Page 11 of The Queen's Shadow

She tugged on Arphaxad’s sleeve. He turned, and she could see that his face was as ashen as hers had to be. He gave her a quick nod, and they turned and fled the cave.

They burst out into a cool, radiant afternoon. Cassandra didn’t stop moving until they had darted past the boulder and clambered back up the ridge. She didn’t stop until her foot snagged on a root and she almost went down.

She caught herself, then whirled to face Arphaxad under the trees. The sun was no longer directly overhead, and the forest was flooded with a deep orange glow.

“What was that?” she said.

Arphaxad was breathing as heavily as she was, and his usually composed features were ashen. “It’s a rift. A tear in the fabric of the world. It’s what happens when magic gets out of control and . . . and consumes the user. Whoever that unlucky Akil was . . . it looks like he’s gone.”

“Inside that thing?” Cassandra said, trying her best to keep her voice even.

Arphaxad nodded, his face grim. “Trapped forever. A fate worse than death.”

Cassandra waved her arm in his direction. “How do you know all this?”

Arphaxad shook his head. “It’s my job to know what’s going on in Medira. The enclave has always been part of that.” He frowned. “Except this . . . this is very, very bad.”

“I can see that,” Cassandra snapped. “What about the other chanters? That white light. The—the metal frames around the room. It was like they appeared from nowhere.”

Arphaxad hesitated.

“We’re in this together now, Phax,” she said, her voice low. “I need to know. It looks like this isn’t just about just Medira and Rendra anymore.”

He glanced back toward the valley. “It’s their magic. That’s . . . how it works. They can open doors between two places and walk through, as if distance doesn’t exist.”

Cassandra stared at him, trying to comprehend what he had just said. So that was the dangerous earth magic the Sorothi chanters dabbled in. A power that could make whatever nation wielded it too strong for any other nation to match.

“But that’s . . . that’s impossible.”

“Obviously not,” he drawled, the arrogance back in his voice. “It’s dangerous though. Too dangerous, as you can see. If the chanters hadn’t been there to beat the rift back . . . well, it could consume this entire valley. And who knows if it would stop there.”

“So that’s why their magic is outlawed,” Cassandra whispered.

Arphaxad nodded. “Yes. But the Sorothi chanters believe it’s a magic worth pursuing on their own terms. And so far, none of them have gone out of their way to abuse it.”

“Until now,” Cassandra said.

“Until now,” he agreed.

They stood in silence for a moment, watching each other in the afternoon light. A light breeze picked up in the trees, rustling the leaves in an eerie hush. For the first time, Cassandra realized that there was no birdsong.

Arphaxad huffed out a breath. “I don’t understand why, though. Why would the Inetian emperor take this kind of risk? Ineti has everything it could ever need—power, wealth, ships, men, weapons, food. Why send soldiers to learn something that’s been outlawed for good reason?”

Cassandra shook her head. “I don’t know that these men are acting at the behest of the emperor.”

Arphaxad watched her for a moment. “Cass,” he said slowly, “you took something, didn’t you?”

Her mouth curved as she pulled the crumpled pages from beneath the band of her tunic. “What?” she said sweetly. “You mean this? It looked like a written in Inetian to me, so I . . . removed it.”

Arphaxad’s eyes glowed, and the corners of his mouth tipped up in an approving smile. “You really are delightful sometimes.”

She snorted, pushing down the sudden warmth that rose in her chest. She glanced down at the letter and carefully unfolded it. She froze. There at the bottom of the page was a name signed in black ink: Sethos Amanakar. One of the sons of the emperor of Ineti.

Chapter 5

Thud. Arphaxad embedded a dagger in the side of a half-rotten tree stump. The hilt quivered in the waning light.

“How arrogant do you have to be to think that this...this ridiculous scheme will accomplish anything except war and bloodshed?” Arphaxad pulled another dagger from his belt and embedded it next to the first, his face blazing with rage. Cassandra had never seen him this worked up about anything before.

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