Page 258 of Lady of Ashes

“You just want those mortal children back in your possessionfor only the gods know why,” Alaric retorted, his ?ngers drumming again.

“I would not expect you to understand,” Balam replied calmly.

“It is done.”

They both turned at the sound of Talwyn’s voice. She was standing, the skystone chains hanging from her hand. Amulets of the traitor gods no longer hung from them but seven nightstone keys. The tops of the keys still held the shape of the gods’ symbols, but they tapered down to long points, two pointed prongs sticking out on either side like thorns.

Alaric stood, slowly walking towards her, taking in this surreal moment. How long had he waited to ?nd these keys? How much had gone into orchestrating the events that had led up to this? How many years of making sure the right people were in the right place at the right time? All leading up to this moment and the ones to come.

He reached out, feeling the cool stone against his palm as he took the keys from the Fae Queen. He squeezed them in his ?st, feeling the pointed prongs break skin. He didn’t care. He ?nally held them in his hand.

They vibrated slightly against his palm, a tingling sensation shooting up his arm. Pure power held within them. He hadn’t expected that. He’d thought they’d need Scarlett’s power to activate the keys. But maybe not …

He turned to say something about it to Balam, but stilled.

Balam’s eyes were ?xed on the map. And Alaric could see why, as the shimmering pillars that represented the rifts slowly began to disappear. One by one, they winked out.

“What is happening?” Mikale asked from where he’d been sitting, quietly brooding for the last three hours.

“It appears all of our rifts are closing,” Balam said, his black eyes lifting to meet Alaric’s.

Without another word, they both Traveled to the closest rift. Two seraph sentries snapped to attention at their appearance, but they ignored them as they approached the rip. It was by a pond in a secluded clearing just north of the castle. Or it was supposed to be.

“The Night Children lands. The one by the river estate,” Alaric said, Traveling in the next heartbeat.

They both stepped from the air within seconds of each other,staring at the spot along the estate wall where they had let the seraphs in to ?ght Scarlett and the Royals when they’d found the Contessa.

The rift was gone. Vanished. As if it had been closed up and sealed. “How is this possible?” Balam asked, anger edging into his voice.

“I do not know,” Alaric ground out through gritted teeth. “Toreall. The one where they captured Scarlett.”

Balam nodded, and moments later they were standing beside the trees of the Dresden Forest, just on the other side of the Earth Court.

That rift was gone too.

But the cry of an eagle had them both turning to the sky. Not an eagle. A grif?n. Three of them.

“How the fuck are they out of the wards?” Alaric seethed, watching as the grif?ns ?ew closer and closer.

Balam said nothing, his eyes ?xed on the approaching beasts and riders.

The High Witch and two of her sentries.

The ground shuddered beneath Alaric’s feet when the grif?ns landed, their massive wings folding against their sides.

“Queen Scarlett Aditya has a message for you,” the High Witch said, her tone hard and unforgiving, while her sentries eyed him and Balam with distaste.

“And what is that?” Alaric gritted out from between his teeth.

“Remember that she is already inside.” The High Witch lifted her chin a little higher then, her grif?n’s wings already stretching back out and preparing to take off. “And that keys can open more than one lock, and some keys and locks do not go together at all.”

With that, the High Witch was ?ying back to the skies, her sentries right behind her, turning and heading back to their lands. Alaric slowly looked down at the keys he still held in his hand.

He felt Balam’s hand land on his shoulder before he Traveled them back to the council room in the castle.

“She played you like a fucking fool,” Balam sneered as soon as they stepped from the air.

He snatched the keys from his hands, holding them before his face. He studied them for only a few seconds before throwing them onto the table. One look at the enchanted map told Alaric thatevery single rift that had been created over the last decade had been closed.

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