Page 47 of The Priory of the Orange Tree

Sabran would keep goading Fýredel until he torched her. The blockhead must really think the wretched Saint would protect her.

Ead ran past the Alabastrine Tower. Debris cascaded from above, and a guard fell dead before her. Cursing the weight of her gown, she reached the Royal Library, flung open its doors, and wove her way between the shelves until she hit the entrance to the clock tower.

She cast off her cloak, unbuckled her girdle. Up the winding steps she went, higher and higher.

Outside, Fýredel still taunted Sabran. Ead stopped in the belfry, where the wind howled through arched windows, and took in the impossible scene.

The Queen of Inys was on the uppermost balcony of the Alabastrine Tower. It stood just southeast of the Dearn Tower, where Fýredel was poised to kill. Wyrm on one building, queen on the other. In her hand was the ceremonial blade that represented Ascalon, the True Sword.

Useless.

“Leave this city, and harm no soul,” she called, “or I swear by the Saint whose blood I carry, you will face a defeat beyond any the House of Berethnet has ever exacted on your kind.” Fýredel bared his teeth again, but Sabran dared to take another step. “Before I leave this world, I will see your kind thrown down, sealed forever in the chasm in the mountain.”

Fýredel reared up and opened his wings. Faced with this behemoth, the Queen of Inys was smaller than a poppet.

Still she did not balk.

The wyrm had bloodlust in his eyes. They burned as hot as the fire in his belly. Ead knew she had moments to decide what to do next.

It would have to be a wind-warding. Wardings like this used a great deal of siden, and she had so very little left—but perhaps, if she poured her last store of it into the effort, she could work one upon Sabran.

She held her hand toward the Alabastrine Tower, cast her siden outward, and twisted it into a wreath around the Queen of Inys.

As Fýredel unleashed his fire, so Ead broke the chains on her long-dormant power. Flame collided with ancient stone. Sabran vanished into light and smoke. Ead was distantly aware of Truyde coming into the belfry, but it was too late to hide what she was doing.

Her senses closed in on Sabran. She felt the strain on her braids of protection around the queen, the fire clawing for dominance, the pain in her own body as the warding gulped away her siden. Sweat soaked her corset. Her arm shook with the effort of keeping her hand turned outward.

When Fýredel closed his jaws, all was silent. Black vapors billowed from the tower, clearing slowly. Ead waited, heart tight as a drum, until she saw the figure in the smoke.

Sabran Berethnet was unscathed.

“It is my turn to giveyoua warning. A warning from my forebear,” she said breathlessly, “that if you make war against Virtudom, this hallowed blood will quench your fire. And it will not return.”

Fýredel did not acknowledge her. Not this time. He was looking at the blackened stone, and the spotless circle around Sabran.

A perfect circle.

His nostrils flared. His pupils thinned to slits. He had seen a warding before. Ead stood like a statue as his merciless gaze roved, searching for her, while Sabran remained still. When he looked toward the belfry, he sniffed, and Ead knew that he had caught her scent. She stepped out of the shadows beneath the clock face.

Fýredel showed his teeth. Every spine on his back flicked up, and a long hiss rattled on his tongue. Holding his gaze, Ead unsheathed her knife and pointed it at him across the divide.

“Here I am,” she said softly. “Here I am.”

The High Western let out a scream of rage. With a push of his hind legs, he launched himself off the Dearn Tower, taking part of the spire and most of its east-facing wall with him. Ead threw herself behind a pillar as a fireball exploded against the clock tower.

The cadence of his wings faded away. Ead lurched back to the balustrade. Sabran was still on the balcony, in her circle of pale stone. The sword had fallen from her hand. She had not looked toward the clock tower, or seen Ead watching her. When Combe reached her, she collapsed against him, and he carried her back into the Alabastrine Tower.

“What did you do?” came a quaking voice from behind Ead. Truyde. “I saw you. What did you do?”

Ead slid to the floor of the belfry, head lolling. Great shudders pushed through her body.

The essence in her blood was spent. Her bones felt hollow, her skin as raw as if she had been flayed. She needed the tree, just a taste of its fruit. The orange tree would save her . . .

“You are a witch.” Truyde stepped away, ashen-faced. “Witch. You practice sorcery. I saw it—”

“You saw nothing.”

“It was aëromancy,” Truyde whispered. “Now I knowyoursecret, and it reeks far worse than mine. Let us see how far you can pursue Triam from the pyre.”

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