Page 255 of The Ashes and the Star-Cursed King

“He has to be somewhere,” Oraya said.

“I’m sure heissomewhere,” Jesmine said, pursing her lips. “Snake that he is. But that somewhere is not in the House of Night.”

“Did you check—”

“We checked everywhere,” Ketura said, throwing her notes down. “Everywhere.”

Ketura’s frustration, I knew, wasn’t with Oraya. It was with herself. She hated losing.

“He must have retreated with the rest of the Bloodborn,” Jesmine said. “Was quick about it, apparently.”

None of this surprised me.

I wanted Septimus in captivity as much as anyone else. But I was under no illusions that he was about to let himself be caught easily. He was far too smart for that, as much as I hated to give him the credit.

These last few weeks had been a blur, establishing the fragile legs of our new kingdom and eliminating the final parasites of the old one. The Bloodborn, at least, had been easy to get rid of—the minute the goddesses showed up, they apparently knew nothing good was happening and began their retreat. By the time the fighting had stopped and Jesmine and Vale had retrieved Oraya and I, most of the Bloodborn troops were already on their way out of the kingdom.

No one objected to letting them go. Good riddance.

The only one we wanted was Septimus.

But he, it seemed, had been the first to leave. Though Jesmine and Vale both gave orders to have him detained immediately, before Oraya and I had even awoken, he had simply disappeared. And these last few weeks had been no more fruitful, not even as our guards tore through all potential strongholds and searched fleets of departing Bloodborn soldiers.

Septimus was long, long gone.

Vale let out a sigh and rubbed his temples. “Let him slink away with his tail between his legs. If that’s how he needs to deal with his defeat, so be it. We have plenty of other traitors to prosecute, and at least those won’t start a war.”

He tapped the parchment in front of him, black with dozens—hundreds—of names.

“Anotherwar,” Jesmine corrected, and Vale sighed again.

“Yes. Let’s avoid another war. Especially one with another House.”

Mische shifted uncomfortably in her seat. I knew she was thinking about the House of Shadow.

We’d been lucky so far. Not a word from them about their prince. If that changed, our strategy was to pin it on Simon, let them believe that justice had already been served.

Risky. But it was the best we had.

Mische, I knew, thought about this possibility more than she let on.

“We did find someone else,” Ketura said, jerking my attention back to the meeting. “In the latest set of raids.”

I blinked, turning to her. “Someone important?”

Her face hardened, like she’d just smelled something very unpleasant.

“Someone I think you might want to talk to.”

* * *

Cairis looked horrible.Then again, it would be a little disappointing if he didn’t, after hours of questioning by Ketura and Vale’s men.

He looked up through the bars, a ray of moonlight falling over his face as he squinted up at me through a swollen eye.

“Oh.” His mouth twisted into a wry smirk, a pathetic recreation of his typical smile. “Hello. Sorry I won’t be very useful. I already told them everything.”

“I figured as much.”

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