Page 14 of The Mirror of Beasts

I wondered when that awareness of him would finally leave, if it could be burned out of my soul like a fever. Even now, I felt him watching me, sensed the way he angled his body toward mine.

He might have been a coward, but I wasn’t.

I looked up, forcing him to meet my gaze, to see me, as I said, “Are we supposed to believe that you care?”

He fisted a hand in his hair, his breathing turning shallow as the silence swelled between us. “Will you let me explain? Or are you too damn stubborn to even listen?”

My broken fingernails curled into the cuts on my palms, and I focused on that sharp bite of pain to steady me.

“Oh, now we get a choice?” I snapped. “You haven’t shut up the entire time you’ve been here.”

His jaw clenched, but I’d given him the opening, and he took it.

“I had to bring the ring to Madrigal,” he said. “It wasn’t a choice—not a real one. Madrigal didn’t just promise me what I needed to get my mom away from my father. She kept my mom captive to ensure I saw the job through.”

I stared back, the muscles in my stomach quivering as they tightened.

“We all had people we were trying to protect,” I said coldly. “You were the only one who had to betray everyone to do it.”

All that imploring softness fell away as his expression hardened to match mine. A part of me was relieved to see it. This was the real Emrys, the one I’d always known. The prince of the guild, the unwelcome rival. Him, I could handle.

“That’s rich coming from you, Lark,” he said. “Didn’t you lie to Neve about how the ring had to be taken?”

Lark. My mind snagged on the name.

“Do not,” Neve warned, finally stepping forward, “compare omitting details to leaving your supposed friends to die in a dark wasteland overrun by monsters.”

He had the decency to look chastened by that, at least. “You’re right. And I’m sorry it had to be that way.” His gaze slid back toward me. “But you saw her—my mother. You saw what Madrigal had already done to keep her in line. You saw her, Tamsin.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about—” But even as I said it, my mind was already painting the fading opulence of the Sorceress Madrigal’s home.

In that short visit, I’d observed only a handful of people: the sorceress herself, Emrys, her pooka companion Dearie, the dinner guests and their horrible animal masks. And the elderly maid near the door.

The maid.

She’d looked as fragile as the etched-glass drinkware that had tumbled from her tray, shattering against the floor. Age had stooped her shoulders, but that was the only normal thing about her appearance, the rest of which had been startling. Her one visible eye had been pure white, with no iris or pupil. Her skin hung from the bones of her face like clay melting off its form. In a word, she’d looked ancient.

But when I lingered on her face, trying to layer it over the few images I’d seen of Cerys Dye, I could almost see it. The fine bone structure. The shape of her eyes. Emrys’s mother had been famed for her beauty—it couldn’t be her.

But Emrys’s grave eyes told a different story.

“Is that true?” Neve asked, glancing between us.

“I think …” My words trailed off. I’d thought a lot of things about him. Believed far more than I should have. “Maybe.”

“It is true,” Emrys protested. “And once I returned with the ring, Madrigal let us both go.”

“Where is your mother now?” Olwen asked, seemingly despite herself.

“She’s safe … she’s … recovering with a friend,” Emrys said. “And when Madrigal heard the Council had ordered that the four of you be taken and imprisoned, she even sent the High Sorceress a letter vouching for you, as a peace offering. The Sistren are calling you the Unmakers. They think you’re working with Lord Death.”

“Yeah, we worked that one out ourselves, thanks,” I said. My exhaustion caught up to me again, and this time, I didn’t try to fight it. “What’s the real reason you’re here? Why would Madrigal feel she owes us anything? I know she’s not doing it out of the goodness of her heart—she’d need to actually possess one for that to be true.”

“She doesn’t want you to reveal that she has the ring to the other sorceresses,” Emrys said. “So no one shows up trying to kill her for it.”

“What did she need it for?” Olwen asked.

“She didn’t say, and I didn’t see her use it,” Emrys said. “And before you ask, I have no idea where it’s hidden now.”

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