It bothers me a little, because the etched figure on the pamphlets was of a monstrous creature ruling over all from on high, with vicious horns and flaring bat wings.
It looked like something my mother might have conjured if she was asked to describe my husband, and while Thalia doesn’t know where the pamphlets came from, they seem to be everywhere these past two months.
My mother has a finger in it. I know she does.
Because an army can be beaten back, but vicious rumors are the hardest battle to win.
If we go after the printing presses, the secret gatherings clearly going on, and the leaders of this whispered rebellion, then we’ll only confirm the rumors. See, they’ll say. The Prince of Evernight is vicious and dangerous. He promises us he’ll be a benevolent ruler, but only if we fall in line. Only if we dare not have a voice. He is a tyrant.
But if we don’t do something, then the rumors will only spread.
Any fae in the city who suffers hardship will start looking upward—to the castle looming over them—as the cause of their suffering. And the leaders of this rebellion—the one stoking anger in the guild halls and rumors in the streets—will find flames that only need fanning.
“This way,” Thiago says, lacing his fingers through mine. He’s wearing an illusion so well-crafted I almost wouldn’t recognize him if not for his smile.
A constant little tingle encases my own skin. I’d jokingly asked if I could be a redhead for the day, and he’d complied, though it feels strange to catch glimpses of myself—pale-skinned and blue-eyed—in the shop windows as we pass.
I squeeze his hand. I won’t let my mother or her efforts hurt him, and while he might be focused on the war—the direct thrust, so to speak—I will be waiting for my mother in the shadows, and all her gossip and innuendo too.
The older part of the city was born when the fae first arrived in Arcaedia.
It was built close to the cliffs guarding Ceres’s back, where it has prime view of the harbor. It’s marked on the map as Oldgate.
We walk beneath an arch that’s guarded by two stone drakon sentinels and slip across the Bridge of Bones. Water thunders through a sluice gate set high in the walls, plummeting past us into the gorge far below. I’ve studied the maps; there’s a walled dam far above the city, melded into the stone of the mountains. Once this section of Ceres was heralded as the City of Waterfalls, but the building of the dam means they’re mostly dry, except for this one which is named Phoenix Falls, though the locals call it Maia’s Tears. During the winter months, for a week or two the sunset will catch it at just the right angle so that it looks like a spill of pure fire.
Once we’re across the bridge into the old quarters of the city, something inside me relaxes. Hawkers call out their wares in the bustling marketplaces, and there are fluttering demi-fey in cages at one stall, and an assortment of potions promising all manner of glamors at another.
I can be no one here.
Not my enemy’s wife or my mother’s daughter. Just another female in a sea of fae going about their daily business.
“If you venture through there” —Thiago points to a long, narrow alleyway— “you’ll find yourself in the catacombs that weave through the mountain under this half of the city. The people here call it the Bone Church, and rumor insists that the fae lord who calls himself the Prince of Shadows rules down there.”
He says it carefully, just in case anyone overhears it.
“I thought the wicked prince who rules this city would squash all upstarts who seek to claim power within his walls?”
“Perhaps he’s not as wicked as they claim.”
“Oh, he’s definitely wicked,” I purr in his ear, enjoying the chance to melt against him. “You should see what he does with his mouth.”
“Behave.” Thiago drags me onward, shooting me a possessive look. “The Prince of Shadows and his followers worship the god of Death, and make offerings to him. You’ll recognize Theron’s assassins because they have a blood moon tattooed on their face—though the only time you ever see them coming is when they’re sent to deliver you into Kato’s arms.”
“Does that not make it easier to differentiate them from the general populace?”
“Theron’s glamors are powerful enough to rival the Prince of Evernight’s. Call it a double-edged sword. To become one of his people, you must wear the tattoo. In response, the only way to remain anonymous is to wear his veil of magic.”
“Sounds like an easy way to ensure loyalty. Betray him and you’ll never walk the streets again without everyone knowing exactly who and what you are.”
Thiago’s lips quirk. “I think you underestimate our good Prince of Shadows. Betray Theron, and they’ll find pieces of your body floating in the river. Or not at all.”
“Will they let you into the Bone Church?”
“If I pay the entry fee,” he replies.
“One tenth of your fortune?”
Another dangerous smile as he plucks a red-black Sorrow’s Tear rose from within his cloak. “I have something Theron might consider more enticing.”
Brushing it against my lips, he winks.
It’s gorgeous. The scent of it is dark and heady, and hints at magic. They grow only where the blood of a Sorrow has fallen, and the thorns are tipped with a poison that’s lethal to the unseelie, and toxic to the seelie. To get them to bloom requires a Sorrow’s tears. They’re impossibly rare.
“If Eris finds out you’re using her to catch this Theron’s attention—”
“Oh, he’ll know it’s not from Eris.” Thiago chuckles. “Eris wouldn’t send him flowers. But he’ll be curious enough to wonder what I want.”
“And I’m to wander through the bookstore? Alone?”
Thiago gives me a
