The Shadowglass (The Bone Witch #3)(15)

I had no answer. All that I knew of the Lady Zoya, I learned from the Dark asha. They were former enemies, rivals and friends, confidants and close companions. And now Lady Zoya directed her anger against the bone witch into the whirling winds that jettisoned salt and other furies into the air.

“We had a bad run of blighted a month ago,” she continued. “Fox saved us. He fought off a couple single-handedly, saved Inessa and Her Majesty’s life. Even had time to rescue Hestia of all people, that ungrateful derriere, as Polaire often liked to say. She would have been blight fodder if I had the choice. I’m the worse of us two, but even I draw the line at what Tea’s done. I could understand why she hated them, but not why she would allow her hatred to harm everyone else.

“Maybe Tea was right to tell you her story. It’s no use keeping emotions bottled up inside. Sooner or later, you burst with all you want to say. Shadi would always listen, but Shadi’s in Ankyo and I’m still here.” She stared at me. “Well, go on. You said you had a song to tell, didn’t you? The crew is clinging to one another, but here you are, holding on to those papers like they’re your lifeline. What do you want to know, while I’m in a mood to talk?”

I looked down at the letters. I had been tempted many, many times to skip forward, to read the end of those pages first—but something held me back. It was not the right way to read a story. “Do you miss her?”

She seemed taken aback by the question, her slate eyes meeting mine again. “Yes,” she said. After another pause: “And no. I miss what we used to be. Did she ever tell you how I used to push her around? I never gave her an apology, and she never asked for one. We just kept on until the moment for it had passed. I wish all were as it used to be.”

Her fingers fluttered, and the ship picked up speed. “But those days are over. She harmed my friends, Bard. I lost so many good people these last few months.”

“So did she.”

Lady Zoya smiled with lips a shade of cruel. “It’s not considered ‘losing them’ if you’re responsible for their deaths, Bard. She torched my city. What kind of hatred runs that deep? That’s the quandary, isn’t it? Besides, if she goes down, we lose Fox. Why take you into her confidence? What does she have left to say?”

She stopped speaking as more heavy gusts of wind roared by.

“What does she have left to say?” she asked quietly. Her gaze turned to the letters I held, and I realized it was not a rhetorical question. “Tell me.”





4


None of Istera’s historians knew much of runic magic, despite the wealth of research on hand. Having red heartsglass prevented them from seeing its effects. Sakmeet’s silver made her the foremost expert, but her notes were all we had left to go by.

Lord Garindor was the next best thing, but even he admitted his limitations. “Those of us with purple heartsglass see magic on a very different spectrum than those with silver,” he explained. “We simply cannot observe some weaves that are obvious to all asha.”

We had returned to the library while the king and his councilors debated the fate of the historian’s assistant-turned-creature. That this daeva-like being had started as a human, not an unnatural aberration, had shaken the Isterans. If there was a rune capable of turning people into monsters, King Rendorvik argued, then perhaps there was a way to change them back.

But the librarians—bless their staunchly patient hearts, as they worked to supply us with information—spent their lives dedicated to these books and still had little idea of the runes we sought. It was not likely that we would succeed, our experiences as asha notwithstanding.

Still, Althy threw herself into the ongoing inquiry. Likh appeared distracted. He kept abandoning the volume he was perusing to prowl the room, lost in thought. Kalen and Khalad were helping guard the strange creature that had once been Yarrod. Lord Garindor, though rattled, had insisted on accompanying us, determined to help.

“I can do little for my assistant’s condition,” he pointed out, “but what expertise I can offer lies here, among these old books. Permit me to assist you in any way I can.”

“You are very kind, milord,” Althy told him gently. “But I’m afraid we don’t know what questions to ask, knowing very little of this ourselves.”

“Are there any generalities regarding your research that you can tell me? Perhaps I can narrow the field.”

“We seek information on any runic spells that could cause this transformation. We have never encountered anything like this in the Willows before.”

The man thought about it. “No, I cannot say that I am acquainted with such a spell. I have looked through many manuscripts on runes, but our experiments were restricted without a silver heart to guide us. As such, we thought it best to turn over our research to the Isteran asha in the hopes they would make better sense of them, though they also found little. Sakmeet was always very private about her own findings.”

“If she knew anything about these runes, she didn’t write about them.” Likh was going through Sakmeet’s old notes, and he sounded frustrated. “Her handwriting is difficult to read.”

“What else can you tell us about Blade that Soars’ and Dancing Wind’s origins?” Althy asked Lord Garindor. “Perhaps we can find another connection there.”