Five Dark Fates (Three Dark Crowns, #4)(16)

‘Nothing,’ Caragh whispers.

Arsinoe clenches her fists. She knows their disappointment is only because they love Jules so much, but she cannot help wondering what sort of miracle they expected her to perform with some of Madrigal’s blood and a piece of paper.

‘Did you read the letter, Cait?’ she asks.

‘I did.’

‘Then you know what’s in it. Or rather, what’s not in it. All Madrigal wrote down were the details of the binding spell and instructions for how to remove it if she died. Not much help now, considering it was removed when she was killed.’

‘But there must be something,’ Emilia says.

‘If you’re so sure, why don’t you try looking.’

‘Wait,’ says Billy. ‘I’m no expert, but . . . you have the binding spell that Madrigal used. Couldn’t you just do the same spell again? Rebind the curse?’

‘No,’ Arsinoe says. ‘When Madrigal first performed the binding, Jules was a baby. Neither of her gifts had taken root yet. Trying to bind her war gift now would be like trying to stuff an oak back inside an acorn. But—’

‘But what?’

She pauses and glances at Jules. Her heartbeat pounds in her ears and sends blood throbbing into her pricked fingertips.

‘But maybe it could be tethered.’

‘Tethered?’

‘Tamed, tied down as a loose sail flapping in the wind. Perhaps it could be bound if it were tied to another person.’ Arsinoe’s thoughts race ahead. It would not be a binding but a sharing. Whoever did it would help Jules to shoulder the load.

‘Tethered to someone so that they could be the keeper of the curse?’ asks Cait. ‘Like Madrigal was?’

‘No. Not exactly. The curse would be . . . shared. And before you ask, I have no idea what that would mean for the other person. They could lose themselves to the curse as well, over time.’

Emilia pounds her fist on the table. ‘When can you do it?’ ‘I don’t even know if I should. It would be massive. Not like charming a false-familiar bear or even reaching out to old gifts. It’s bigger than anything I’ve ever tried.’

Emilia turns to Mathilde. ‘Do you have any particular feeling about this?’

‘Nothing yet,’ says the seer. ‘I have seen nothing about Jules’s fate. The thread has gone dark. I will keep listening. Keep reading the smoke for visions.’ That is the only aspect of the gift she possesses, Arsinoe has learned. Visions and momentary flashes. The oracles say it is the stronger side of the sight, but Arsinoe does not know why. It would be much more useful to be able to cast the bones and have an answer when you need one.

‘Could it harm Jules?’ Ellis asks softly.

‘It could harm everything,’ Arsinoe replies. ‘It could all go wrong.’

‘Arsinoe.’

At the sound of Jules’s creaking whisper, they turn. Jules lies on her bed of straw, but her eyes are fixed on them, her throat straining to speak. Arsinoe and Emilia nearly dive to her side. It is so good to hear her voice.

‘Jules, Jules,’ Arsinoe says. ‘You’re back.’

Emilia smoothes Jules’s hair away from her forehead.

‘I knew you would be.’

They fall silent as Jules’s lips struggle to form words. ‘You have to do it. You have to bind it. I can’t . . .’ She squeezes her eyes shut and braces against a wave of pain.

‘All right,’ Arsinoe says. ‘All right, I’ll do it.’

Arsinoe lays supplies out across the small desk that has become an apothecary table. Bundles of herbs for burning. Candles to burn them with. Two thin, delicately made white scarves, a knife and bandages. Always bandages.

When Madrigal performed the first binding, she bled herself nearly to death and Jules, too. Innocent, tiny, newborn Jules. Arsinoe was not there, just a newborn herself at that time, but she can still imagine the baby’s fading, exhausted screams. She squeezes her eyes shut. At least Jules is not a baby anymore.

Across the room, Jules’s door opens and Emilia emerges. She looks wrung out, as she always does when she leaves Jules.

‘I do not mean to disturb you,’ the warrior says, leaning down to hug Camden roughly and offer her a strip of dried meat. ‘Is it . . . going well?’

‘The original binding was cast in Wolf Spring, not far from the Milone property beneath the bent-over tree, and if I had a choice, that’s where I would attempt this.’ She looks up at Emilia regretfully. Wolf Spring is too far, and too watched. Innisfuil Valley and the Breccia Domain are out, too, for much the same reasons. ‘But otherwise . . . all is going according to plan.’

‘And what,’ Emilia asks, ‘is that plan? Who are you going to tether? Who will carry the curse with Jules?’

Arsinoe’s brow furrows. That answer was obvious the moment the plan was hatched. ‘I will, of course.’

‘You will.’ Emilia’s mouth crooks. ‘A queen and our one low-magic practitioner. Brilliant. If the tether goes wrong and the curse takes you both, I cannot think of a worse person to have out of control. You might be even more dangerous than she is.’ She walks to the table and sweeps her hand over the top of it like she would dash the ingredients to the floor. ‘And of course it would be you. So that Jules could be tied again to your fate. Hers with a queen’s.’