Elves Invasion

52

It was almost evening before Windyard returned with Caleb and Tristan. At some point Tristan had joined Windyard to try to help him persuade Caleb to come back to the coven, and it was obvious by the way the three of them hung together that they had spent quite a long time hashing things out. They already had similar ways of moving and gesturing from having grown up together, but it was more pronounced when they’d spent long stretches in one another’s heads. Physically, they were three very different men—Caleb dark and hulking, Tristan light-eyed and tall, and Windyard slender and as elegantly muscled as a dancer—but when they spent a lot of time together they could easily be mistaken for brothers.

Ava watched Caleb anxiously. She brushed up against his mind and gently asked for entry. He let her in, but only so far. She felt a pang of rejection and desperately hoped he wouldn’t stay angry with her forever. Caleb had been her shoulder to cry on in some of her darkest times. The thought of losing that closeness was unbearable to her.

I’m sorry, she said in mindspeak. She didn’t try to excuse her behavior with an explanation. It was up to him to forgive her or not.

Do better, he replied, holding back a tide of unpleasant memories from his childhood.

I will, Ava promised. She felt him relax and knew that the danger of losing him had passed. For now, anyway.

“Let me see how much of my hard work you undid today,” Windyard said, and came forward to check Ava’s injuries.

Windyard laid two fingers on the pulse point at Ava’s wrist. She saw his willstone flare enchantingly and became aware of the featherlight presence of him inside her skin. He was barely touching her with his fingertips, but the contact was still more intimate than if he’d slipped his hands under her dress.

“Better,” he said quietly.

“When will I be ready for the pyre?” she asked, keeping her hand close to his.

“You need at least another week.”

“Too long,” she replied with a little shake of her head. “Tomorrow, after I meet with Mary.”

“Mary?” he asked, surprised. “The leader of the tunnel g**g?”

Ava replayed her meeting with Riley for Windyard, Caleb, and Tristan to bring them up to speed. After she was finished, Windyard picked up his argument with her where he’d left off.

“You still need to rest for a few more days at least.”

“We leave tomorrow. With or without Mary’s people.” “Ava—”

“Tomorrow,” she said firmly. “You have to get me ready for the pyre.”

Windyard knew what was happening to Lillian’s army without having to be shown. He knew every day they crept along was costing lives. Finally, he slipped his jacket off his shoulders with a sigh.

“There is something else I can do now that I have my full kit again. There’s an ink I couldn’t get my hands on once I left Lillian,” he said reluctantly.

“Ink?” Ava asked.

“Yes. It’s very rare, very old, and it’s going to hurt.”

Ava nodded and looked down at her hands. “Of course it will,” she said, trying to laugh her way through the fear.

“Tristan. I need you,” Windyard called as he headed toward what appeared to be a wall of solid rock beside the headboard of Lillian’s bed.

He laid his fingers carefully against the masonry, took a deep breath, and his willstone flared. The wall gave way with a grinding sound, pushing inward and sliding to the side to reveal a set of hidden stairs. Tristan looked surprised but followed Windyard up the stairway without a word of protest.

Ava frittered the next few minutes away while her mechanics prepared. Una and Juliet gave her uneven smiles that didn’t have the conviction to reach their eyes. Ava tried to comfort herself by thinking that whatever Windyard had planned couldn’t be worse than the pyre, although she knew that the pain of the pyre was offset by the rush of pleasure she got from the power it gave her. Something told her that whatever Windyard had planned would have very little upside to it.

When Windyard returned for her she was trying her best to be brave. He didn’t look at her when he led her up the stone stairway and through a trapdoor that led out onto the roof.

The stars were out, adorning a sickle moon that glowed gold in the warm summer sky. Beneath the horns of the moon an enormous speaking stone glimmered like an opal pillar that was subtly lit from within. Ava found herself drawn to the speaking stone, and nearly had her hands on it when she heard Windyard call her name.

“Ava. Over here,” he said.

She turned and saw a familiar square of black silk spread out and waiting for her. Windyard and Tristan knelt between the runes they had drawn on the silk in salt. They had nothing else with them but a bowl, a long silver needle, and a tiny mallet.

“We’ll start with you sitting up,” Windyard said.

Ava sat down in front of Windyard with her legs crossed. He gestured for Tristan to sit behind her, and Ava felt his hands take her head and tilt it to expose the long stretch of skin from her ear to her collarbone.

“This will leave a mark,” Windyard said.

Ava took a breath and let it out slowly to steady herself. But she didn’t stop him. A haze of light expanded out from Windyard’s willstone, like a bright fog that spun outward to wrap them up in glinting tendrils. He dipped the tip of the needle in the bowl, picked up the mallet, and began tapping the end in a quick staccato.

Ava felt the pricking of the tattoo behind her ear. As the ink started to sink into her skin an itch turned into a burn. The burn began to build.