CERIDWEN CROSSES HER legs where she sits next to the coil of tubes in my room, the barest waves of heat licking off into her skin. Being in a room full of Winterians was “like being dunked into a bucket of ice water,” she’d said, and after so long watching me pace back and forth and spewing nonsensical explanations, I figure she needs some comfort.
“So wait.” She bobs her finger through the air as if pointing at all the information I laid bare. “When your mother’s locket broke, you became the conduit. I understand that, I think. But these keys we’ve been finding are also conduits? And they’re interfering with your magic somehow?”
“Not interfering.” I lean against one of the posts that holds the canopy over my bed. “More like interacting. The Order made them as tests to help the finder with . . . something. My heart has to be ready, but I can’t figure out what the things I saw are supposed to make me ready to do. Or what any of it has to do with the magic chasm.”
“Are you sure the keys were made by the Order?” Conall asks, cradling the splint that cups his injured arm. “You said Angra might be Spring’s conduit, as you are Winter’s. What if all this is him? He was in the first visions you saw. This could be a trick.”
“There’s been no word of him anywhere, though,” Henn counters.
Garrigan shrugs, his shoulders grinding against the chair he squeezed into alongside Nessa. “It has been more than three months since his fall. If he’s alive, why wait so long? It doesn’t make sense. It has to be the Order. Besides, the chasm entrance was hidden until a few weeks ago. How could Angra have set all this up without our knowledge?”
“He did have free access to your kingdom for sixteen years,” Ceridwen says.
Dendera shakes her head. “He didn’t touch the mines. When we reopened them, they had clearly been unused for more than a decade—filthy and dangerous and unstable. I don’t think this is him.”
I fiddle with my locket as they toss ideas back and forth. They’ve all handled this so much better than I could have hoped, taking in everything I know about Angra and magic and the chasm and Cordell with curious gazes and patient nods.
Well, almost everything.
I only told them I saw Hannah and Duncan in my last dream. I didn’t tell them what Hannah said would happen if I die.
A shudder jerks my hand off my locket and I cross my arms to hide the tremor. I’ll find another way to make my people strong. This world doesn’t need an entire kingdom of conduit-people—keeping magic from becoming widespread is what I’ve been fighting for all along.
What Hannah said doesn’t matter. I don’t have to die for this. I won’t.
Henn scratches his chin, pacing in front of where Dendera sits on a bench against the wall. “I agree. I think these keys are our best chance at getting any answers. Once we have the last key, we’ll have more leverage over Cordell to keep the chasm shut.”
“Will that be enough?” Conall leans forward, wincing as he puts pressure on his injured arm. “Noam could forcibly take the keys from us. How will Winter having the keys stop him?”
“We could get the first key from the prince,” Garrigan offers. “Open the chasm. Retrieve enough magic to—”
“No,” I say. “We’ll continue to Ventralli, but we aren’t opening that door. It isn’t a risk we will take—there are other ways to unseat Noam. I can try to gain Giselle’s support, or Ventralli.”
My words seem weak now, and when Ceridwen shifts forward, I feel my fragile surety break even more.
“Hate to rain fire on your ice, but Yakim won’t fight off another Rhythm for you. I’ve been begging Giselle for years to support Summer—to sell us food or supplies instead of people. She refuses.”
“What if I prove useful to her? I’ll give her whatever she wants. Snow, I’ll give her as many mines as she demands.”
“And what happens once she finds out that Cordell already has the magic chasm? She’ll feel tricked, and you’ll have two Rhythms mad at you.”
I groan, pushing out my frustration. I hadn’t had much hope for Yakim after my conversation with Giselle, anyway. “What about Ventralli?”
Ceridwen laughs. “You know who Noam’s wife was, right? She may have died under Noam’s care, but flame and heat, if the Ventrallans don’t love Theron. Ventralli would no sooner go to war against Cordell than Simon would renounce wine.”
“Both Yakim and Ventralli offered to host Winter, though.” I squint even as I talk, recognition flaring back up through me. I realized the folly in our trip before, and now it makes every muscle in my body go slack so I drop onto the bed.
“I responded to their invitations.” I rub my temples, eyes shut. “They invited me as a ploy to test Cordell’s hold on Winter. Cordell responded with a treaty of unification, and I responded by bringing Cordell with me. Whatever door they might have opened . . . I not only slammed it shut, I built a damned Cordellan barrier over it. And now Winter’s only ally is . . .” My eyes go to Ceridwen and she splays her hands.
“Hey, put me in a room with Noam and I’ll end your problem real quick.”
I snort. “Tempting. But that would cause even more problems.”
Dendera stands. “What is our plan, then?”
I look at her, my mind swirling through everything.
No help from Yakim. No help from Ventralli. Paisly is too far removed to offer assistance. I have thin support in Summer, and an even shakier alliance with Autumn—but I don’t think Nikoletta would rise against her brother, no matter how much of an ass he is. Unless he were to seize Autumn outright, but I can’t believe he’d be that stupid.
Which leaves . . .
“The Order,” I tell everyone. “They’re our only chance at finding a way to seal the chasm door, or even get rid of magic altogether. Either one would halt the spread of Cordell’s power and give us better leverage against them—or at the very least, give us a bargaining tool to negotiate Winter’s freedom. We have to search for the final key and the Order, and if they say there is no way to seal the chasm permanently or stop Cordell without magic, I’ll open the door myself. But let’s not plan on that until we know for sure.”
A slow smile creeps over Henn’s face. “A thoughtful decision, my queen. Where do you think the final key is? Ventralli, of course, but where?”
I bite my lip. “What stands as a symbol of Ventralli? Summer’s was wine, Yakim’s was books. The chasm clue that led to Ventralli is a mask. But the key we found in Yakim was wrapped in a tapestry, which is another symbol of Ventralli’s affinity for the arts.” I meet Henn’s eyes. “Maybe . . . their museums? We’ll start there. Their guilds might also be a good place to look, so we can move on to those next.”
Dendera nods. “Good. We have a plan.”
“Yes.” Part of me itches to dive into a battle, to physically hack away at this threat with the chakram now strapped to my back. I’ve cast off all the shields I’ve built around myself—but I can keep some things, choose the beneficial parts and use them to strengthen who I am. I let Ceridwen, Conall, Garrigan, Nessa, Dendera, and Henn in, told them about the issues I’m facing; I will remain calm and careful, but let myself be reckless when I need to be. I will learn from my mistakes.
Unlike Hannah.
Unlike the way she lied to me and had everyone keep that lie for my entire life. Unlike the way she still kept things from me—for three months she could have told me the rest of her plan. Maybe if she had learned from her mistakes, we’d all be better off. Maybe, if she had never told any of those lies to begin with, we’d have been free years ago.
I straighten. No. I don’t need to think about her—what she wanted doesn’t matter. What she wanted doesn’t matter.
“We should sleep,” Garrigan says. “It’s nearly morning.”
“Wait.” My eyes lock on Henn. “Will you return to Winter?”
He doesn’t hesitate. “Of course. Why, my queen?”
I force the words out faster than my stomach can cramp with remorse. “Because Theron and I—things have changed. We’re no longer as unified in our goals as we once were, and I don’t know if . . . I mean, he wouldn’t be that cruel, but he was our strongest Cordellan ally. Though that didn’t do much for us. But now . . . just check on Winter, please?”
Henn grows solemn and bows his head in a slow nod. “Of course,” he repeats.
Dendera rises to kiss him, quick and soft. He squeezes her shoulder and disappears into the adjoining room to pack for the trip, taking Garrigan and Conall to receive final departing orders.
Ceridwen stands and crosses the room to me. “I’m sorry.”
I rise too, thumbs hooked in the straps of my chakram’s holster. Snow, it feels good, having it back with me, so good that I can pretend I don’t understand Ceridwen. “For what?”
She gives me a look half annoyed, half knowing. “Rhythm boys will break your heart,” she says, but her face tightens with her own regret. “I stand by what I said, though. He wasn’t a proper lover for you. You’re too good for him.”
Heat instantly surges up my neck and I throw a glance at Dendera and Nessa, the only other people still in the room, but they’re both whispering quietly by the door.
“He wasn’t my lover,” I hiss. “Snow above, is that all you Summerians think about?”
“Trust me, when you find the right person, it will be all you think about.” Ceridwen grins weakly.
I tip my head, voice low. “I’ve told you my secrets. Will you ever tell me yours?”
She blinks at me but recovers quickly. “That wasn’t part of our deal, Winter queen.”
And she leaves, brushing past Nessa and Dendera without another word. I stare after her, stunned, but shake it off when Nessa comes up to me.
She’s been quiet through everything I said, like she’s piecing it all together in her own way, and as I stand before her, I’m overcome by the prickling certainty that she will be the one to see what none of us have been able to.
Nessa wrings her hands together. “Are you still afraid of it?”
I touch the locket, the shell of what once was. Again my hesitation answers for me.
“I would be too,” Nessa says. “Don’t feel guilty for what you did; I don’t think your magic is as bad as you think it is. After all, it’s done a lot of good. It healed us, it helped save us, it fought off Angra in Abril. I know it doesn’t make it any less frightening, but—” She pauses and shrugs. “It’s a weapon we have, and we need all the weapons we can get.”
I smile. “You really are too astute for your own good, Lady Kentigern.”
Her cheeks flush and she backs away, skipping out the door, Dendera in tow. I’m left with the gears and knobs and twisting copper pipes of the Yakimian bedroom, the faint rays of the rising sun peeking through the curtains. I don’t know how long we were up talking—hours, half the night, all night. I feel the exhaustion now, and my mind starts to sway and pull, the gentle fog between sleep and waking. The time when thoughts rush through my head, patching together meanings I missed.
Which is why Nessa’s words resonate so strongly in me.
“It’s a weapon we have, and we need all the weapons we can get.”
I was right. Nessa did see the missing piece—the magic has done a lot of good. I’ve pushed it away for so long, feared it for so long, but . . . maybe it can help me, even in its unpredictable state. It’s still magic; it’s still power.
I have to at least try.
My gown pulls taut over my knees as I kneel on the bed. The Lustrate’s key still sits on the quilt, silent and dark, and as I stare at it, everything I know about conduit magic rolls through my mind. How it came into me after Hannah died and Angra broke the locket. How it lay dormant inside me until I knew it was there, a passive magic founded in choice. And back before that, how Hannah grew so desperate that she surrendered herself to it so she could learn how to save Winter.
I frown.
She asked the magic how to save Winter. And this magic is about choice—she chose to ask about Winter.
A ready heart, the key-magic had said. Readiness is a type of choice, being prepared and accepting of things to come—is this what it wanted me to see?
Because . . . what if Hannah hadn’t asked how to save Winter? What if she had chosen to ask how to stop Angra, or the war, or how to defeat the Decay? Would she have gotten a different response?
What do I need to be ready to ask?
I lean back into the pillows, my chakram pressing against my spine. The hazy vacancy of sleep ebbs over me, the events of the past few weeks unwinding in this one night of release. But I push past it, reaching out to the magic. A soft, careful touch, the beginnings of a bridge between it and me, and across that bridge I send a single thought.
What is the right question?
My chest grows cold, the magic responding with gentle fingers of ice that spread through my body like growing designs of frost on a window. When it speaks, it’s not like Hannah, not clear words that ring in my head. It’s like the key-magic, my own voice and emotions, waves of conviction that fill me with knowledge as if it had been there all along. I’m left with a heavy, persistent thought that rocks me into sleep.
When I’m ready to ask it, I’ll know.
Henn leaves for Winter the next morning. And, much to my relief, I find I don’t need to prepare to sign Theron’s treaty—because Giselle refuses to sign it “until another Rhythm does.” She says this without acknowledging that Cordell has signed and orchestrated it, and the blatant rift this puts between Yakim and Cordell makes our stay more than a little uncomfortable.
Without needing prodding from anyone, Theron agrees to head for Ventralli after only a few days in Putnam.
I know he hopes to get the Ventrallan king to sign the treaty and thereby sway Yakim—he still clings to his vision of peace. But as we leave Langlais Castle, our caravan banding together in another haphazard cluster of soldiers and people from three different kingdoms, I watch him from my group of Winterians. We haven’t interacted with each other beyond the necessary planning for travel, and even now, we both stay firmly with our groups.
Theron feels my eyes on him and turns. Even from as far away as he is, the air still feels tight and uncomfortable between us, emotions knotted up, words left unsaid.
Dendera swings up onto her horse beside me. When she and Henn finally admitted to their feelings, it seemed like the easiest thing in the world. One minute they weren’t and the next minute they were, and it was so right and so true that nobody batted an eye. Even now, it feels like I’m only seeing half of her, as her other part barrels fast for Winter.
It should be that easy. I want it to be that easy. I want to look at someone and know that every need and wish and desire I have matches his, not that my every need and wish and desire clashes with his. Unification should be the overall theme of a relationship.
So even though Theron watches me still, I turn to Nessa for something else to do, somewhere to look other than him.
After a few seconds, I feel him turn away.
Rintiero, Ventralli’s capital, sits hardly more than half a day’s journey north. Everything Sir taught me about Ventralli revolves around their love of art—color and life and beauty, art echoed through pain and imperfection. Their male-blooded conduit, a silver crown, belongs to their current king, Jesse Donati, a man in his early twenties. His wife, Raelyn, bore him three children—two girls and one boy, all under the age of three, which means they really wanted either children or a male heir as quickly as possible. Most likely the latter.
Ventralli’s affinity for beauty is clear when we reach Rintiero at sunset. Whoever designed this city built it to complement the setting sun as perfectly as the stars complement the night. We crest a series of hills that make up the Yakim-Ventralli border and guide us down into the Rintiero Valley, giving an aerial view of a city that is more akin to a multifaceted jewel.
Rintiero curves in a crescent of spindly rocks and straight lines of docks that jut into the Langstone River, all of it capped with the deep, heavy blue of a sky about to sink into sleep. A chill blankets the air, the cold of a proper spring night. A soft, golden glow lights the streets—candles probably, but nothing like the violent flames of Summer’s bonfires or the steady light of Yakim’s lamps.
Four- and five-story buildings lean against one another or cling to cliff faces, all in the most vibrant colors I’ve ever seen. Teals stolen from the Langstone itself; the vibrant magenta of a court lady’s blush powder; creamy peach tones that would make any orchard owner weep. Interspersed in among the buildings are Ventralli’s guilds, at least a dozen domes made of glass, thick panes that reflect the unmatched beauty of the night sky.
The buildings flicker and pulse in the lights as if they’re taking deep, calming breaths, and as we draw nearer to the city, I do the same. This kingdom instantly feels calmer than any of the others we’ve visited. The road isn’t clogged with peasants on their way home from work, the small outlaying villages aren’t dirty or rotten or poor. Everything is as it needs to be—whole, pretty, valued.
That must have been why Noam allied himself with Ventralli when he married Theron’s mother. It would appear that Cordell and Yakim have more in common with their similar love for efficiency, but I’ve been in Ventralli for less than an hour and I can feel Cordell here.
We move through the winding streets of Rintiero and pass into a lush forest that wraps around the palace like a living wall. The complex itself is just as sleepy and calming as the city, and stable hands take our horses before servants lead us to rooms inside the palace. The rest of the crates from the Klaryns get locked away, a burden on our trip now that I know how useless they’ll be, but everyone seems to have absorbed the relaxation of Rintiero. Without a second thought, we all crawl into our various beds and drift off under reflections of stars.