Page 99 of Silver in the Bone

Emrys pushed the heavy oak doors open a crack, using his head lamp to peer inside before propping them open for me. I swept my flashlight beam over the cavernous space. It was vast but cluttered with furniture, rugs, and stacks of trunks that had been left down here and—intentionally or not—forgotten.

“You’ve brought me to ... basement storage?” I asked.

“This is where the cloaked figure came last night,” Emrys said. “I managed to hide behind one of the doors while they were inside, but I couldn’t see what they were doing, and I didn’t want to risk coming in alone in case I got locked in.”

“Dying alone down here where no one could hear you scream would be a drag,” I noted. “Were they looking for something?”

“No, that’s the weird part,” he said. “It didn’t sound like they were rummaging around, and they weren’t holding anything as they came out. All I heard was the sound of stones shifting.”

“Were they building something?” I asked, touching the dusty top of the nearest trunk. Silver stars were inlaid in the wooden lid, but it was otherwise in shambles. The damp air was drowning in the stench of rot.

“Or they were moving something out of the way,” Emrys said, scratching at his chin. “I think there could be another passage or doorway hidden in here.”

I whirled around. “A doorway out into the forest?”

Now I understood his request to bring Ignatius.

Putting my flashlight between my teeth to free up my hands, I retrieved the bundle of purple from my bag. Darkness wove through my thoughts like ink in water.

Clutching the Hand of Glory in one fist and returning my flash-light to the other, I asked, “Are we even outside the tower’s walls?”

“That’s the question,” Emrys said. “It feels like we should be, right?”

“Let’s hope not.”

“And why is that?” he asked.

“Because why would someone need secret access to the forest when it’s overrun by Children?” I said. “There’s nothing out there—no crops, no fresh water, no animals—that they would need to risk their lives to get, especially while it’s dark out.”

“You never disappoint, Bird,” Emrys said, shaking his head. “You always find a way to make things even more terrifying.”

I ignored him. “I think we can all agree that what’s happening here is some kind of curse, but why did it only rear its head two years ago?”

“It might have been cast to start on an anniversary of something,” Emrys pointed out. “Or someone might have accidentally triggered it.”

“Accidentally?” I scoffed. “What’s more likely—that, or this curse being an inside job?”

“You think someone in this tower cast the curse.” Emrys turned toward me fully, all traces of humor gone from his expression.

“Don’t tell me that thought didn’t cross your mind,” I said.

“I’d be lying if I said it didn’t,” Emrys said. “But what’s missing is the why—because they were sympathetic to the druids? Or secretly worship Lord Death? We don’t really have proof of that, do we?”

“There is one thing,” I said, surprised at how easy it felt to bounce theories off him. “I didn’t notice it the first night—”

“That tends to happen when you’re running for your life,” Emrys said magnanimously.

“—but the creatures,” I continued sharply, “seem to work together to hunt. And look at how they’ve coordinated themselves around the moat. I don’t think they have enough sense or awareness to function as a pack, you know?”

“So you think someone is controlling them,” he finished.

I set Ignatius down and pulled out my lighter.

“Hold your breath the first few seconds,” I warned Emrys. “Unless you want to fill your lungs with the smell of burning hair.”

He did as I suggested, his face a mixture of alarm and curiosity as Ignatius cracked his stiff knuckles and the skin over his eye slid open. It gave a bleary look around before narrowing as it fixed on me.

“I’m just staying alive to spite you at this point,” I told him. “Come on, time to earn your next lard bath.”

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