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I prod the tender spot on the back of my skull, recalling my own abduction.
Worry shoots through me, masking the hurt.
Did they take Avaline too?
“Is there anyone else here?” I ask, heart thundering. “A female? Nymph?”
She shakes her head.
Thank fuck. I say a silent prayer to Dagny and Sylithe for watching over Ava. If whoever took me left her behind, maybe—just maybe—Riven is already on his way.
“Answer me,” she pleads. “How do you know my name?”
Right.
“We met at King Riven’s palace, remember?”
“No.” Her tongue darts out, wetting her chapped and peeling lips. “I never made it to the palace. Pirates captured me, and then I woke up here.”
“Oh, gods, Lyrielle,” I whisper, reaching for her through the bars as dread wreaks havoc on my insides. “I’m so, so sorry.”
If this is the real Lyrielle, who was wearing her face?
She collapses against the cold iron, her scent a tangle of sweat, excreta, and despair. I can’t imagine the excruciating pain she’s been in all this time. Forced to reject the call of the sea… I swallow, surveying her lower half. Her legs. They could become permanent. They might already be.
Dagny, save us.
I breathe through my mouth as I smooth my hand over her filthy hair, speaking softly.
“It’s all right,” I say. “We’re going to make it out of here.”
“They’ll never let us leave.”
My tone is calm, voice steady. “Who are ‘they’?”
“A male. Well-spoken and hungry for power.” She looses a slow breath. “Hates the king.”
Definitely Lord Devlin.
“Who else?” I ask.
“A female. Beware of that one. She’s old. Merciless. Worse than the male.” She shudders. “Far, far worse.”
A female?
“Quite the introduction,” crows a voice so cruel, so familiar.
You’re terrifying the witchlings.
My body locks in place, blood running cold.
The cloying scent of myrrh, blood oranges, and hatred floods the dungeon, drowning out Lyrielle’s stench with its own.
A flickering lantern illuminates the face of the witch who has haunted me for centuries.
The coven matron.
Chapter 38
