Page 136 of The Mirror of Beasts

“Madrigal,” Kasumi said sharply. “Isolde.”

The slight brunette beside her straightened, eagerly awaiting her instructions.

“Go retrieve the sword so we can examine it,” she continued. “Aife and Annalise—collect what you can from the dragon.”

“You’re welcome for that, by the way,” Nash said.

Kasumi’s lips compressed into a tight line. “Don’t make me stuff you up its foul end.”

The remaining sorceresses used their wands to carve sigils into the table beneath Neve. The top pulled free of its legs and hovered on some unfelt buoy of air.

“Oh, look at this,” the Sorceress Annalise said, holding up the dragon’s limp tongue. “The scholars will be thrilled.”

A cackle echoed off the soaring stone walls in answer. Isolde was scurrying around the doorway, bent at the waist, her face becoming more and more frantic. But Madrigal only leaned against the wall, laughing.

And I knew. Somehow I did. It felt like the world was crumbling beneath me.

“What?” Emrys asked, then stopped, realizing it too. “Oh, gods. No …”

I hurried toward them, joining Isolde’s frantic search, following the path I’d seen the sword take as it had spun away from us.

Instead, I found footprints. I followed the trail of them to the castle’s once-grand entrance, down the stairs leading back out into the dead kingdom.

A scream clawed up my throat, but when I dropped to my knees, no sound came.

Caitriona was gone, and she’d taken Excalibur with her.

As it turned out, Nash’s journey to Lyonesse hadn’t involved bartering with ill-tempered ancient beings or breaking through the spell barriers of high magic that sealed our world off from the Otherlands. He’d slipped in like a spider through a crack between the worlds—the very one the sorceresses themselves used.

“How in hellfire did you know about this?” I demanded.

Kasumi and the other sorceresses looked just as vexed as they shuffled toward us through the icy snow, Neve on the tabletop floating between them.

“Yes, I should like to know that myself,” Kasumi said.

As we’d walked the long path from the castle back to the abandoned village, the crunch of our footsteps in the snow the only sound between us, Nash had led us to the front door of what appeared to be a simple home.

The key Nash retrieved from his leather jacket’s pocket looked similar to the skeleton keys we’d use to open a Vein and enter a sorceress’s vault. This bone, however, was less a bone and more a claw, and it was longer than the hand that clasped it.

“Is this a Vein?” Emrys asked. “Or just a split between the worlds?”

“Give me that,” Kasumi said, snatching the key from Nash. She held the razor-tipped end up in silent threat and he lifted his hands in surrender.

“After you, milady,” he said, making a sweeping gesture as he pushed the door open.

Emrys had his answer. It wasn’t like any Vein I’d seen—rather than a spiraling fabric of iridescent spellwork, the darkness ahead of us was shrouded in mist. It slithered out, searching.

“How?” I repeated, forcing Nash to stare at me.

“I’m a man of fewer and fewer secrets, my little imp,” he said, with the smugness I knew so well. “Allow me to keep this one, won’t you?”

“No,” I said flatly. He pulled me aside to allow Kasumi and the others to pass through the doorway first, handling Neve with a gentleness that I begrudgingly approved.

“I traded a sorceress for it, all right?” Nash said gruffly, scrubbing the snow off his face. He looked weary as he followed my gaze.

“The girl made neat work of that snaky beast when she sent it to its death,” he told me. “She’ll be all right.”

“I know that,” I snapped. That was never my fear. Caitriona was more than capable of protecting herself. Nash had suggested searching the nearby rooms, on the off chance she’d fallen through some floor or gotten herself trapped, but we’d both known it was a waste of time. She’d probably called for Rosydd the moment she stepped out of the castle.

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