As if following Merik’s thoughts, Kullen smiled—a taut, inhuman thing that stretched at his lips but did not reach his eyes. “I know my Heart-Thread is with you.” He sang the words, and his steps bounced closer, almost jaunty. “And is that also young Leeri I see following?” The smile spread wider. “He always was so loyal. But no one is as loyal as I am, Merik.”

Wind burst out, a wall to knock Merik back. He hit the ground. Pain tore through him and Kullen laughed and stalked closer.

But Merik drew in the Fury’s own winds, enough to attack, enough to distract. Then he charged upright, and as he flew, he swung out a leg and aimed for his Threadbrother’s knees.

Kullen was already skipping back by the time he reached him, but it was enough. They had moved away from the door, and Merik had—for a flicker of a moment—gained the advantage. He unsheathed his cutlass; he swung. No magic, just brute force. It was the one thing he had always done better than Kullen: swordplay. And though Kullen tried to sweep at Merik with magic, his attempts were dull. Halfhearted.

For of course, they were bound by cleaving magic and Threads. If Merik died, then Kullen died with him. And while Merik might not understand how, there was no denying that truth he had faced in Lovats two weeks before.

He was faced with it again now as Kullen skipped and slid, avoiding Merik’s blade yet scarcely fighting back. “You won’t kill me,” Kullen declared, spinning left.

“I will.” Merik darted, his blade aimed for Kullen’s neck. “I would gladly die if it meant saving the people you’ve abandoned.”

“Always so brave, our Prince Merik. Always so holy. But remember: the holiest have the farthest to fall.”

“SIR!” Cam shrieked, tinny and distant. “The door!”

Kullen heard those words too. As one, he and Merik turned. As one, they flew for the chapel. It was no different from the hundreds of races they’d held as children in Nihar, and just like in those days, Kullen was faster. Yet Merik had meant what he’d said: he would die to protect Cam and Ryber.

As the chapel zoomed in close, Merik swung one last time at Kullen. He missed Kullen’s neck, but not Kullen’s ear. The top sliced off. Kullen screamed, a sound that exploded in Merik’s brain. Mental fists that punched away all thought, all consciousness.

The shadows roared over Merik. He fell.

* * *

Merik awoke in the middle of a storm.

He tried to stand—wriggling left and right, straining to rise as dark rain flayed his skin. I’m bound, he realized at the same instant that lightning pierced the skies. Thunder crashed, against his skin and inside his skull.

Merik rolled left. Mud slid over his cheek. Grass swept and writhed around him, and rainwater pooled. If he did not at least sit up, the water would rise. He would drown.

That wasn’t what frightened him most, though. No, that was Kullen’s voice cracking through the storm, buzzing in Merik’s brain.

Just in time, Threadbrother. You will get to see exactly what I came here for.

Digging his shoulder into the sodden soil, Merik drew in his knees. His wrists were tied behind his back, and his ankles looped tight. But with several grunts, groans, and popped joints, he managed to get his legs beneath him. He managed to sit up.

A meadow surrounded him, broken up by eight massive stones in three rows. Crudely-shaped columns, they towered twice as high as a man, twice as wide, and over the nearest one, Kullen flew. Lightning sizzled into him, winds spun and flew.

A thousand years, these have stood. A thousand years, the Sightwitches have hidden their treasures from the world. But no longer. Once this glamour falls, I will lead the Raider King’s forces to this place. Electricity ruptured outward, blinding in its brightness. And we will claim the sleeping mountain.

Just before Merik’s eyes seared shut, unable to fight the heat or the light or the noise, he saw the magicked lightning hit one of the stones. It fractured, a sound that ripped across the sky, ripped into Merik’s exposed skin.

A boom of energy tore through the earth. It dragged Merik down, back into the mud, where rain hammered against him and shadows took hold once more.

FIVE

Today was the day.

Two weeks of preparation, of cleaning and assembling, of organizing and arranging and pestering the High Council for help, donations, people—anything really, the stingy bastards—and now the underground city was finally ready for refugees.

Vivia Nihar, however, Queen-in-Waiting to the Nubrevnan throne, was not ready at all.

Her heart seemed to have gotten stuck somewhere behind her esophagus, and she had rubbed so much at her left coat cuff that she’d actually snapped off the gold button.

Whoever found it would be very happy, indeed.

Vivia stood before the Pin’s Keep main entrance, crowds thick before her. Squalling babes and frantic fathers; lone, lost teenagers; and coughing grandmothers, too. But none were the faces Vivia wanted—the two faces she’d expected to see when the chimes had rung in the ninth hour.

Come on, Stix, come on. This wasn’t like her. Stacia Sotar, Vivia’s former first mate—now elevated to full captain—was always on time, always early. Yet nowhere in the thicket of hungry faces did Vivia spot Stix’s white hair, so bright against her black skin.

Nor did she spot the man Stix and five other guards were meant to escort: her father, Serafin Nihar, former King and former King Regent.

“You’re sure they aren’t inside?” Vivia asked her own nearest guard for the fourth time since the chimes had clanged. And for the fourth time, the woman shook her head. “There’s no one inside Pin’s Keep, Highness. As ordered.”

The shelter had been completely cleared out. All its volunteers now waited in the cellar where the tunnel to the under-city began, or else they waited in the under-city itself. Fifty soldiers also stood sentry, while another two hundred were dispersed throughout Lovats, as insisted upon by Vizers Quihar and Eltar. Riots are a possibility, they kept chorusing, and loath as Vivia was to admit that they were right …

Well, they were right. Vivia’s lottery system might have worked thus far without protest, but once families saw others being escorted into a new, underground home, such reactions might shift like a fickle tide.

And Vivia could hardly blame them. Lovats had been in shambles since the seafire attack two weeks ago, and it had hardly been pristine or whole before that. Which was why Vivia had had her Pin’s Keep volunteers spend a week telling any and every person they met that this lottery system was Only step one in a much larger, longer-term plan to house the city!

Admittedly, Vivia had yet to sort out the rest of her plan, and the sudden ending of the Twenty Year Truce—as well as the resuming war that the Truce had paused—now kept the High Council too distracted to help her. Once her coronation finally came, though, and once she finally wore the crown that was hers by birth, then she could take matters into her own hands. She wouldn’t need the approval of a bunch of men who never agreed on anything.

Vivia cleared her throat. She couldn’t wait any longer; Stix and her father would just have to miss the opening. She gave a final swipe against her shirt front. Then patted the edges of her face. A movement she had done so often as a child, and had thought she’d grown out of as an adult.

Until two weeks ago, when they’d named her Queen-in-Waiting.

When you are with others, her mother always used to say, the Little Fox must become a bear. Now, is your mask on, Vivia?

Yes, Mother, Vivia thought. It’s on. Her lips parted, and the crowds nearest her quieted—

Then there they were. Stix at the fore, shoving through the fray and half a head taller than the rest. Behind her, surrounded by soldiers in the same navy uniforms Stix wore, marched Serafin.

And Vivia realized the people hadn’t quieted for her at all. They recognized the former King; they gawped and whispered and waved. Serafin waved back, grinning. His cheeks bore more color than Vivia had seen him wear in almost a year.

She should be happy about that. And she was—she really was. Yet there was something else knotting in her belly. Something she didn’t like that she wished would stop immediately. And it did stop the instant her eyes met Stix’s. The instant Stix smiled, dazzling and bright.

Heat fanned up Vivia’s neck onto her face, an inescapable blush that happened every time she saw her best friend, and likely would continue until Vivia finally worked up the courage to mention the kiss from the under-city.

Nothing had been the same since that kiss—a mere brush of Stix’s lips on Vivia’s cheek. And nothing had been the same since Vivia had been labeled Queen-in-Waiting … yet not truly labeled at all, because although the power might have passed from her father to her, the “waiting” part seemed more important to the High Council than the “queen” part.

“So sorry, Your Highness,” Stix murmured, hurrying into position on Vivia’s left side. “A message came in that needed immediate processing. But,” she added, glancing at Serafin, “I wasn’t sure he should see it.”

“What could be—”