My gaze follows the way she strokes it protectively.
I think my heart stops in my chest.
Asha just grins up at me maniacally. “You know, I think I’ll just wait and tell you in the morning.”
CHAPTER 121
NOX
Ermengarde castle is abandoned when Blaise and I arrive.
I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, as I killed its queen.
You can really tell how tiny the population is in Mystral given our queen is dead and life seems to have gone on as usual in all the towns we’ve passed through.
I’m sure eventually someone will make a claim for the throne.
It’s strange being back here, and when I step through the gate, left ajar, it occurs to me that this is the first time I’ve done so willingly.
The castle itself still looks just as menacing as it was the day Abra and the king stole me from my family, the turrets just as sharp as they pierce the heavens.
A chill snakes my bones that has nothing to do with the Mystrian climate, the howling wind that cuts through the grounds, rifling up loose bits of freshly fallen snow.
“You ready?” Blaise asks me.
“No,” I say, but I take her hand, and we step forward anyway.
We make our way to Gunter’s room first. He’s half of the reason we’re here. Apparently, among Blaise’s companions who accompanied her to the Rip was a human by the name of Marcus, whom Abra had poisoned in an attempt to coerce his wife.
Somehow, Marcus’s daughter had figured out how to use Rivrean flax to treat his illness, though he’ll need to take it his entire life unless they can find a permanent cure.
Unfortunately, the flax only grows in Rivre, and the onslaught of Others damaged the grounds. They think it might be years before the field is restored to health. Blaise heard of the problem through correspondence with Amity and immediately thought to come here.
We’d needed to make our way back here eventually, anyway.
As we enter Gunter’s room, I find myself flinching at the scent. It’s been months since Gunter burned his familiar incense here, but the fragrance permeates the room, as well as my childhood, and even a whiff of it feels like being slammed over the side of the head with Gunter’s presence.
Gunter, whom I killed because I couldn’t get control of Farin.
Gunter, whom I failed.
Just like I failed Zora.
As Blaise and I carry Gunter’s sacks of flax up the dungeon stairs and to the wagon we parked just outside the entrance, the incense follows me, reminding me of the male who raised me when my father couldn’t. The male whose blood I drained from his veins.
He’d begged for my forgiveness when he died. I didn’t know at the time that he’d been apologizing for weaving Zora’s mind into the Fabric, for placing her in an indefinite slumber.
As we grab the last of the sacks, Blaise must sense my discomfort being back here, because she says, “He wrote about it in his journals. I think he feared what Abra might have done to Zora if he disobeyed her.”
My throat goes dry as I scan the room. Gunter’s organized chaos. His piles of journals and books. His desk in the corner, the candle atop it burned to its base. The spinning wheel in the corner, which he used to put my sister to sleep.
My chest clenches, because it doesn’t matter—the one secret Gunter kept from me.
In the end, he could only protect us in the way he knew best.
I forgive you, I think on the way out.
And as Blaise closes the door behind us, I think I hear him reach from the past and whisper it back.
We’re silent as we wind our way up the staircase that leads to the abandoned ballroom. The door, left ajar, creaks, beckoning us into the glittering space that held Zora’s body for so many years.
We don’t know where she is.
The last anyone still living saw her was Asha, when she was being dragged from the Rip in Az’s wagon.
We don’t know what Az did with Zora once they returned to Naenden.
Blaise still feels guilty about it—ending him before she made him tell where he hid Zora’s body. I’ve told her not to.
Because I already know what happened.
And I doubt it had anything to do with Az.
Because I left Zora alone with Farin. Meaning Zora is dead.
I always wondered what would happen if you died in the Fabric.
If I had to guess, there was no body for Az to hide.
