Page 25 of The Dead Saint

“I must make a copy,” the Mapmaker said, the silver chain clinking as he stood and moved toward his desk. “One for the prince and one for yourself. As soon as I finish, I’m sure you will want to leave.”

“Yes,” Adrian said.

“I will complete it as quickly as possible,” the vampire said.

It was then Sorcha felt the vampire’s gaze on her—cool, fleeting curiosity.

“The woman?” the Mapmaker asked.

“She goes with me,” Adrian said.

“Then take her and leave,” the vampire said, curiosity gone, the monotone returned. “The copy will be done soon.”

Sorcha kept her back to the two as she finished adjusting her gown, grateful there were no buttons or ties to fight with. Her fingers trembled, fear hovering at the edges of her mind. The woman? The vampire’s question had held the hint of hunger.

Vampire. Her mind swirled with the word.

“Come,” the Wolf said, gesturing at the door when she turned. “You will need to choose what you bring with you.”

“I have a choice?” She didn’t bother to hide her surprise.

The clothes and jewelry the prince had given her were beautiful. Red velvet and silk, swaths of sheer chiffon. Everything that deep familiar color. The color of the temple, the red and gold that marked the devout. The color of blood and wealth.

“You will need to pack light,” the Wolf said. “Your horse can only carry so much, and we will be moving fast. Bring only what you can’t live without.”

All of it. None of it. Some of it.

Sorcha had no idea how to pack for a journey she had never been prepared to take. But she knew, whatever she brought with her, she’d need to be able to run in. No matter what happened, she’d escape the Wolf somehow.

Chapter Ten

The empress’s eyes fluttered as she came out of a deep sleep, cheeks washed of all color, hands withered and clawed. They reminded him of bird’s feet—of twisted tree roots—the way spiders curled in on themselves when they died. His mother was doing the same thing. Slowly pulling in, tightening, curling.

Soon she would be dead.

The healers had warned him. But he didn’t need their assertions to know that the light in his mother’s eyes—once a shade of blue so piercing that men had come from all over the empire to see them, her beauty renowned, talked about in every court, every kingdom—was gone. Now they were milky, and her vision was gone. Rags and tatters of her beauty remained—a sharp cheekbone, the way her lip curled into a faint smile even now. But what had made her a true beauty had been the kindness she’d extended to everyone who climbed the stairs of the Traveling City.

In the end, it was her generosity that would kill her. She’d invited a snake into her sanctuary, into her home, into her life. Soon he would know who it had been. And he would kill that person—man, woman, or child.

But a more pressing matter was the Saint.

The mystics claimed there was no other way to resurrect someone. No magic. No other guarantee to return, to preserve her life, and with her death fast approaching, there was no other way to bring her back.

Eine was determined. It didn’t matter how long it took, how far they would have to go, to reach each piece. He would have them all, and when his mother died, he would bring her back.

Before the city had burned, Kira, the famous Kahina of the Golden Citadel, had come to him. She’d slipped past her own city guards, through the Horde gathered around the thick walls, past the guards around the Traveling City, and into his court.

He’d refused to hear the witch speak at first. Waving his hand, the unspoken command to kill her given and understood, before she could even set foot before him. But she’d broken free of the guards in the outer chamber and fallen to her knees before him, hands smacking the hardwood as she prostrated herself, pressing her forehead to the floor and whispering.

I can help you.

Of course, he’d let her live. He would take any help he could get. But he didn’t trust her. A red witch, the leader of a death cult, untrustworthy in every way. But he needed her.

He reached down and took his mother’s hand—dry and soft, brittle as dying hope—and gently squeezed it. But he could not bring himself to speak. Her eyes closed again, hiding the milky, unseeing gaze, her breathing ragged. Part of him was relieved and wanted the unseeing gaze gone forever, wanted his clever-eyed mother to look back at him and smile.

But she couldn’t.

He would rather she sleep if she could not be who she had always been.

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