Dead of Winter (The Arcana Chronicles #3)(4)

That was his answer? Sometimes I wanted to grab him and shake him.

“We’re here.” Along the back wall stood a three-story structure, clad in metal sheeting. Matthew climbed a ladder to the top.

I followed, leaving the wolf to prowl below. At every rung, I wheezed and winced. “Can we . . . please talk about . . . a rescue for Jack?”

At the top level, Matthew tilted up a license plate, revealing a small slot. “Empress.” He motioned for me to peer out.

“Okay, what am I looking at? Oh, wow.” We were high up on a blustery vantage with a sheer drop-off. A river that looked as broad as the Mississippi coursed below. An amazing sight. Before the rains, there’d been no bodies of water like this.

“The placement of this fort is genius.” That minefield moat bordered three sides of the wall, while this steep bluff and river protected the fourth.

“Jack,” he said simply. “Fort Arcana grew from you. The mission . . .”

When he couldn’t find me at Death’s, Jack had targeted the Lovers for me—and for him. He’d had his own vendetta against the Milovnícis.

I gazed across the water at an opposing bluff. Fires dotted the area. Tents stretched for what seemed like miles. A few rock ridges jutted upward, offering protection from attack.

“Is that the Army of the Southeast?” It was huge. I tried to imagine where Jack was being kept. To be this close to him . . .

“Half of the Azey. Azey South. Azey North’s not too far away.”

Which meant Violet wasn’t too far away either. How to get to Jack before she did? “I don’t suppose this wind ever dies down?” I could launch spores from here, putting all the soldiers to sleep. Then I’d take a boat across, stroll into their camp, and drag Jack out.

“The winds go all night. Which is all day.”

There went that idea—

Shots erupted from across the river, lots of them at one time. My stomach dropped as the sounds echoed over the water. I whirled around to Matthew. “Not him?”

“No. Daily execution.” How the Milovnícis kept the rank and file in line.

I sagged with such relief, I almost felt guilty. Then I wondered how those shots had affected Jack.

“He believes no help is coming,” Matthew whispered. “Knows he can’t escape. Thinks his friends are dead.”

The idea of Jack alone, with no hope, gutted me. “Is he . . . is he scared?”

“Certain he’ll die. Surprised by how unfrightened he is.”

“You can tell? You always had trouble reading him.”

Nod. “Three months’ practice.”

“But you can’t read his future?”

Matthew’s brows drew together. “Never wanted this to happen.”

“Can you tell him we’re coming for him?”

Without a word, Matthew crossed to the ladder and climbed down. I clumsily followed. Back on the ground, he said, “Your alliance is injured.”

Did he mean that my allies were benched, or that my alliance was shaky? “Are you taking me to Finn and Selena?” I hadn’t seen them in months.

“Across the courtyard to the barracks.” Matthew started away again, heading in a different direction, balancing on the boards.

With Cyclops at my side, I tromped along the mud-caked planks through a central area, like a quad (courtyard might be a stretch).

When Matthew stopped in front of a tent, I bade the wolf stay outside. He snuffled indignantly, plunking down in the mud.

Taking a deep breath, I tugged down my poncho hood and entered, Matthew behind me.

Selena and Finn lay on cots. The Archer’s arm was in a sling—her bow arm. An arrow stretched over her lap, and she petted the feather fletchings, the sound like riffled cards. She stared, seemingly at nothing.

One of Finn’s legs was splinted, elevated on a bug-out bag. A metal crutch leaned beside his cot.

A fire burned in the center of the tent, vented out of the roof. More Arcana sat on benches around it: the Tower, Judgment, and the World Card, an alliance of three.

Joules sized me up. Gabriel tilted one of his black wings in greeting. Tess Quinn waved shyly, her fingernails bitten to the quick. Matthew dropped down to sit beside her.

“Well, if it isn’t our fair Empress,” Joules said in his thick Irish accent.

Selena shot upright, her silver-blond hair tumbling over her shoulders.

“Evie!” Finn called. “How did you get free of Death?”

This could get tricky. “Uh, I had an opportunity to . . . steal away.” Steal Death’s horse and saddle, steal a new bug-out bag, steal my hi-tech all-weather gear. “It’s not important. I’m here now.”

“Yet you didn’t accept my offer.” Joules’s reddish brown hair was disheveled, his gaze cagey.

Selena—who’d called out no greeting—said, “If you got a jump on Death to escape, then you could have brought Joules’s payment.”

Aric hadn’t been the only one to offer a deal to save Jack. Joules had demanded Death’s severed head in exchange for a rescue. “It’s not that simple,” I told them. “Things aren’t how we thought them.”

“Did you have a chance to kill the Reaper or not?” Whatever Joules read in my expression made him say, “You feckin’ did! A shot at the Endless Knight! The one who always bloody wins!”