“Aurora, ru—” But the shadows are in my mouth before I can finish, tasting of ash. Sliding down my throat, heavy and tarlike. I want to retch, but I can’t. My lips move, but no sound comes out.
“This is better than I hoped,” Kal says.
I reach for my magic, desperate to save Aurora from whatever he’s planning, but it’s buried too deeply beneath the darkness—as Kal’s had been when he was bound here.
“All I need is a little of her magic.” He roots around the chamber, tossing bits of debris right and left before settling on something. Not just something. It’s the spindle I cursed—the one that forced him to sleep.
Kal comes to me and I try to kick him away, but my legs are still shadow-bound. I can only knock my knees together. Huddle my body as far into the corner as it will go. But he grabs me by the elbow and hauls me forward. Pries my hands out of my skirts, spindle ready.
I sink my teeth into his shoulder.
He howls, scrambling backward and dropping the spindle. Kal examines the wound with two fingers. I’d bitten through the fabric of his shirt. The taste of his Shifter blood is in my mouth, iron and silt. I spit it into his face.
Kal wipes away the inky flecks with his sleeve. And then, so fast I don’t even see the movement, the back of his hand pummels into my cheek. Something snaps, a pain like I’ve never felt exploding through the fragile bones of my face. I cannot breathe. Cannot think. Stars trip and dance across my vision, and then there’s another pain—a sharp, swift puncture on the pad of my first finger.
“There.” Kal huffs.
My own green blood beads on my fingertip, and I realize that Kal stabbed me with the spindle. The wound feels deep. The ancient spindle’s tip is wet and glittering.
What is he doing? The spindle can’t curse me—not when it’s coated in my own magic.
There are footsteps on the stairs—Aurora draws closer. Kal winks at me and waves his hands. A thick shroud of shadows engulfs me, and I whisper a silent hope that Aurora can outrun the Shifter. That she’ll sense the trap.
But she won’t get the chance.
A muffled cry manages to wriggle past the shadows in my mouth, too faint to be heard over the wind buffeting the tower, as Kal begins to shrink. His body whittles down, becoming thinner and narrower. His doublet and breeches morph into a black, worn dress. His hair lengthens and thins, and green veins expose themselves beneath paper-thin, scaly skin. And then it is myself staring back at me, a malevolent smirk fixed on my own lips.
“Aurora.” The voice is so much like mine that I cringe. “I’m in here.”
No. No no no no no no no.
Aurora enters the room, letting her hood fall down around her shoulders. I buck against the shadows. Against the darkness in my nose and mouth, the weight pressing down on me like iron. It’s enough to crush me. I cannot feel my magic. Cannot do anything but stare in horror as she rushes to Kal and throws her arms around my body.
But she pulls back, a crease between her brows. She looks at the broken tables and chairs. “Are you all right?”
Hope flutters. She is suspicious. Yes, Aurora. Flee. Go now.
Kal nods, kisses her cheek, and then rubs at my temples. “Just tired. What are you doing here? I told Laurel to come.”
Bastard. I strain harder, but the shadows don’t budge.
“It was too risky to send word.” She extracts a pouch from the pocket of her cloak. “I saw an opportunity and had to take it. If Father knows you’re gone, he’s keeping quiet about it.”
“But he won’t for long.” Kal passes the spinning wheel and bumps it. The flywheel turns. “What did you bring me?”
“A ring.” Aurora tugs it free, a gold band with a fat lapis stone set in the center, but her gaze doubles back to the wheel. “I’ll have to return it before morning. I’ve made certain he intends to wear it.”
The spindle gleams in the next flare of lightning. Kal smiles. Spins the flywheel again. A faint green aura limns the wood.
“Do you like it?” Kal asks, goading the wheel faster. Aurora inches closer, entranced.
“It’s beautiful.” Her lips hardly move. Her grip on the ring goes slack and it pings against the stone floor, far louder than any boom of thunder.
“Yes. Quite an old thing. But still useful, I think. Would you like to try it?”
Aurora nods. Reaches one hand toward the wheel. I scream, but it is only the crash of a violent wave.
There must be a way out of these bonds. Desperate, I dive beneath the shadows, searching once again for my magic.
Kal is saying something to Aurora. Telling her how to use the wheel. She is so close now. Just another inch.
You found me, pet. At last.
I nearly faint at the sound of someone else’s voice in my head. A voice I know from the flames of the summoning ritual.
Mortania?
A laugh flutters against my eardrums.
Well met, my dear. Well met.
I am losing my mind. Can she read my thoughts? I wonder, verging on hysteria. Can she kill me? But the presence I feel is not ominous. It is strong as it pumps from the place where my magic lives. Comforting. Almost motherly. I swallow back the ache in my throat.
You and I will do wonderful things together. Wait and see.
And it’s then that I notice something else tangled with my power. Something that is not entirely my own.
Yes, Alyce. Yes.
It’s Mortania’s magic. That’s what had happened when
