Page 122 of Silvercloak

He shrugged, as though this settled matters.

Saffron decided to push her luck, to follow her detective’s instincts. “What kind of prophecies do you share with Levan?”

“Aha, now you’ve overstepped, my darling.” He pushed off the wall and blew her an elaborate Bellandrian air-kiss: three smooches, pressed against the tips of his fingers. “Tell Levan I miss hisvock.”

“I probably won’t,” Saffron replied drily.

Once Harrow’s clipped footsteps had disappeared around the corner with a swoosh of navy cloak, Saffron opened the door to Levan’s chambers. Rasso padded in beside her, nuzzling at her hip, a smudge of silver-white in the low light of the glimmering candles.

It was late, and exhaustion pressed into Saffron from all angles. A heavy, breathless force that felt like the stifling heat of Lyrian’s fire. It had been a fraught few hours inside a fraught few weeks inside a fraught life, and there was still no end in sight. She was back to square one thanks to the botched raids, and she doubted the Bloodmoons would be so lax with their ledgers going forward.

How in the hells would she ever bring them to justice? It would be even harder for the Silvercloaks to secure a warrant after the chaos of the failed dock raid.

But she couldn’t think about that right now. She just had to keep moving forward.

The first thing she did upon entering Levan’s room was slide a hand under his bed and pull out the discarded wand. Tucking it into her cloak pocket, she wasn’t quite sure why she felt the need to retrieve it—only that the idea of it falling into Lyrian’s hands felt dangerous, somehow.

Then she crossed to the writing desk and tapped her own wand tip against the third drawer down. “Baudry’s bitch.” She allowed herself a soft chuckle at the password. Only Levan.

The drawer shook itself loose, and she opened it to find a neat apothecary of various salves and medicinal herbs, all alphabetized and dated as to when they were brewed.

Why did he need to password-protect this?

Almost at once, the question answered itself.

There, in a small wooden trinket box, was a label that saidloxlure.

Was it used as pain relief in some of his salves? If so, it made sense that he had to keep it under lock and key. Castian was openly an addict, along with Saints knew how many others. Hells, Levan himself had to be tempted. It was the ultimate test of his own self-control to keep it right there in his room. He must have a will of iron to resist day after day.

She grabbed the salve he’d requested—a pale turquoise jar, topped with wax-sealed paper.She wondered why he would ever use a salve on himself instead of healing the wound magically, as he was perfectly able to do. Were some curse wounds immune tomederan? She tried to remember from her mother’s practice but came up empty.

Saff hated the feeling that more and more of her mother was being lost to the murky past. It was like trying to cup water in your hands; no matter how tightly you pressed your fingers together, it would slowly, inevitably, slip away.

She was just about to leave when another thought came to her.

The notebook in the bottom drawer—the one she’d been unable to pry open the last time she snooped in this room. She’d wondered at the time if it might have been a ledger.

She pulled it out of the drawer, running a finger over its plain spine.

Once more, she tapped her wand and said, “Baudry’s bitch.”

It fell open on a random page in the first quarter of the notebook.

A journal. The page was dated around six months ago, and Levan’s narrow cursive handwriting looped and swirled all over the parchment. Saff’s heart leapt into her mouth.

SORDING, 14 MAGNÁRIEL, YEAR 1174

Almost three years since Alucia died. A thousand days, and I have felt every single one.

They say time heals all wounds, but even with my mother’s wand and a fallowwolf by my side, I cannot convince the slippery seconds and minutes and hours to obey. To wind back the clock to before Alucia was killed.

What use is Rezaran blood if it cannot move time like a tide? I am a slave to its relentless forward march, leaving everyone I have ever loved dead in its wake. Though in truth, Alucia was never mine to love. That much is horribly clear.

How much loss can one person take before the lure of lox becomes too strong to resist?

Saffron slammed the journal shut, chest pounding.

Alucia had been dead for threeyears?

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