Kingdom of Sea and Stone

I nodded. “Very well. I’ll relay the terms to Talia.”

He started to turn, then reined his horse back around. “One more thing, Nor. I need to know if it works both ways.”

I narrowed my eyes. “What do you mean?”

“Can you see my memories in your dreams, or do I alone hold that honor?”

My blood ran cold at his words. “What?”

“Little Nor, writhing in agony from the wound on your cheek.” He touched his face where my scar was. “Being scolded by your mother for your sister’s failings. You want to be loved so badly, Nor, and that will always be your greatest weakness.”

Ceren had violated me many times before: touching me without permission, locking me up, stealing my blood. But somehow this was worse. “Stay out of my head, Ceren.”

“Why would I do that, when I enjoy watching you suffer so much?”

I nudged Titania away, refusing to let him know how much his words disturbed me. “I’ve seen you, too, Ceren,” I said over my shoulder. “And you are as much of a child now as you were then.”

26



With the first part of my plan in place, we rode back to New Castle. Talin asked me repeatedly what deal we had made, but I wouldn’t tell him anything until Zadie, Sami, Ebb, Adriel, Osius, and Grig were present. This plan affected all of us.

A part of me still couldn’t believe I had agreed to Zadie’s idea. When I’d told her that I planned to offer my blood in exchange for the Varenians, her protests had begun even before I finished speaking.

“I won’t let you offer yourself up to Ceren like a fish on a platter,” she had said in the courtyard, her amber eyes blazing with anger. “I can’t believe you thought you could get away with this.”

“I’m not going to tell Talin, and neither are you. You promised.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “That was before I knew you’d completely lost your mind.”

“Zadie, offering Ceren a little of my blood in exchange for the Varenians is a good deal. Frankly, we’ll be lucky if he even agrees to it.”

Zadie and I had argued back and forth for nearly half an hour, neither one of us backing down. “Even if I trusted Ceren not to hurt you,” Zadie said, “you’d be winning the battle just to lose the war.”

“And what do you propose?” I had shot back, exasperated. “If we do nothing and Talia marches on New Castle, Ceren will have the Varenians to use however he sees fit: as troops, cannon fodder, or collateral. And I’m not sure Talia cares enough about them to let that stop her.”

She had paced for a few minutes, considering. “What if we only let Ceren believe he was getting your blood?”

I shook my head. “Ceren isn’t stupid. He’ll want to collect the blood from my arm himself.”

That was when Zadie had proposed her idea, and our arguing had only escalated from there. But I had recognized the same determination in her eyes I’d seen the night she scarred herself. I had always been known as the stubborn one, but when it came down to it, Zadie was even more obstinate than I was.

Now, as Zadie explained to the gathering what we had agreed upon, it was Samiel who exploded in a fit of rage.

“I can’t believe I’m hearing this!” he shouted, practically leaping from his chair. “We can’t send Zadie in Nor’s place. Assuming Ceren even falls for it, she doesn’t have Nor’s healing abilities. If he cuts too deep or too hard—”

“He never has before,” Zadie said calmly.

I turned to Talin, who was staring at me with silent, seething anger. “Say something,” I pleaded. I hadn’t expected him to like the idea of me offering my blood in exchange for the Varenians, but I had hoped he would at least understand why I did it.

“I can’t believe you made a deal with Ceren without consulting me first,” he said finally.

“I knew you’d never agree to it. Anyway, you should be thanking me. We needed to lure Ceren out of New Castle, and we have. There is a place where the forest grows relatively close to Ceren’s camp. You can ride there under cover of darkness tonight with your troops. When we make the exchange, we’ll give a signal. By the time Ceren realizes what we’ve done, you’ll have cut him off from New Castle and the rest of his army.”

I was afraid Talin would dismiss the deal outright, but he closed his eyes for a moment before speaking. “I need to discuss this with my mother. We’ll meet again in an hour.” When he opened his eyes, they went straight to me, and I half hoped he would ask me to stay so we could talk through this. Instead, he dismissed us all with a wave of his hand.

Sami and Zadie disappeared to their room to argue in private. Adriel followed me back to our room in silence. Once the door was closed, she had plenty of say.

“I hope you know what you’re doing.” She flopped down on her bed, arms and legs stretched out like a starfish. “Because I have absolutely no idea.”

“Zadie wants to do this, Adriel. And I’d be a hypocrite if I wouldn’t let her do the very thing I proposed. She asked me to trust her, and believe me, knowingly putting my sister in harm’s way is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. But she’s braver than people realize—than I realized—and I believe she can do this.”

“And what if Ceren realizes what you’ve done? He could kill her, Nor.”

It was the very same point I’d made to Zadie, but she’d had a counterargument. “Ceren knows he would never get my blood if he killed Zadie.”

“And if he drinks the blood right away? He’ll expect a vision.”

“Which is why I’m going to be there, hidden. If he won’t wait until Zadie is back with our troops, I’ll cut myself the moment he drinks it.”

She shook her head again but finally scooted over enough for me to sit on her bed. “I don’t like it. I know you want to protect the Varenians, but we both know they wouldn’t do the same for you.”

I lay down next to her. “Would the people of Galeth heal you if you were the ailing one?”

“I doubt it.”

“Exactly. And yet you work for them anyway.”

“At least I get paid.”

I turned to face her. “You know that’s not the reason you do it. I know in my heart this is right, Adriel.”

She sighed, resigned, and reached onto her nightstand for the leather book. “There’s a spell written in Penery. My mother only taught me a few words in the language, but I found a book in the library that helped me translate it.”