Page 6 of House of the Raven
Calierin finds a bottle inside a hole in the wall and hands it over. I tip it to Elassan’s lips, and he takes a labored sip.
Kadewyn lifts the male’s shirt and examines the wound. He throws me a wary glance and shakes his head slightly.
“They… g-got Unmenar,” Elassan says hoarsely.
“Dead?” Kadewyn seeks to clarify.
Elassan nods his head once, then goes utterly still. Dead, too.
Kadewyn closes the dead male’s eyes. “May the winds carry your essence to the Glimmer.”
I stand abruptly and turn toward the wall. How many more of my people must die in this godsforsaken, accursed realm? How can I feel guilt over those we kill when they do the same to us?
“Damn humans!” Calierin pounds a fist on the wall. She wears her anger on the surface.
Kadewyn leaves, then comes back with help. “See that Elassan is taken care of.”
They gather his remains and take him further into the catacombs. They’ll have no trouble finding a place for him, but he shouldn’t have to sleep eternally in this rotten land. He should be laid to rest in Tirnanog and be forever protected by Faoloir, god of all creatures.
The excitement over today’s plunder will be bashed by another friend’s death. There is so little to enjoy.
When will we get out of here?
It’s the same question I’ve asked myself for so long.
We sit quietly for an entire hour, passing around the bottle, wishing it actually contained feyglen instead of the cheapest human wine. Feyglen is made from grapes that only grow in Tirnanog. It is sweeter and stronger, what I need right now to put me out of my misery for at least a few hours.
“How do we divide it?” Kadewyn asks, breaking the silence. He points toward the trinkets on the table because that’s what they are: jewels and gold from the human nobility who think strongboxes in guarded keepscan protect their gaudy accessories. But no lock is safe from Kadewyn’s kind of magic.
“Rífíor?” he presses when I don’t respond.
The humans call me River, mispronouncing the name I chose for myself when I stopped wandering this realm and came to the capital. The veilfallen correctly call me Rífíor, a common enough name in Tirnanog, but a fake one, after all. I will soon go by a third name. Will it suit me better?
“Same as always,” I respond.
He nods.
After half of the pile is taken away and distributed amongst the poorest fae families in the city, every veilfallen will receive an equal part. They risk their lives every day. It’s the least they deserve.
After paying everyone, Kadewyn returns with food and drink. I guzzle the rancid-tasting wine in one go and ignore the chunk of bread and dry meat.
I stare at the ground and run a hand down my face, feeling the jagged edges of my scar. I’m still feeling annoyed that a human girl bested me. Fate put her in my path, and l allowed her to slip through my fingers. But that’s all right. My new plan is already in motion, and perhaps this is the one that will ultimately lead me to the escape I yearn for, although I still fear my quest may not conclude anytime soon.
It’s not that I’m jaded. It’s simply that I’m beginning to think I deserve this curse.
3
VALERIA
“I yearn for peace in the realm, but the other tribes remain resistant. If only there were a means to unite us all.”
Lorenzo el Valiente (Casa Escalante) - Tribal Leader - 100 BV
Father hasn’t said a word. He sits in his favorite chair in his study, arms crossed, jaw set. Amira stands behind him, looking just as stern. They are unified against me, as always. Against Jago, too, who shuffles from foot to foot next to me, making this a repeat of many past occasions.
Rey Simón Plumanegra the Third is a man of fifty with graying blond hair, olive skin, and clear blue eyes. He wears a closely cropped beard and is as fit as an ox. He likes hard labor and has never shied away from it. He practices with the Guardia Real in the lower courtyard every morning, rides his stallion in the palace woods in the evenings, and mucks up his own stall afterward.
Amira Plumanegra, my older sister, is twenty-five and the future queen. She acts as if she were my mother sometimes, but it’s Father she resembles more and more as time goes by—not physically, mind you, temperamentally. He’s shaping her to be the monarch Castella needs, which is taking all the fun out of her.
