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With my frown deepening, I strode to the antechamber, passing bronze and brass fixtures. My open silk shirt hung off my frame. I’d been in a hurry to leave the suite, and since it wouldn’t have been the first or last time that I arrived flawlessly disheveled, I had decided to clasp the garment and shrug on my choice of coat on the way out.
Instead, I ignored the outer vestment currently flopped over a wing chair and stalked from the threshold. In the foyer separating my door from the nursery and Briar’s apartment, my eyes skewered the corridors. Darkness smothered every passage, blanketing the patterned rugs, wainscoting, and wall paintings.
The wicked fuck?
After stepping into the mezzanine off the foyer, ominous silence and absence greeted me. Autumn’s coat-of-arms hung from the beamed rafters, the pennant immobile. Not a scant trace of a breeze, much less anything substantial enough to extinguish a fortress.
Nature and the almighty Seasons worked in mysterious ways. Nonetheless, I’d spent a fiendish portion of my life as a shadow lurking in and out of a castle.
Instinct sent me veering back into the suite and across the chambers. No need to linger. By now, Briar would be outside with Nicu, her mother, and our clan.
A selection of blades was sheathed in my boots and pants, but I could do better. On the way, I snatched my velvet coat off the chair and stabbed my hands into the sleeves, arming myself with an additional surplus of concealed daggers. Grabbing my staff from a wall hook, harnessing it across my back, and knocking open a hidden wall panel with my shoulder, I slipped into another void.
Navigating from one conduit to the next, I descended a handful of levels before emerging into one of a dozen quads. Voices and silhouettes idled through the area. Courtiers dressed in wool and cashmere finery craned their heads, glancing in befuddlement at the castle’s brick monoliths. Unnerved, they spoke in hushed tones.
“What happened …”
“The whole castle …”
“Snuffed out …”
I traveled past them, dismissing their looks and whispers when they noticed me. The coat slapped my calves, and my eyes clicked to the stifled bonfires surrounding the castle. By comparison, the lower town pulsated with light.
My footfalls quickened. Entering the main courtyard, I headed toward our clan, who huddled near the central maple.
Cadence, Posy, and Vale had gathered with Eliot, Aire, and Avalea. My son leaned his runty body against the minstrel’s legs and was petting Tumble, trying to calm the squirming, agitated creature. At the sight of Nicu, my muscles slumped in relief, then tensed once more.
One person was missing.
She must have stepped away to converse with the residents. That must be it.
Cadence propped her fists on her hips. From a distance, I heard the lady interrogate the First Knight, “Please tell me this is some type of creepy special effect for Reaper’s Fest.”
“It is not,” the soldier replied, his features upturned and consulting a circle of hawks and falcons dicing through the clouds. “Neither is it a willful act of nature.”
Dropping his gaze, the man ran his flat palm slowly through the air, as though sketching an invisible current, reading something there before curling his gloved fingers inward. Sensing my approach, Aire’s attention shot to me. “It is a human disturbance. Something intentional.”
“Papa!” Nicu piped, wrapping Tumble around his shoulders, hopping from Eliot’s legs, and leaping into my arms.
Draped in a shimmering bronze gown, Avalea followed the child’s trajectory, her eyes jumping from Nicu to the empty space around me. “Where’s Briar?”
Cold dread splashed across my chest as I hefted Nicu off the ground. “She’s not here?”
Silence. Everyone stared, apprehension dawning quickly. Fair enough, they had assumed the princess was with me. Yet the underlying panic in Avalea’s voice was infectious, transferring to the rest of our clan as they drew the same conclusion.
My blood chilled. Whilst balancing my son, I swerved toward the castle. My eyes cut across the brick facade, scaling the towers in the Royal wing where I’d last seen her.
Something intentional.
Cold terror leached from my veins. In its place, fury set my retinas aflame, and a silent roar cannoned up my throat.
Briar!
All this time, we had suspected a potential plot occurring at Reaper’s Fest. Aye, we’d hoped for the better after what happened to Summer. But we’d also kept ourselves ready and assigned more troops to the covert passages.
Yet the king’s faction had fucking gotten in anyway. And as a bonus, they’d suffocated the castle fires. I had enough experience with targeting to guess why.
“Papa?” Nicu’s voice trembled. “Are you hiding Briar Patch?”
