Page 67 of Tusk Love

“Then that’s why the Spider’s Web took Wensleydale,” said Oskar. “Accanfal will make her unseal the trunk in exchange for Wensleydale’s life—and she will do it, because that’s the kind of person she is. In spite of the two of you.” A thought occurred to him. Speaking of Wensleydale…“That whole thing about the Parure being a Truscan artifact—that was all bullshit, wasn’t it? Wensleydale knows.”

Illiard gave a miserable nod. “He didn’t want to marry a merchant’s daughter. So I said she’d come with a priceless enchanted treasure.And he and I concocted that cover story. The plan was for him to tell Guinevere the truth—and to get her to unseal the trunk—once they were married.”

“You,” Oskar said crisply, “are a horrible little man, and I will gut Wensleydale like a fish after I rescue him.” He headed to the door, reaching for the knob just as it flew open.

It was Captain Therault with an update. “Two of the guests are missing,” he told Oskar. “The Opal of the Ocean and her bodyguard.”

Oskar let out a curse. The barest bones of a frantic plan formed in his mind. “We need to watch all the city’s exits. Therault, you’ll secure the gates. I’ll take some of your men down with me to the docks.”

The captain saluted. He didn’t question the fact that a nameless peasant only tangentially related to his employer was now the one giving the orders. And thank the gods for that, because it was about damn time Oskar caught a break.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Guinevere

There were four things Guinevere was immediately aware of when she came to.

First was the dull pain at the back of her skull. Second was the teak floorboards she was lying on in the center of a large, mostly bare compartment pervaded by a gentle rocking motion that had her feeling vaguely nauseous.

Third was the fact that she wasn’t alone. There was a robed figure some distance away from her, standing in the shadows beyond the sickly yellow illumination of a few oil lanterns. She squinted, trying and failing to make sense of the silhouette, with its dimly lit features that were slightly off for reasons she couldn’t pinpoint, the nose that seemed too long and curved and the arms that were too bony and the oddly shaped tufts around the head that surely couldn’t be hair.

“You’re awake at last.” The voice was cold and nasal, with a certain melodious croakiness. It sounded like a sparrow’s heartbeat, leaping into the wind.

The Spider’s Web had delivered her to this person, to this isolated place she had no idea where. And that brought Guinevere to the fourth thing: she was strangely calm about it.

It was a heavy, blank sort of calm. It tugged at her eyelids. There was a cloudlike timbre to it that drowned out the song of the universe.

“I’m under a spell, aren’t I?” she murmured to the wooden floor beneath her cheek.

“A calming one, yes,” said the figure. “After all, I could not risk your little friend getting loose.” He held something up; it glimmered weakly in the gloom, a chain of silver wrapped around his fist. Her totem.

There was something not quite right about that fist. The palm was too small, the digits too thin. They curved like…talons?

“What did you do to the real Mia Lavera? Is she all right?” Guinevere asked this because she needed to know, but her concern for this other woman who’d been endangered on her account was sheathed behind a wall of glass. The calming spell made it difficult to feel much of anything.

“Nicodranas’s brightest star is passed out in her own abode. I expect she’ll be coming to at any moment,” said the figure. “The Zhelezo will probably come knocking to question her on her abrupt disappearance from the ball, but that’s hardly my concern.”

He stepped into the light. That was when Guinevere realized he was an eisfuura, the first one she had ever seen in the flesh. What she had thought was an overly long nose was in reality an eagle’s beak, and the tufts were a frill of brown-and-white feathers around his head. What she had assumed were robes were actually feathers, dangling from his elongated arms like a shaggy pelt.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“My name is Accanfal.”

It clicked neatly into place. It fit in her mind, this thing that she had forgotten. This name that she had heard in a dream.

He pointed to something beside her, calling her attention to it for the first time since she woke. It was the pearwood trunk. “And your father stole that from me.”

“It’s not stealing to win a bet.”

Accanfal let out a raucous, cawing laugh. “Isthatwhat Illiard told you?”

Guinevere fell silent.

“You don’t even know what this treasure is, do you?” Accanfal sneered. “I sailed from my native Marquet to hunt it down. I followed the trail of arcane whispers to the ruins of the elves. And there it was. A trove of enchanted jewelry, each piece brimming with elemental power.” He strode over to the trunk and dragged his talons over its lid in what was almost a loving caress. “The Duskmaven’s Parure.”

The Duskmaven. Yes. Goddess of Death. Matron of Ravens. That explained the magic she’d sensed within when she touched the trunk back in Zadash. She should have brought it up the moment Wensleydale told her all that rot about the set belonging to House Truscan, but she hadn’t wanted to cause a stir. Hadn’t wanted him to know about her magic.

Now that Accanfal had moved closer to the light, Guinevere noted the jewelry he wore. An emerald ring. An emerald bracelet. A diamond-studded emerald pendant.

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