Page 137 of The Courting of Bristol Keats
She gave the tray a cursory glance. It seemed like all she had done these past few days was eat. Even this morning at the farmhouse, Tyghan and Cully had made everyone a huge breakfast, and except for an egg that rolled off the tablealmostto the floor, before Tyghan flicked his fingers and made it return safely to his hand, they did it without using any magic. Perfect frittatas, fresh berry compotes, seared herbed salmon. It drew a round of applause from them all. She had eyed him with new curiosity. Maybe he wouldn’t fumble with pizza toppings after all.
She downed a handful of shelled hazelnuts from a dish on the tray, and suddenly resting seemed like a perfectly logical thing to do. She pulled off her boots and went to the bathing chamber to run a hot bath. As the tub filled, she went to the dressing table to deal with her horrible mass of tangles. She regretted not braiding her hair for the ride home. August had torn over sky and road, prodded by Tyghan to get home quickly. As she lifted her brush to her scalp, something bright caught her eye. Tucked between the black bristles was a tiny piece of paper. She smiled. A love note from Tyghan? He had left other little gifts for her around her room—a perfectly round citrine crystal, an enchanted harp that played itself, a rose on her pillow. She pulled the folded piece of paper from the bristles and unfolded it.
It wasn’t a love note.
CHAPTER 93
Guilt lapped at Tyghan’s conscience as he headed for Lir Rotunda. The wrongness of what he had done stuck in his throat like a fishbone.I didn’t control her mind, he reasoned with himself. The horrors of dark magic were too deeply ingrained in him to do such a thing. It wasn’t even a spell he had used when he grabbed her hand. Only a calming maneuver. Madame Chastain used it on patients. He had used it on Bristol at the farm, so she could sleep. Pulling tense energies from muscles, that’s all it was. But today, Bristol hadn’t wanted to relax. She was wearing those tensions for battle. He should have let them be—except that he was tired. He didn’t want to battle with her. He just wanted to get his meeting over with and have a plan set, because he knew Kormick was strategizing every minute of every day. Tyghan had a bigger fight ahead of him, and he wanted to end the one at hand.
“There you are!” Quin hooted, as if Tyghan was hours late instead of just a few minutes. Did you take care of—”
“The topic is off the table!” he snapped. “Do you understand? I won’t control her mind unless you want me to control your minds, too.”
“Slow down.” Kasta’s reply was sharp, the admonishment of a friend, not a subject. “We weren’t talking about dark magic. We were talking about the kind of control you exert over all your knights. Likefollowing orders?”
The fire in Tyghan drained, and he backed down. Of course they weren’t asking him to use dark magic. Why had his mind even gone there? Maybe three full days without any sleep had stretched even his limits.
“These maps are useless,” Quin grumbled, trying to pull their attention back to the business of rescuing Cael.
Tyghan circled the table, pulling one map from the pile.
It was true. Maps of Fomoria were old and unreliable. They only provided basic geological landmarks—rivers, mountains, gorges, and forests—but they didn’t show where new fortresses, bridges, or traps might be.
Except for dangerous sprints into the interior, the landscape hadn’t been traversed by outsiders in a generation, and with thick forests, there was only so much you could see from the air. Tyghan was on one of those quick sprints in the last botched search attempt that ended in an ambush. They had passed a warded citadel that defied their detection until it was too late. Fomorian warriors had swarmed out like wasps from a nest, outnumbering them ten to one.
“We stick to the air, then,” Cully said. “Invisible.”
Kasta shook her head. “That can only get us so far.” Magics and weapons had diminished power under the veil of invisibility. Eventually they had to navigate the forest that circled the high cliffs like a dark leafy moat—and they needed swift weapons and magic to do it. And they couldn’t land two dozen horses on the narrow cliff ledge, open and exposed like Kormick had done, unmindful of the noise they made. They might as well blare a horn alerting the guards.
“Down here,” Dalagorn said, his thick finger pointing to a plateau just below the tree line of the forest. “We land here and climb up the backside to the lookout.”
Tyghan nodded. It might work. “But we’re going to need a glamoured proxy to leave in Cael’s place. A missing prisoner would alert Kormick that we’re up to something.”
Dalagorn eyed the map, shaking his head. “Why not just gut the guards and ditch the bodies? It would be easy enough.”
“Unless someone comes to check on the prisoner,” Kasta said. “Like Kormick, or one of his wizards.”
And now they were back to a proxy.
“What should we leave in his place?” Quin wondered aloud.
Several possibilities were offered up but dismissed for one reason or another, mostly because of their vocalizations. Voices were harder to glamour. “A hare,” Cully said. “They’re mostly silent, and they kick like hell.”
“And they have big ears,” Dalagorn added.
Chuckles rolled around the table. Cael was known for hearing every rumor that rolled through the palace. It was settled. A glamoured hare would be left in Cael’s place.
Next, they moved on to the Abyss portal, narrowing its location down to a smaller area, based on recent sightings of the restless dead.
“If we can pinpoint that,” Quin said, “Kormick’s ass is ours.”
The note trembled between Bristol’s fingers.
My Brije,
This note is for your eyes only. Do not share it with anyone. I need you to come to a secret location immediately. Follow the city road past the end of Tatha Bridge. After twelve miles, take the northern fork for another forty miles until you reach the forest. Someone will be waiting there and will lead you to where I’m hiding. Come alone, and make sure you’re not followed. I know you can do this. My life depends on your silence. Trust no one. I need you, Brije. Hurry.
She paced her bath chamber, then stopped to read the note on her dressing table again. She’d already read it several times now, as if each new time would reveal something she had missed. How did the note get there? Surely it wasn’t her father who brought it, or he would just have stayed until she returned. Who had placed it there? Her skin prickled with suspicion, and she searched her room in case an intruder still lurked. In the time she was away, any number of fae could have sneaked into her room. She couldn’t leave based on a note. Could she? She washed her face. Furiously brushed at the horrible tangles still in her hair. Leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. Then paced again. It was impossible not to share this note with anyone.Impossible.And yet.
