Page 108 of The Song Rising

“Paige.”

“Yes?” I said softly.

A quake in the æther made me tense. I turned sharply to face Leith.

The disturbance was far away, too far for my spirit to fly, but stealing closer by the moment. The æther filled itself with the softest, fluttering tremors—like the ripples from a footstep near water, or birds unsettled by a gunshot.

Warden noticed my tension. “What is it?”

My heartbeat marched to a new drum. I could hear nothing but that call to arms behind my ribs.

Something was coming.

19

Offering

My burner phone rang in my pocket. I scrambled to pick it up, forcing my numb fingers into action.

“They’re marching,” Maria said. “The army. They’re marching on the citadel.”

“What?” I stood. “Did they see you?”

“It had nothing to do with us—we never even made it to the depot—” Her voice faded, then returned: “. . . get out of here.”

I clutched the phone tighter. “Where are you?”

“We’ll meet you on Waverley Bridge.”

She hung up.

“Shit.” I shoved the phone into my pocket. “The army—it’s coming here, now. Marching on Edinburgh. What the hell is Vance doing? Why would she send soldiers to catch a few rebels?”

Warden touched my cheek, met my gaze. “Remember what Maria said. You must assume that whatever she is planning, however large the scale, however grand the aim—everything she does will be aimed at you.”

I stared back at him, swallowing my dread. For a decade I had buried ScionIDE and the Incursion beneath the flowers, locked them in a strongbox where I could never truly see. I had been a child, suffocated by fear. Every memory I thought I’d had was a mockery of the true violence I’d seen—violence that would never sleep if Senshield remained active.

We might yet stop it.

And I thought I might know how.

“Warden,” I said, “if I entered Vance’s dreamscape, and you used me as a conduit, would you be able to see her memories?”

“You should not enter Vance’s dreamscape.”

I drew myself up. “If you want me to be a leader, I suggest you follow my orders, Arcturus.”

His face was still a mask, but a light came back into his eyes. I searched their burning depths.

“We do not go any closer than we must,” he said.

I should have known he would help me. I pressed his hand in mine, full of words I knew I wouldn’t say.

We made our way back down the hill and ran between the pine trees. Half a moon smiled down at us. As I sprinted beneath the branches, adrenaline crashed from crown to toe, erasing all the pain from my old wounds. I came to life in the arms of fear. Some would suffer. Some would stand. Either way, Hildred Vance would surrender information we could use against her, the information I had chased across the country. Hildred Vance, who had killed my father. Hildred Vance, who had overseen the fall of Ireland.

At the edge of the park, I skidded to a stop, unable to believe what I was seeing. A multitude of people had amassed before the gates of Haliruid House—hundreds of them, gathered around a fountain on the enormous driveway, all of them shouting at the Vigiles and brandishing signs:KEEP THE WAR MACHINES IN LONDON, NOT THE LOWLANDS. VICIOUS VANCE. DITCH THE DEPOT. NO MORE BOMBS IN BONNY SCOTLAND.Among them were black moths, splashed on to placards and held up high.

A protest.

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