Page 220 of Of Nine So Bold

It had been years since I last set foot in Lumilia. At the time, I’d only been a teenager swearing allegiance to the king, and I never went inside the castle itself, remaining instead in the courtyard or in the barracks where all the other soldiers stayed.

I sure as hell had never heard anyone say the castle couldchangeitself.

With my friends around me and my sword in my hand, I ran through the halls. Our cabin had been alive, in a way. Our magic—mine more than most—had given it a sort of life. So the thought of this place having a similar quality wasn’t completely foreign to me.

But given what was happening around us, the castle was currently in a battle for its life—and from what I could tell, it wasn’t exactly winning.

Branches grew from the stone walls like they were intent on ripping the entire place apart. Rot clung to everything, chewing into the stones like it was devouring the granite and the magic alike. But worst were the fissures where everything just… ended.

“Gap in the floor, straight ahead,” the demon called back. He stepped over the jagged gash of nothingness in the granite,his body hunched awkwardly to keep his wings from hitting the ceiling. “Stupid little one this time.”

Clay gave a wry chuckle, enjoying the demon’s insults, but I kept my attention on the walls and floor as Ozias and I stepped over the gap as well. The strange fissures had started showing up the closer we came to the outer walls, like they were another form of rot slowly gaining purchase on the castle itself. And they seemed able to spread quickly, or for others to open near them without warning.

We couldn’t take anything for granted.

“Here, allow me.” Byron hefted the steward over the gap and then set the man back down. I vaguely recalled the thin, graying man from the day I swore allegiance to the throne of Aneira. He’d been rigid. Proper. Seemingly clothed in rules and correct procedures as much as the formal livery of his station.

Even the castle becoming this madhouse of trees and rot hadn’t done much to shake that from him.

“Thank you,” Harran said with a tight nod. “Much appreciated.”

Shaking my head, I kept going. We had to be getting close to the courtyard by now.

As if summoned by my thoughts, an archway waited at the end of the larger hallway around the next turn, sunlight shining down on the flagstones beyond. The demon and Ozias had both stopped short of it, hanging back from the reach of the light.

“Well,” Lars said, clearly trying to keep a positive note in his voice when he spotted the exit too. “Here goes nothing.”

Cursing silently, I adjusted my grip on my sword and continued down the tunnel, only to pause when I reached the archway.

The courtyard was empty.

Clay made a sarcastic sound. “Oh, no. Thisdefinitelyisn’t a trap.”

“Now what do we do?” Byron asked, peering past our shoulders at the empty space. Shaped like a pentagon with crenelated walls on three sides and the tall castle walls forming two more, the courtyard spanned several thousand square feet. A tall, barred gateway stood on the opposite end, directly across from us. Broad, gray flagstones covered the ground everywhere except for where a ring of dirt and dead grass waited at the center of the courtyard. At the heart of that ring stood the royal tree.

Or what was left of it.

For a moment, I stared, my examination of the courtyard faltering at the sight of the twisted thing that had once been the royal tree of Aneira. Generations of Aneirans had tended to it lovingly, and in my memory, the tree had been a beautiful testimony to what humans could do if only they tried.

But now its bark was covered in writhing black veins of rot. Its branches looked like those in the castle, skeletal hands clawing at the air. Even in the depth of winter, countless apples hung from its branches, all of them emanating that same nauseating energy designed to draw us in and make us devour them, never mind that we could die.

An icy, crystalline feeling surged over my skin, dulling the pull.

The magic of Erenelle. It wasn’t having any of that crooning nonsense. Even as the chill of its power sank back inside me, becoming almost imperceptible once more, nothing about the apple tree appealed to me.

Except making sure it died.

Returning my focus to the courtyard, my mind raced to calculate the possibilities—or lack thereof. I could see what Casimir had spoken of now: magic lit the sky to the west where the apothecary district lay. Hopefully that meant the witches, the giants, and maybe even the shadow wolf had made it, butit didn’t do us much good at the moment. Meanwhile, the windows on the castle were a threat, as were the spaces behind the crenelations. Either could hide attackers, and save for this door, the courtyard exit on the far end, and the main entrance to the castle itself, we’d be utterly exposed with nowhere to retreat from any of them.

Clay was right. Perfect place for an ambush.

And we had no choice but to enter it anyway.

“Surround the princess,” I told the others, still keeping my eyes on the empty courtyard. “We move fast and we don’t stop until we’re across the?—”

Rumbling suddenly shook the corridor where we stood. The flagstones on the floor cracked, branches shooting up fast between them.

“Holy shit, go!” Clay shoved us forward.

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