Page 142 of Thief of Souls
A glint of gold echoes in the torchlight. I get a glimpse of a tiny crossbow, and then she pulls the trigger.
I go to Sift, but the tiny bolt slams into my hip just before I make the leap. It jolts me through the shadows, spitting me out on the floor by her feet.
I yank the bolt out of my upper thigh, hissing at her through my teeth. “You think that little prick is going to bring me down?”
“No.” She launches herself at me, the silk of her dress flying. “But this will.”
She throws a handful of powder in my face, and my body reacts before I can think it through. I inhale sharply, even as I try to roll out of the cloud of drug.
Because that’s what it is.
The first acrid taste of the drug coats my tongue. Metallic. Metallic,shit. Snake root. I need to get out of here, get to Keir—
I try to Sift, but the shadows bleed away from me even as my knees hit the marble floor. The entire room is spinning. I knew it worked within seconds, but I didn’t realize it wasthispotent.
“Ismena.” Her face comes into focus as I sway. “Don’t. I saved… your life.”
“And then you threw me to the wolves,” she says, tears streaming down her face as she withdraws something bright and shiny from her pocket.
Light erupts within the room, searing my eyes.
I try to shield them, but it only throws me off-balance, and I slam to the cold tiles. Ismena grabs my hand, locking that burning, searing band of light around my wrist.
“A little gift from the Court of Dawn,” she says. “No more shadows for you.”
Pure light.
Rhea.
I try to scream as she snaps both ends into place. Burning, burning, right through to my bones…. A hand clamps over my mouth, and then my eyes roll back in my head as I taste one last mouthful of snake root.
The last thing I hear is a dragon bellowing before Ismena jerks a turnkey portal from her pocket.
I swear I imagine it—did he somehow sense I was gone?—but then she throws her arms around me and activates the portal.
The world sucks me into a pinprick point.
And then it vanishes.
30
Don’t show a single hint of weakness.
I stalk through the hallways of the Court of Shadows, every nerve in my body screaming at me as dozens of wraiths flock to see me make the long, silent walk toward the throne room. My whole body hurts after I came to in the dungeons nearly two days ago, but it’s the burning brand biting into the skin around my wrist that sets my teeth on edge.
And the presence of my captor.
I underestimated Ismena.
Or maybe I underestimated just how far Ruhle would go.
He prowls just behind me, his leather cloak flaring like bat like wings. “Not quite as mouthy now, little wraith,” he taunts.
Swallowing down the lump in my throat, I try to ignore the burning manacles around my wrists. I tried to Sift out of the dungeon, but the light merely burned right through me, leaving me shaking and gasping on the floor. I can’t Sift right now, but I’ll get free. Somehow. Falion manipulated the light. That has to mean I might be able to do it too. And I’m too valuable to my father for him to break me and toss me to the scrap heap….
It doesn’t still the nervous twisting in my stomach.
He doesn’t need me whole, after all, and there are many tortures I can survive.
