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It twisted back to the father. “She’s alone now. Her mother left her. With me. I’m alone now.” He bent forward, face in hands, crying.
Then he stood back up as the king. “I’ll find her, bring her back from the black world.”
He twisted again.
“The witch promised. She would be reborn. I did everything she asked!” the crazed creature screeched. “Everything! The tower room. The waiting. The liar! Liar! She stole my Alea!”
Luc swore.
The creature had taken over, the other parts of Cumbria silenced by the mania.
“That is all we will get from this soul,” Lexa said, and the fog and darkness swirled as she moved them into her apartment under Alabastrine once more. Luc couldn’t move, and he didn’t seem to be the only one, Nix and Lexa in their own heads, frozen as well in the middle of the room.
Luc swallowed, shaken by what he’d experienced. “He hurt her,” he said. “His daughter? Azleah?”
“The necromancy, along with all the other abominable things he did due to his grief,” Lexa replied, then sighed. “The hearts of men can’t lie.” There weren’t many instances in which Luc had seen his sister shaken, but she seemed as affected by what they’d witnessed as he was.
Nix was the first to move, dropping onto a couch with his head in his hands. “Who is Scarlett to that… creature?”
Luc shook his head. “I don’t know. A descendant of Azleah? It would explain the godblood. The healing. Alea Maximora is in her line somewhere.”
“And that… maniacal king?”
“But Azleah disappeared. From the record,” Nix said.
Lexa cleared her throat. “Has anyone considered that perhaps Scarlett is Azleah?”
“What?” Nix shook his head.
Luc’s head snapped toward his sister, catching Nix’s movement out of the corner of his eye. He thought about what Eitan had said about Mattias disappearing.
“Good gods, no,” Luc said, but he swallowed, recalling what he’d said to Brinna. Why would someone hide?Fear,Brinna had said. Shame, anger, danger. What if it was all of them?
He looked at Nix, who was looking at him.
“The magic,” Nix said and pressed his hand to his heart. “He blamed a witch.”
“Time,” Luc said, now unable to shake what he’d learned about Mattias. Luc shoved his hands into his hair and twisted away from his siblings. As much as he didn’t want to believe it, there was a knowing in the center of him, as if the pieces had slid into place. “Holy fuck.”
“The question is,” Lexa started, “who is the witch?”
The overwhelming need to see Brinna burned through Luc like a flash fire, and he whirled to Nix. “I need to get back to Brinna,” Luc said, stalking to the door. “Now.”
Nix watched him, his head tilting and his brows shifting on his face with a question.
Lexa’s brows lowered over her narrowed eyes. “Lucian?”
Luc took a breath that didn’t seem deep enough and pressed his fingers to his heart. “I mean, you know, to tell her what we’ve learned and see if she has any more news from the dreams. See what’s happening with Aurielle.”
Nix stood, clearing his throat. “Yes. I’ll take you home.”
“It is curious,” Lexa said, those unnerving eyes still on Luc. “That you are able to Dream Walk with her.” A single brow shifted over her eye.
He didn’t want to think about it, still denying it was anything more than godlight and magic.
“Curious why?” Luc asked, then evaded her gaze by smoothing the wrinkles in the fabric of his shirt.
Her eyes shifted to Nix. “And you can’t speak with Aurielle, Nixus, though your yoke?”
