“Eona!” Dela crossed the soft rugs, a drying cloth in her hand. “Wash it off. Now! You will feel better.” She had already helped me out of my bloodied clothes and cleared them away as I dressed in a clean tunic and trousers. But I could still smell death.
I closed my eyes and splashed my face. The heat against my eyelids, my nose, my mouth was too much like the Righi. I straightened, the clamp of panic shortening my breath.
“Get me some cold water! Now!”
Dela motioned to the girl, who ran forward and picked up the bowl, carefully stepping with it to the tent doorway.
“Here.” Dela held out the cloth to me. I wiped my eyes and mouth. The rough beige cotton came away stained with pink.
“Nothing will ever make me feel better about Dillon,” I said.
“Ryko told me what he saw.” Dela’s face tightened with distaste. “That thing was not Dillon. Not anymore.”
“It was once Dillon.”
She clasped my arm. “He was probably in agony. You said yourself it was like hot acid in your head.”
“Dela, I took the folio’s power,” I whispered. “I used it to kill him. What have I become?”
She pulled me against her chest. I pressed my forehead into her muscular shoulder. “You are not Dillon,” she said briskly, rubbing my back. “Do not even think it. You did what you had to do. And you got His Majesty the folio.” She held me away from her for a moment, her dark eyes solemn. “You have restored Ryko’s faith, too.”
She folded me back against her shoulder.
“The folio is just death and destruction,” I said.
“Well, Yuso has it under guard now,” Dela said. “His Majesty and the leaders are discussing what to do with it.”
I pulled away. “Now? Without me? But I am Naiso. I should be there.”
Dela caught my arm. “Ryko told me what the folio can do, Eona. The leaders are discussing the potential of Lord Ido’s power. His Majesty does not want you to be there.”
The Dragoneye had been right; their first thought was to enslave him with the folio’s blood power.
“No!” I jerked myself free and started toward the door. “I can compel Ido. They do not need to use the black folio on him.”
Dela intercepted me, thrusting her body in front of the closed door. “Eona. I am not here only as your friend. I cannot let you go to that meeting.”
“You are here to guard me?”
She placed her hand on my back, her man’s strength steering me to the bed-seat opposite the door. “Just sit down. Sleep.”
I pushed her hand away. “Sleep? For all I know, they could be deciding to compel my power, too!”
“You do not believe that, Eona. You are exhausted. Try to rest.” She picked up the red folio from a nearby table on which Vida had laid out my few other belongings: the pouch containing the Dragoneye compass, and my ancestor’s plaques set around a small prayer candle. “Or if you cannot sleep, we could work on Kinra’s folio together. I have found another name within it: Pia.” The black pearls wrapped around Dela’s hand in a rattle of recognition.
“It is probably another riddle,” I snapped. “Just let me be.” I turned from her, although I knew it was childish.
In all truth, I was exhausted, in both body and mind. Yet the terrible turmoil of my thoughts—about Ido and the folio and Dillon’s death—kept me pacing the tent for a full bell while Dela sat by the door and kept her head bent over the red folio. At some point, the girl brought back a bowl of clean water, but her wide-eyed fear just made me angrier, and Dela dismissed her quickly. Rage and guilt, however, could not hold off my exhaustion forever. I finally lay down on the bed-seat, curling into my fatigue.
I woke with a sour mouth and a crick in my neck. The smoke circle in the roof of the tent held the dark mauve of dusk. I sat up, digging my thumbs into the cramped muscles at the base of my skull. I had slept the entire day.
“My lady, can I call for anything?” Vida asked from her crosslegged position on the floor. One jailer replaced with another.
“Some tea,” I said ungraciously. “And some light.”
Vida rose and opened the door, leaning out to murmur instructions to someone outside. She pulled back with a lamp in her hand, its glow brightening the wall coverings from shad-owed pink to bright red. Dela had left the folio on the table. She was returning, then; a chance for me to apologize for my surliness.
I stood, smoothing down the ruck of my tunic. “Do the leaders still meet with His Majesty?”
Vida placed the lamp on the table. “They are finished.”
“And?”
“I’m sorry, my lady, I do not know.” From her tone, she knew the question had been about Ido’s fate. “But the word in the camp is that we’ll be fighting within the next few days,” she offered.
“Is that really a rumor, or does it come from your father?” I asked.
“Let’s just say that when I asked to be assigned to a platoon, I was told that I would be staying in camp to help with the injured, and I was to be ready for action soon.”
We were both silent; no doubt there would be plenty of injured to be helped.
“Will you do something for me, Vida?” I asked.
“If I can, my lady.”
“When the fighting starts, will you make sure Lillia is safe? And Rilla and Chart?”
She nodded. “I’ll try.”
A hard knock on the door sent her back across the carpets. I swished my hands through the water in the washbowl, the cool contact making me shiver. I had brought my mother and friends into such danger.
“My lady.”
I turned at Yuso’s clipped voice, my hands dripping.
The captain stood in the doorway, his lean body in shadow. “His Majesty wishes to see you.”
I nodded. No doubt to tell me what had been decided. Vida grabbed a cloth and passed it to me. I dried my hands as Vida picked up my back sheath.
“No, my lady,” Yuso said. “His Majesty wishes me to carry your swords.”
Vida’s eyes met mine. None of us went unarmed in the camp.
“Give Captain Yuso my swords, Vida,” I said, overriding the mute objection in her face.
I recalled Yuso asking about their power. Did Kygo think they were a threat? Did he think I was a threat?
Yuso slung the back sheath over his shoulder. “My lady, you are expected now.”
“She has just risen,” Vida said quickly. She kneeled beside me, twitching the hem of my tunic into place. “She needs a few moments to prepare herself.”
Yuso’s gaze swept over the room, stopping on the table with my belongings. Perhaps Kygo thought everything I owned was a threat.
Yuso’s eyes shifted back to me. “Lady Eona is expected now,” he repeated.
“It’s all right, Vida.” I patted her hands, which were busy repleating my waist sash. Reluctantly, she pulled away.
I walked across to Yuso. He wore his usual dour expression, but there was energy coiled tight in him, distilled into the continual rub of his forefinger against his thumb. He knew something was about to happen.
“I will wait here, my lady,” Vida said.
I looked back and smiled as reassuringly as I could, then stepped over the threshold. Yuso shut the door and silently led me across the large space outside the meeting tent. We passed small groups of people talking and laughing around fires, their warm camaraderie grating against my disquiet. I caught the slink of a shadow dog between two tents, only the white tip of its tail giving it substance in the gloom. A child howled in the distance, or maybe it was the keen of a night animal. It was soon obvious that we were headed beyond the heavily settled areas of the camp, toward a round tent set well apart from its neighbors, a guard stationed at its door.
“Is that where you are keeping the black folio?”
“Yes,” Yuso said.
I stopped. “Why does His Majesty want to see me in there?”
“That is for him to tell you.”
The guard saluted as we approached. Yuso opened the door, the wash of yellow lamplight casting his thin, lined face into seamed relief. He bowed and shifted aside for me to enter, hanging back a moment to give a murmured order to the sentry. With a crawl of unease across my shoulders, I stepped into the tent. Uncovered walls, no carpets. Just one man—another guard—standing beside a table that held a black lacquered box. No Kygo. The guard ducked his head in a duty bow.
Yuso ushered me farther inside.
“Sirk, your watch is over,” Yuso said, dismissing the man, who bowed again and backed out of the tent, closing the door behind him.
I walked over to the black box, its polish catching the lamplight in a slide of bright reflection. Why did Kygo want all the guards gone? Was he going to compel my power?
I turned to face Yuso. “What does His Maj—”
My head snapped back, the blow as solid as the man behind it. I staggered, my hands pressed into the pulsing agony across my cheekbone. The second blow into my stomach was so heavy it lifted me off my feet and punched away my air. I doubled over, gulping silently for breath, my vision blurred by shock and pain. He hooked his shin behind my knees. My legs buckled and I dropped on my back. The tent around me hazed into streaming lines of gray. Something slammed into my chest like a stone weight, pinning me to the ground; Yuso’s knee. He bent over, his mouth set with the business at hand.
“Open up,” he said.
He clamped my nostrils together. I gasped for air and saw the white porcelain of a herbalist’s bottle in his hand. He forced it into my mouth, the cold ceramic edge clipping my teeth. Foul, briny liquid ran down the back of my throat. I wrenched away, coughing and gagging against the bitter draught, trying to spit it up. Trying to yell. He dug his fingers into either side of my jaw and forced my head back. I punched at him, connecting once onto a hard edge of bone, but the tent was already fading into soft blackness, the drug dragging me down into the thick silence of the shadow world.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
A STINGING SLAP across my face hammered me back into myself. Another slap forced my head back and my eyes open. I gasped, a blurred face filling my vision. Bitter pain pounded in my head like a nail being driven into the base of my skull. Acid and metal in my mouth. I knew that taste. Panic burst through me into raw agony. It was the folio. And it was blood power.
“No!” I tried to raise my hands, but something gripped the need and held me still.
The blur in front of me sharpened into Yuso. I looked down; my wrists were bound with the white pearls, the black folio pressed between my palms. Blood smeared the gleaming rope. I tried to lift my hands again, but a clamp of compulsion locked them down. I could feel it around my mind, caging my arms and legs. I sucked in a long breath, groping wildly for the energy world, but a burning wall of acid blocked every pathway I tried.
“Yuso!” It came out as a croak, my mouth so parched I could barely dredge up sound. My hazed senses caught a backdrop of red and the smell of incense and roasted meat.
Yuso’s eyes shifted from mine. “She is awake, Your Majesty,” he said, straightening.
“Good.”
The cold voice snaked into my mind, bowing my spine back against the wooden chair.
Sethon.
He was across the tent, back to me, the play of lamplight on his gilt armor emphasizing the breadth of his warrior body. Blood roared in my ears as understanding crushed me into a heartbeat and ragged breath. Sethon. Yuso had given me to Sethon. He had brought our enemy all of my power.
I was in a field tent, but the lush furnishings were suited to a palace chamber. The light from large gold lamps shone across carpets, elegant chairs, a lounging couch, and a large darkwood table with my swords on it. Four aides stood at attention, one against each wall, their curious eyes on me. At the base of the tent, I could see a sliver of darkness. It was still night. How long had I been senseless?
The High Lord turned, face impassive. His kinship to Kygo was carved into the clean modeling of his features, yet there was no warmth in his eyes nor mercy in the full lips. Everything was tight and twisted, like the scar that cut across his nose and cheek.
“Do you know where you are, girl?”
I nodded. At least I could move my head. I strained against the invisible hold of the black folio. Could I call its power as I had with Dillon? I focused on the energy pinning me down. Come, I called silently. Come to me. My desperation vibrated through the compulsion, but the folio did not answer. I was not strong enough to break the grip of Sethon’s blood.
He crossed the short distance between us, every heavy step echoing in my chest. I flinched as he leaned down and threaded his thick forefinger under the bloodied pearls.
“And you can feel my hold on your will? My control of your body?”
“Yes,” I whispered.
He tilted his head. “Let’s test that, shall we? Let’s see if this blood power truly works.”
He pressed his calloused thumb along my little finger and bent it slowly back. The pain built, and built again. I gasped, the need to rip my hand from his grasp slamming into the wall of compulsion.
“I will break it,” he said.
“No, please. I can’t move!”
“Are you sure?” He smiled into my panting fear and pushed harder.
“I can’t! I can’t!”
He wrenched back. The bone snapped. Agony shot through the marrow of my arm. I screamed, my body jerking, mind raging with the need to snatch my hand against the safety of my chest.
He inhaled deeply, as if breathing in my pain. “Exhilarating,” he said. “I can see why you enjoyed compelling Ido.” He dropped my hands and the folio back into my lap, the raw impact making the world spin for a long, gray moment. “It is going to be most interesting to explore your capabilities, Lady Eona.” He took my jaw in his thumb and forefinger and forced my head back.
“Your Majesty.” Yuso stood to one side, hands clenched. “I have delivered Lady Eona and the folio. I have done as you wished.”
Sethon waved him away. “Later, Yuso.”
How had I not seen Yuso’s treachery? My mind raced over the last few weeks, looking for missed signs.
“You raised the alarm at the palace, didn’t you?” I said. “And the army at Sokaya. Did you shoot Ido, and kill Jun, too?”
Yuso angled his face away from me.
“Bastard!” I pushed all of my rage into the word.
“Your Majesty,” he said through his teeth. “Please. You promised me my son as soon as I brought the girl and the book to you.”
Sethon leaned closer to me, as if sharing a confidence. The smell of him—acrid and metallic—caught in my throat, an echo of the folio. “Unlike you, Lady Eona, Yuso’s son does not have much fortitude,” he said. “When I broke his fingers, he passed out. I’m sure a flogging brought on by his father’s insolence would kill him.”
A vein pulsed in Yuso’s forehead.
Sethon nodded toward the wall of the tent. “Wait over there, captain. I still have work for you.”
He watched as Yuso forced his fury into a bow and retreated.
“Love is such an exploitable weakness.” Sethon turned his cold scrutiny back to me. “Yuso tells me that both my nephew and Lord Ido will come running to your aid.” He dragged his thumb across my lips. “What do you have that brings two powerful men running to their annihilation? Is it just the dragon, or something else?”
“They will not come,” I croaked.
He tapped my cheek lightly. “We both know they will come before the day is out. You are the perfect lure.”
I clenched my teeth; he was right.
He leaned over to a small table set beside the chair. Around me, there was no lush carpet, just dirt floor. He picked up a long, thin knife. The shapes of blades, hooks, and a mallet flared at the corner of my eye. I had seen such implements before: in Ido’s cell. The memory fired through my body, urging me to run. To fight. But I could not move.
“My nephew
will come for you,” Sethon said, “and in doing so, he will deliver the Imperial Pearl to me, safe under that strong, young pulse in his throat.” He lifted the blade and examined the honed edge. “I would have preferred for Yuso to kill him and bring me the pearl, but all the lore says it must be transferred from one living host to the next in the space of twelve breaths.” He shrugged. “One never knows if these stories are true or not.”
He yanked at the edges of my tunic, exposing the skin above my breasts. In my mind, I punched and kicked, but my body stayed motionless under his hands.
“Ido truly believes you are the key to the String of Pearls,” Sethon said. “He took a lot of damage before he gave up his secrets, but in the end, he was … very forthcoming about you and the black folio.” He paused, his forefinger tracing my collarbone. “A leash made of your own dragons’ Hua. The last thing he gave up before I lost him in the shadow world.”
“What?”
Sethon eyed me. “Ido didn’t tell you?” His body rocked with a silent laugh. “Still playing his games.” He patted my cheek. “The black folio is made from the essence of all twelve dragons. Created by the first Dragoneyes. You are caught by your own kind.”
“No!”
Yet the truth of his words crashed through me. From the first time I had touched the black folio, I’d felt its power reach for both of us—the Mirror Dragon and me. But why would the first Dragoneyes make such a thing?
I wondered what else Ido had not told me.
Then Sethon pressed the knife lightly into the base of my throat, and my whole world became that thin length of blade and the hand that held it.
“I understand from Yuso that you can heal yourself, Lady Eona. Over and over again.” The hand arched and leaned into the blade, the edge just sinking into my skin. Blood rose around it, the pain leaping through my nerves a moment later. “Let us explore the extent of this leash.”
I had been cut before—felt the quick shock of the battle slash—but this was another kind of hurt. Slow and deliberate, a careful carving of flesh that dragged me behind its trail of blood into a crescendo of agony. I screamed, my head straining back, my body locked under the hand and knife, unable to run or fight or even press myself away from the malice slicing into my chest.