Page 39 of Her Dark Reflection

I ducked my head at the crack of a gunshot, wildly casting about to see if anyone had been hit. As unreliable as pistols were, more likely to backfire and harm the shooter than anything else, they were still deadly. The woman on the ground started flailing wildly, drawing my attention back to her, and I saw that she was looking at us between the legs of her captor, her gaze locked on Gwinellyn as she shrieked and pointed.

Out of nowhere, Prince Tallius was before us. I’d never seen him up close before. His golden hair was thrashing around in the wind and a scowl marred his handsome face.

‘Where have you been?’ he demanded, grabbing Gwinellyn’s hand. ‘You know you aren’t meant to wander on your own.’

She seemed to close in on herself, growing smaller beneath his gaze. ‘I’m not alone.’ The sight made me want to grind my teeth. Who was he to speak to her like that? Just some foreign prince, a spare son several steps out of line for his own throne, sponging off Brimordia’s hospitality. And why was shelettinghim speak to her like that?

He tugged her away without another word, leaving me to fend for myself. Gwinellyn sent me an apologetic glance but didn’t resist him. He clearly put the charm in prince charming, that one. I didn’t need him, anyway. I was perfectly capable of stuffing myself into a carriage. Though as I had this thought, the one behind me suddenly lurched forward as the carriage driver whipped at the flanks of the horse. Clearly not that one, then. All around me, the courtiers were beginning to surge and scurry, grappling to get themselves into the few carriages available.

I craned my neck, searching for another to fight my way into, and something caught my attention. A point of stillness in the melee of the crowd nearby. A figure in black, untouched by the chaos, as though he existed in a void that drained away all movement and noise before it reached him. We locked eyes.

A feeble, ridiculous part of me felt better knowing Draven was here. It eroded the sharp edges from the fear that had been swelling inside me. He’d saved my life once and I was sure he’d do so again if it came down to it. He’d invested too much into me to let me die.

I didn’t question my absolute faith that he would be able to save me.

A thunderous boom shook the air, sending everyone around me staggering. The weave had broken. The crowd surged forward, and chaos erupted as the soldiers struggled to keep them back, brandishing their broadswords as stones and vegetable matter began sailing into the mess of courtiers, eliciting shrieks of pain and horror all around me. The red-robed figures of druthi were now joining the soldiers to snatch at the broken weave being trampled against the cobblestones. Could they repair it? If they could, they would never do so fast enough. Already, the crowd was beginning to break through the line of soldiers.

I jumped as a hand grabbed my elbow.

‘Why are you just standing there? Get out of here,’ Draven’s voice urged in my ear. ‘This is about to turn bloody.’

I glanced behind me, beyond the pillars of flame that had consumed the pyres, to see the palace gates were open and the line of carriages was thundering through. The platform where the king had stood was empty and courtiers were streaming after the carriages on foot, shoving to get through the gates.

‘They’ll close the gates on anyone left out here,’ he yelled as he pulled me along. ‘And you’re too conspicuous in that dress. The crowd will rip you apart.’

As though the gates were responding to his prediction, they began to move before our eyes and the courtiers trying to get through grew frenzied. With angry commoners now flooding into the square, there was a sea of people between us and safety. Draven cursed and looked around. ‘Can’t you just zap us somewhere else?’ I shouted.

He levelled me an incredulous look. ‘Of course not, you little fool. This way.’

We pushed through the people around us as refuse and rocks continued to rain down. Someone slammed into me and I stumbled, crying out. My knee jarred painfully against the stone and all that kept me from sprawling beneath the crush of the crowd was Draven yanking me back to my feet. We reached a lonely lantern post rising above the rolling mass of people. He wrapped my hand around it with his own.

‘Wait here,’ he yelled over the din. He released me, and panic gripped me, as if he had been the only thing keeping it at bay.

‘Wait!’ I cried, trying to grab at him, but I quickly lost him in the crowd. People jostled me on all sides and the wind was rising again to steal the breath from my mouth and send grit pelting at my face. A stray ribbon caught at my arm, straining and twisting around me for a few moments before it slipped away and upwards in a violent gust. Was I an idiot, standing still in the middle of what was quickly turning into a riot, trusting Draven to come back for me?

There was a hand suddenly at my neck, tearing at my necklace until it was cutting into my skin. I clawed at my throat, blood pounding in my head, gasping for breath, until finally it snapped. I whipped around to find a large woman with frizzy hair and huge forearms trying to pull my hat from my head. I gripped her shoulders, pulled her off balance and kneed her square in the stomach. She doubled over, winded, and with a sharp shove I pushed her onto her ass.

My gaze flashed to the gates. I had to get out of here. I had just decided to make a run for it when Draven reappeared with a palace soldier at his side. Judging from the hackle on his helmet, I guessed a captain.

‘There’s another way in. Lester will show us where to go,’ Draven yelled, taking my arm again. He almost yanked me off my feet as he towed me through the crowd. More soldiers seemed to have joined the melee. I flinched as a young man wielding a fire poker was cut down before me and didn’t look down as his blood washed the cobblestones beneath my shoes. My heart raced. Another gunshot split the air and I flinched, expecting pain. The clash of metal on metal rang in my ears as swords met poles and hammers and whatever paltry weapons the rioters had managed to get their hands on.

Through the chaos of bodies, I saw a building, then a gate hanging on its hinges. We pushed through it until we were in a narrow alleyway lined with crates. The soldier kicked over a few stacks of crates to reveal a door set low in the stone, which he crouched to unbolt with a key on a ring fished from his pocket. The door swung open.

Draven clasped his hand and nodded, and I peered closer at the face beneath a mop of sandy hair. Recognition flickered. Then I was tugged down a flight of crumbling stone stairs. When we had cleared the doorway, the door swung closed behind us and we were plunged into darkness.

Itwasquiet.Iwould hardly have guessed at the chaos beyond the door if I hadn’t just been dragged through it, and the dark was so thick I couldn’t see the stairs, the walls, or the man leading me down into Aether knew where.

I stopped short, and when he tugged on me, I wrenched my hand from his grip and folded my arms. ‘I can’t see.’

The darkness sighed. A moment later, a spark of light flickered and grew until I could see that we were in a tunnel sloping down into the earth. Our shadows loomed large on the dirt walls around us.

I gaped at Draven, my eyebrows climbing my forehead as I realised he hadn’t lit a torch, but was holding a handful of flames. Now, I knew very little about magic. The Druthi Guild were merciless in guarding their secrets—the young initiate burning in the square was a testament to that—but some facets of magic working were common knowledge. I knew it was somehow woven into objects. It required preparation and materials and time.

Druthi didn’t summon flames from nowhere and then hold them in their hand.

‘Let’s go.’ He was already moving, his feet quickly traversing the stairs and taking his palmful of flame with him.

‘I’m coming. Just wait a moment.’ I tripped after him, not wanting to be left behind. Wherever he was going, at least he had light. I didn’t want to be left here in the dark. ‘What is this place?’

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