Five Dark Fates (Three Dark Crowns, #4)(19)

‘An anchor,’ says a woman on her left, and they laugh.

They are afraid. Whether or not they chose to come does not change that. Mirabella looks at each of them in the torchlight. She has seen them all before—their faces glowing in the lit candles of the temple or receiving blessings on a festival day—but she does not know them well. The boy on her right is even a Westwood, one of the cousins who would sometimes visit the house with his sisters. She should have expected to see a Westwood there. Their gifts are among the strongest in the city. She remembers the boy’s name: Eamon Westwood. He had a fierce gift of wind. But she never saw him call a storm.

At a nod from Katharine, they send the barge out into the bay. They must propel themselves, using their gifts to control the currents, as not a single member of the queensguard could be compelled to row. As they go farther and farther from shore, their nerves start to betray them: gusts of wind come in sudden blusters, uncalled for and uncontrolled. When they arrived, they looked so sadly hopeful, dressed in their best as if they expected a grand ceremony.

‘The queen tells me you have come of your own free will,’ Mirabella says.

‘We have,’ says Eamon. ‘We were there when the mist rose in Rolanth. When it devoured the Midsummer Festival. We should have done more then, but . . .’ He lowers his eyes, shakes his head.

They have seen what the mist can do. They know what to expect. That should make her feel better, but it does not.

Do not hate the mist, Luca whispered to her before they set off. It is still our protector. We still have need of it. We must only hold it at bay. Discover what will appease it. Appease it, Mirabella thinks. Train it, like a dog.

She has always thought of the mist as an embodiment of the Goddess. An extension of her, just as the blood that runs through her own veins.

We can try to know the Goddess’s will, she thinks as if she were speaking to Luca. We can fumble about and try to please her. Or we can fight.

In Mirabella’s experience, fighting has worked better. They are close now, close enough to see it in the distance: a barrier of fog, stretched out in both directions and straight into the sky, much farther than their torchlight can show. The barge beneath them slows as a few of their gifts slacken and hesitate. But it is too late now to turn back.

‘In Moorgate Park, I saw it reach down a girl’s throat and tear out her insides,’ Eamon says.

Mirabella nods. ‘At Innisfuil, I saw the same.’

‘What are we doing? Are we mad?’

‘Do not think about that now!’ shouts the woman to Mirabella’s left. ‘Call your wind. Push it back!’

Mirabella takes a breath and feels her gift rise alongside the others’. Their courage makes her proud. As does their strength. The wind they call must be felt all the way back onshore. It must tear through the tents of the marketplace. The waves that rise will send the moored boats crashing against their docks.

But they were not fast enough. In the space of a blink, the mist has surrounded the barge. Thick arms of it creep over the side, moving so slowly and gently that not even Mirabella tries to evade it. Which is, of course, what it wants.

‘Call your storms,’ Mirabella says. But she does not know if she is heard. The mist has swamped the barge. She can no longer see the rear of it, and the light from the torches has been swallowed, rendering the air a sickening shade of orange. In mute horror, she watches as the mist slips over the first elemental like a shroud. When it draws back, the space where the girl stood only a breath before is empty.

‘Where did she go?’ Eamon screams.

‘I don’t know!’

They search, turning in all directions, their wind whipping around them like a tornado.

‘Oh, Goddess,’ the woman to Mirabella’s left moans. ‘The blood.’

Where the elemental girl had stood, the deck is splashed with bright red blood, as if someone had thrown out a butcher’s bucket.

‘Storms!’ Mirabella shouts as they start to panic. ‘Stay together!’ Her own storm rises, but it is fractured; she is distracted by the noise and the sight of what remains of the girl. The woman to her left wanders toward the blood, and the mist flows over her. One second she is there, and the next all is white, and a sickening scream rings out, cutting off abruptly at the sound of popping, as a hand of clenched knuckles. Worse still is the ripping noise that follows.

‘I can’t . . . ,’ Eamon sputters. He falls to the deck and grabs hold of Mirabella’s skirt. ‘I can’t!’

‘You can! Focus!’ She calls her storm again, eyes to the sky where thunderheads gather beside the moon. Crackles of lightning give them their eyes back, showing the strange shadows that move through the mist. ‘Wind,’ she whispers. And the wind obeys. The elementals who remain still fight beside her; she feels their push added to her own. Their wind cuts through the gray, the diseased whiteness that surrounds them. But it is not enough. It flows through the mist like a sieve, and the mist keeps advancing.

Has it grown stronger since she last faced it? Has it taken her measure and learned new tricks?

‘Ah! Help me!’

She looks down and sees Eamon half swallowed. She grasps his arm and pulls him closer as he screams.

She cannot save them. She will watch them all torn apart, turned inside out, one by one.

‘Into the water!’ She drags Eamon to the side and throws him overboard. ‘Dive! Swim for shore!’