we would be held in contempt of the crown. There was every chance I would not hand it over.”

“Because Celestine is trying to deconstruct Lindle power,” Caspian said, the realization dawning. He read through the calculation again. “Because a resurrection—it’s not just a resurrection of life. It’s a resurrection of magic.”

“Precisely,” Nore said. “It requires sacrificing whatever part of you does the calculation—but that doesn’t matter anymore. The medallion must have been some sort of early mage-hood, or maybe an early power source—perhaps even one portable for a mage? A well’s power, focused into an object, that one can draw on?” Nore shook her head. “That spell is for the removal of power, and we can’t work through the calculation because it’s an enigma: working through the calculation itself makes magic incalculable.”

“The medallion,” Caspian said, working through it. “She thinks that the medallion was somehow involved in the splitting of power and magic—because with the medallion and spell together, an artifact that predates the system and the spell to separate the two, she can figure out how Idistran power came to be.”

“That has to be it,” Nore agreed. “But if Celestine is doing that…”

“And if Celestine wants the crown,” Caspian said, staring at his hands, “she would never inherit. But if she created a system of power that relied on her favor, based on the Idistran system—”

“Then there would be no choice,” Nore said. She dragged Caspian out of his chair, holding his hands in hers. “Celestine was never aiding Idistra. She was studying them, trying to figure out a way to seize power for herself.”

Caspian clasped Nore’s face in his hands. “And this is proof,” he said. “Undeniable proof. And if we could convey it to your queen—”

“Then I would no longer be a traitor to Lindan,” Nore said, feeling the catch in her throat, “and neither would you.”

He kissed her, long and hard. “Your brain, Finch,” he growled against her mouth. “Gods, I can never get enough of it.”

She pulled away, gasping, her hands already working down the buttons of his shirt. He peeled it free, wrestling out of it before getting to work on her layers. “And Locke’s power—”

“Shut up, Finch,” Caspian said against her throat. “We’re done for tonight.”

If you truly plan to move forward with this, you need to make a decision. This endless stalling is not helping your cause.

And if you’re delaying out of fear, let me remind you: you don’t have to do this. I told your father the same thing.

Note from Scaelas to Locke, 1636 UCE

thirty-four

CAPTAIN CROSS RAN A tight ship, and this was something Nore could appreciate. The vessel was small and fast—after only two days, they were rounding the rocky cliffs of Eprain and steering into the Bay of Locke. Nore could not see the black rock of the scraggly little island yet, but that did not lessen her anxiety.

She stood at the helm with Caspian, Isla, and Nicodemus. It surprised her a bit how comfortable Caspian looked on a ship—he had, in fact, proven himself useful; in hindsight, it shouldn’t have been surprising at all, after she’d read his letters. In the years they’d been apart, when he’d done odd contract work for private employers, he’d had to help on many a vessel en route to some new destination.

Besides, this was their first voyage in which he hadn’t been restricted to a cabin, for one reason or another.

But now he was done working, a body at rest as he leaned his elbows against the rail, a smile on his face as the wind whipped through his hair, like they weren’t possibly sailing to their death. She could see his brain working, even now—they had theories on a proposal for the High Lady, ideas about how her power could be fixed, but all of that depended on getting to her in the first place.

That task, unfortunately, fell to Nore.