Page 84 of A Treachery of Swans

And aim the pistol at my father’s head.

Regnault senses something is amiss at the last second. He shoves me aside just as the shot goes off. I hear him hiss as the iron ball skims his upper arm and shatters the balcony window. I crash to thefloor once more, the firearm knocked from my grip. I don’t bother going after it. I run for the door.

Regnault whirls on me, lips pulled back, eyes wild. His hand shoots out, spell-threads glowing between his fingers, and the floor near the balcony turns to ice just as I pass it. I lose my footing, a scream escaping me as my knees crack brutally against the ground. From the now-open balcony, the winter wind rushes in, howling, shaking the curtains and bed frame.

“I should have known,” Regnault shouts over the wind, approaching me. His hand rises again, fingertips glowing. The ice from beneath me melts, rising into the air and then gathering into a slender, frosted shard aimed straight for my heart. “Pathetic street rat. What will you be without me?”

I raise my chin. Meet his eyes, my chest heaving, licking blood from my split lip.

“Free,” I hiss.

He lets the ice shard fly.

I squeeze my eyes shut in anticipation of pain. In the same moment, something wraps around me. Warm and downy, my world is suddenly muffled.

Startled, I open my eyes once more and am greeted by a swath of white. The breath rushes from me in a gasp as I realize what I’m looking at.

Wings. I am encompassed by wings.

I hear my father snarl. “You think you can stop this, foolish girl?”

Behind me, my savior grunts in pain, but the shield does not loosen. Soft hands wrap around my waist. “You’ve done well, sorciere,” murmurs a gentle, impossibly familiar voice. “Now don’t resist.”

Then I’m pulled into the air.

SCENE XXXIIThe Lake

Night

The Château grounds pass below me in a blur, nothing but spindly steel and skeletal trees, all coated by black-as-soot snow. I fade in and out, half dazed and half weary but fighting stubbornly against unconsciousness, dreadfully afraid of letting my guard down again. I don’t know what to think of the fact that Marie holds me to her chest, her chin against the crown of my head, and wings—her wings, glorious wings—spread out on either side of us.

Absurdly I think,It’s a good thing I’m not afraid of heights.

Then I close my eyes and lose the battle against darkness.

I am drowning.

Water fills my nose, my mouth, bitter and ink-dark, tasting of fish and rust and flesh. I struggle, looking around myself, searching for the surface, but there is no surface in sight. Far below, I can barely make out the serrated outline of ruins: crumpled columnsand shattered statues and an altar split neatly in half. A temple.

My lungs burn. I thrash, kicking away from the temple, but I can’t seem to move. I know that by now I should have inhaled water, should have drowned. But I can’t. I’m trapped in stasis, not drowned but nearly there, my body begging for air.

Little owl.

The voice comes from everywhere at once, singsong, as fluid as the lake’s water. It floods into my nostrils and streams between my teeth, pushes its way all the way into my bursting lungs.

Little owl, little owl, should I let you drown?

Little liar, little thief, who stole your father’s crown.

Suddenly the ruins below me are gone; in their place is a colossal statue.

A woman, her pinned-up hair and smooth skin forged of cracked marble, with half the skin of her face missing, exposing the golden bone of her skull. Tiny black and white fish swim around her, small as ants. Slowly from the depths her hand emerges, reaching for me like a great sea beast’s maw.

What is it that you seek?Morgane demands.

I shouldn’t be able to speak as I drown, but somehow I can. “I want to destroy the Couronne du Roi.”

Little liar lies again.The Mother’s mouth doesn’t move, her eyes unblinking. Her hand comes ever closer to me, and I thrash, trying to escape, to no avail. Her single finger is the length of my body—somehow I know that if she traps me, I will be trapped forever.

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