“They didn’t strike me directly,” Isolfr went on. “So I could recover on my own in time—”
“But you won’t be able to make a daring rescue,” I said. “I get it.” I gave him a half grin. “Guess it’ll be up to me, then.”
Isolfr didn’t return my smile.
“Do you want me to help you sit up?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “I don’t have the strength. Lying here—is better.”
I didn’t have anything to say to that. The cart rattled along, our captors’ voices rising and falling. Isolfr and I didn’t speak much, although I watched him, ready to nudge him again if his eyes closed.
They didn’t.
And together we rode in that cart toward an unknown fate.
• • •
We rode for a long time. We stopped twice, and both times the burly brown-haired man from earlier led Isolfr and me out to the fields to relieve ourselves. “Don’t want you soiling our cart,” he said. They never gave us any food or water, though, and as soon as I had finished—since Isolfr apparently had no need for that sort of thing, a fact he disguised as best he could from our captor—the man would drag us back up to the cart and we’d be on our way.
I watched the sky change, something I’d never seen in its entirety in my time in the Mists. It wasn’t like watching a sunrise—there was no ball of light creeping up over the horizon. Rather, it was as if the color simply drained out of the sky. The dark green went away and was replaced by the paler shade of daytime.
My stomach was empty, my throat dry and scratchy. In the daylight it was easier to the see the stretches of grasslands surrounding us. The landscape never changed.
And then, without warning, the cart rattled to a stop.
I assumed the brown-haired man was going to take us out to the fields again, even though I didn’t need to do anything. Instead, I heard the sound of hooves clopping against stone. Isolfr stirred, lifting his head. His skin was growing paler, coming close to translucent. He slumped back down and let out a sigh.
“How much longer can you make it?” I whispered to him. “I thought you just needed to rest—”
“So did I,” he slurred.
I sat up as best I could with my hands tied behind my back. My limbs were stiff and sore, and it was hard to even get up on my knees—but I managed. I peered over the top of the cart. Our captors had climbed down and were waiting on the road for a rider ambling toward us on a shaggy, thick-furred horse. He wore a long cape of luxurious blood-colored fabric that fluttered and snapped out behind him.
“Name your business,” the rider shouted in a rich, sonorous voice.
“Dragon hunters, sir.” It was the black-haired man who spoke, the one who had dragged me across the field. Quinton. “Killed three adults. Come for our reward.”
“Evidence?” The rider drew closer and pulled his horse to a halt a few paces away from the men. He peered down at them, his face fixed into a disapproving frown.
“Three diamond scales. Turned the rest back into mist.” Quinton reached into his coat and pulled out a packet of burlap, which he unfolded there on the road. The diamond scales burned like fire in his hand.
“Very well. We’ll see about your reward.” The rider sniffed. Then he jerked his head up, and his eyes latched onto the cart.
They latched onto me.
I dove back down and tried to make myself as small as possible. Isolfr frowned at me, and he looked like he wanted to say something. But before he could speak, the rider’s voice drifted over on the wind.
“And what else do you have with you today?”
A pause. I sat very still, holding my breath so I didn’t miss any of Quinton’s answer.
“That’s between us and the lord,” he answered.
“I’m afraid it’s between you and me right now,” the rider said. “Who do you have in your cart?”
Footsteps clattered against the road. I trembled in the cart, trying for the first time since daybreak to work my binds free. Isolfr lifted his head, his face twisted up in exertion.
“Don’t do it,” I hissed at him. “If you destroy yourself, then you can’t help me anymore.”
“I’m trying to help you no—”
“And what do we have here?”
The rider’s voice was right behind my head. I froze.
“Well?” More hoofsteps. “Explain yourself, Quinton.”
The rider stopped at the back of the cart. He peered in and looked from me to Isolfr and back again. I thought of Lord Foxfollow, how he’d looked when I met him in the in-between world. Handsome and slippery like you’d never be able to put a finger on him. This rider reminded me of him, with his sharp gray eyes and his slicked-back hair.
The rider’s brow furrowed. “Well?” he barked.
“Found ’em with the dragons, sir.” Quinton’s voice boomed out into the still air. “Thought they might be spies.”
“Spies?” The rider looked down at Quinton, then gestured back at the cart. “You think they’re spies? They’re from the Sun Realm! Did you not notice their eyes?”
“Exactly,” the black-haired man said. “We thought the lord would be interested—”
“I dare say he’d be interested.” The rider drew up his shoulders and lifted his chin. “Tell me, what was their mode of transportation?”
Isolfr perked up at that, and he managed to swing himself up to sitting. I still didn’t dare move.
“Was it a carriage, perhaps? Enchanted? Of his lordship’s design?”
Isolfr broke into a big grin.
“Well, it’s hard to say, sir, it’d been destroyed by the dragons—it was burning when we got there—”
“Oh, bollocks,” the rider said. “You’ve kidnapped his lordship’s guests! Bring them out of the cart and untie them immediately.”
For a moment I didn’t understand what the rider had said. I was so petrified that I could only expect the worst. But Isolfr leaned forward and shouted, “Are you an aide of Lord Trystan, sir?”
The rider glanced over at him. “I am indeed. And you are in his hallowed lands as we speak.” The rider turned back to the dragon hunters. “Why haven’t you untied them yet?”
The back of the cart slammed open. The browned-haired man stood on the other side, his arms crossed over his chest. Behind him Quinton was glaring at the rider, who didn’t seem to notice. Or care.
“Well, come down with you then,” the brown-haired man said. “You heard his honor. We’re to cut you free.”
Finally, belatedly, the relief rushed through me. I let out a long breath as Isolfr scooted forward over the straw.
“Stop dawdling!” the rider shouted. “Get in there and free them.”
The brown-haired man glowered, but he jumped up into the back of the cart in one easy motion—surprising, given his bulk. He pulled out a knife and brought it down behind Isolfr’s back. The ropes fell to the cart, and Isolfr swung his arms forward and wriggled his fingers.
“Thank you,” Isolfr said.
The brown-haired man ignored him. He turned to me and said, “Come along then, you heard his honor.”
My relief made it hard to move. I was trying not to laugh and trying not to cry at the same time. I turned around as best I could, and the brown-haired man must have grown impatient because he hauled me up to my feet and sliced through my ropes. Immediately I shook my arms out, relishing the stinging tingle as feeling rushed back into them. Shakily, I made it to my feet. Isolfr was already on the ground, hunched over a little, standing beside the rider’s horse. The rider watched me with his glittering gray eyes.
“I’ll take you up to the manor,” he said in that aristocrat’s voice. “Separate from these overzealous fools. I am sorry to see that you were so badly mistreated, and I’m sure Lord Trystan will be sorry as well.”
I crawled out of the back of the cart. The road was made of dark polished glass. It felt strange beneath my feet, slippery like ice.
“Take your dragon scales to
the usual place,” the rider said to the dragon hunters. Then, to Isolfr and me, “Come along.”
His horse trotted off. I glanced over at Isolfr, feeling dazed and uncertain. “Are you sure this is a good idea?” I whispered to him.
He smiled at me, despite his pale skin and shaky countenance. “Yes,” he said, “I think it is.”
I took a deep breath. The rider glanced over his shoulder at us. “Don’t delay!” he said. “Lord Trystan is waiting for you.”
Isolfr made his way down the road. I took a deep breath and followed him, keeping my head down as I walked past the dragon hunters. They didn’t say anything to me.
I looked back up as soon as I was clear of the cart—and gasped. A manor rose out of the sweeping grass, its windows glittering in the sun. I’d never seen anything like it in my entire life, not even in the capital, where the wealthy of Kjora made their homes. Even when I’d attended a dance with Bryn, it had not been held in a place like this, with turrets and towers.
I stopped in the middle of the road and gaped for a moment. Isolfr and the rider continued on their way, and I stumbled after them to catch up.
“That’s where Trystan lives?” I murmured to Isolfr. I didn’t like the idea of the rider listening in on our conversation.
“Yes,” Isolfr said. “It’s a nice home, don’t you think?”
“Nice?” I squeaked. “It’s a palace!”
Isolfr laughed. “That’s not a palace. It’s not grand enough.”
I smacked him on the arm. “I’ve never seen anything grander. This looks like the palace at Jokja, the one Mama told me about in her stories.”
Isolfr grinned. “Well, we better make sure we never take you to Jandanvari Palace, then,” he said. “Because you might completely pass out in wonder.”
“Stop making fun of me.” I scowled at him. He made a face back at me, then laughed. He was still as weak as before, but our approach to the palace—I was going to keep thinking of it as a palace, no matter what Isolfr said—seemed to have brightened his mood.
We didn’t have to walk long before we reached the outer gate. It was carved out of black stone, statues of dragons perched on the top, their tails and wings swirling around in strange, elaborate designs. The palace rose up behind the gate, throwing off light like the dragon’s diamond scales.
I shivered. I didn’t like that this Lord Trystan seemed so fond of the creatures that had nearly eaten us.
The rider trotted his horse right up to the gate and whispered words in a language I didn’t understand. They swirled around me like mist and fog, sparking with the magic inside of my system.
The doors slid open.
“In you go,” the rider said. He turned his horse around so that he faced away from the palace.
“You aren’t coming with us?” I asked, peering up at him. “How will we know where to go?”
The rider flattened out the line of his mouth. “I’m not allowed past the gates,” he said. “Go to the front door, ring the bell, and tell Master Illsey that you’re here to see Lord Trystan. He’ll recognize your faces.”
Before I could ask any more questions, the rider clopped away, back down the shining black road.
“Why can’t he go past the gates?” I asked Isolfr. “What’s going to happen to us in there?” I peered inside, but inside didn’t look much different from outside. Just the road, more grass. And the manor, looming overhead.
“It must be a Mists tradition,” he said.
I glared at him. “We don’t know that. It could be dangerous—” I pressed close to him and lowered my voice. “We still don’t know if we’re even in Lord Trystan’s lands, you know. The rider could have been lying.”
Isolfr looked over at me. He looked even more drained than he had been earlier. His eyes were like two dull stones, and I could already start see the path of veins beneath his skin.
“I need aid,” he said. “We have to take this risk.”
“You never want to take risks!”
“But we don’t have a choice.” Isolfr’s voice wavered. “With Frida and Kolur—we had a choice. Now—” He turned toward the gate. “Besides, I don’t think this is how Foxfollow would trick us. He wouldn’t trick us at all.” A pause. “He’d just attack.”
And then Isolfr stepped through the gate, crossing over to the other side.
Nothing happened to him. He turned around and blinked at me. The air stirred, a wind that didn’t prickle the magic inside of me like any wind I felt at home.
“It’s fine,” he said.
I gathered up my strength. Then I walked forward, closing my eyes as I passed under the gate. I stopped. Opened them. I was inside.
At first, nothing happened.
Then there was a screeching clang and a wheezing like the sound I heard inside the walls of our carriage, and the gate slammed shut behind us.
I jumped. Inside the enclosure, everything was quiet. There was no chatter of voices, no laughter or singing or shouting. Nothing.
The place seemed abandoned.
“Let’s go,” Isolfr said. “I’m not sure I can stand much longer.”
That was enough to drive me forward. I didn’t want to see him collapse in the grass, knowing I didn’t have the ingredients to save him.
We walked down the road, our shoes clicking against the smoky glass. Slowly, the grass gave way to a garden overgrown with strange glowing flowers that let out little puffs of white mist. They turned on their stalks to follow us as we walked past. I wrapped my arms around my chest and concentrated on my magic, on keeping it safe from those sinister flowers.
Eventually, the road ended at a set of stairs leading up to a pair of elaborately carved black stone doors. A frayed silk rope hung down beside the door, puddling on the stairs. Isolfr climbed up the stairs and gave it a hard tug.
Deep inside the manor, bells rang.
“Get up here!” he called out to me. I hesitated, frowning at the stone doors. Isolfr beckoned me. “You need to be up here—” But he was interrupted by a loud scraping creak. He whirled around to face the door, drawing himself up straight. I swallowed my fear and bounded up the steps, arriving at the top just as a thin little man appeared in the doorway. Master Illsey, I assumed.
“May I help you?” he asked.
“My name is Isolfr Witherjoy,” Isolfr said, bowing at the waist. “This is my traveling companion, Hanna Euli.”
I fumbled with my skirts and sank into a wobbling curtsy.
“We’re here to meet with Lord Trystan.”
Master Illsey sniffed like he didn’t approve, but he said, “Ah yes. He said you would be arriving soon. Come in, please.”
He stepped out of the doorway. Isolfr and I exchanged glances. I still couldn’t shake the feeling that we were walking not into Trystan’s manor, but into a trap set by Lord Foxfollow.
Isolfr slid into the gloomy darkness. Master Illsey stared at me from the doorway, his gray eyes thick and heavy.
I took a deep breath, and I crept inside behind Isolfr.
It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the dim light of the foyer. A chandelier hung from the ceiling, although it wasn’t lit, and a statue of a dragon lurked up against the wall. I noticed that it was coated in a layer of dust.
“This way,” Master Illsey said, breezing past me. He smelled of cold winter air, of mist. I shivered. At least the house itself didn’t smell of mists, but of cloves and oranges, a bright spicy scent that tickled at my nose.
Master Illsey’s footsteps echoed in the cavernous hallways. Isolfr and I followed without speaking. We threaded deep into the house, turning left and right and left again until I was certain that I’d never find my way out on my own. Everything was covered in dust, as if this Lord Trystan couldn’t be bothered with housekeeping.
Isolfr shuffled beside me. The burst of energy when he greeted Master Illsey seemed to have drained the rest out of him; I was afraid he would pass out before we made it to Trystan.
And I prayed to
the ancestors that we really were going to see Trystan.
Eventually, Master Illsey stopped in front of a shut door. He turned around to us and his eyes gleamed silver, like twin moons at night. I jumped, unsure what light they were reflecting—there wasn’t any in this hallway.
“You may wait in here,” he said. “Lord Trystan will see you shortly. Feel free to tell the housekeeper if there’s anything she can fetch for you.”
He shoved the door open. Light poured out into the hallway, and I threw up my arm without thinking. My eyes stung.
“In you go,” Master Illsey said, sounding annoyed.
I stumbled into the room. It was larger than my entire house back home, and windows stretched all the way across one side, amplifying the daytime light from outside. A trio of chairs was set up in the center of the room, angled around a small round table. Everything was elegant but, at the same time, shabby, as if it were also very old.
Isolfr immediately shuffled up to one of the chairs and sank down in it, head lolling back. I slid into the seat beside him.
“Are you all right?” I whispered.
“I’m fine,” he said, even as he shook his head. “I just—I need some more of the spell we cast earlier, the potion. I’m sure Trystan will have so—”
The doors clanged open, and I jumped, my heart pounding. A woman bustled in. She wore flowing violet robes and she carried a silver tray containing a long, thin bottle and a pair of glasses.
“Would you care for a glass of brandydown wine?” she asked in a smooth, liquidy voice.
I stared at her, blinking. I’d never heard of brandydown wine—the fishermen aboard the Shira hadn’t served it to us. But the woman didn’t wait for an answer. With one free hand she poured our drinks. The wine was pale and silvery, little bubbles crawling up the sides of the glass. She handed one to me and one to Isolfr and then she swept out of the room.
“What is it?” I asked, staring down into my drink. It fizzed and popped.
“I’m not sure,” Isolfr said. He set his glass on the table. “I shouldn’t drink it, not in my condition. I don’t know what effect it’ll have.”