He sounded almost dreamy, like he was babbling about a crush. Briony shuddered. Cursemakers had a reputation for being kind of creepy, and she was starting to understand why. Nobody should have that much love for something designed to hurt others.
But your family loves the tournament, whispered a little voice in her head. She pushed it down.
“Why are you even talking to me?” she asked. “Shouldn’t you be listening to my sister give you a sales pitch for why you should grant her all your nastiest wares?”
Reid snorted. “Oh, my shop received a visit from a certain government representative last week. She had quite a lot of questions about what cursework had helped champions prevail in the past. Let’s just say I have a feeling I know which family she was asking about: powerful enough to have a real shot at winning, but far easier to control than the Lowes or the Blairs. I bet your sister already has all the spellstones she could possibly need. That’s probably why the government chose her as champion—she’s compliant.”
Briony gaped at him. She tried to speak, but the Sworn to Secrecy snagged on her vocal cords. Magick flared around her, white specks shimmering in the air.
“Interesting,” Reid murmured, stepping closer to her. “So it is true.”
“I—” Briony gasped out. “You—How—？”
Reid shrugged. “It was only a theory until just now, honestly.”
Briony hadn’t broken her oath, but it didn’t matter. The truth was out there, and Agent Yoo’s involvement could ruin the Thorburns’ credibility.
“Please don’t tell anyone,” she said hastily, relieved to find that the words spilled freely now.
“Oh, don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me. But I do wonder … doesn’t it bother you, knowing that your family bent their traditions? The high magick belongs to your families, after all. Why help anyone else claim it?”
Yes, it did bother her, but Briony didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of any more uncomfortable truths.
“My family’s choices are none of your business.”
“But they are your business,” Reid said crisply. “Have fun being a good little Thorburn, then. If that’s what you really want.”
He left her by the fountain with a sarcastic goodbye wave. Briony watched him go, fury coursing through her. But it wasn’t because of his pushy questions—it was at herself. For not being brave enough to ask those questions on her own.
Why would her family—her powerful, proud family—let one book cast aside hundreds of years of tradition?
Something was beginning to rise in Briony. Not an idea, exactly, but the beginnings of one, winking in the back of her mind like a bit of raw magick waiting to be collected and honed into something greater. She slipped out of the garden into the giant manor house that had belonged to her family for longer than anyone could remember. It was the home where she and Innes had grown up, always surrounded by relatives and yet never truly belonging with any of them. Briony rushed up the spiral staircase to her room and knelt on the woolen rug at the foot of her bed.
Copies of A Tradition of Tragedy had been anonymously delivered to all seven of the tournament families on the day of its release. Briony had been the one to find the package on the Thorburns’ doorstep, and she’d told everyone that she’d destroyed it. They’d been pleased, and they’d had no reason to question her.
But the same curious part of her that was stirring now had secretly kept the book. She drew it out from beneath her mattress and swept off a layer of dust. The cover was lurid and distasteful: dozens of photos and portraits of previous champions, each filtered with an unforgiving red.
Briony took a deep, shuddering breath, and flipped to the first page.
ALISTAIR LOWE
The Lowes win even when no one expects it, even when another champion is deemed the strongest or the favorite. And the rest of us are left to ask how.
We never get an answer.
A Tradition of Tragedy
Alistair wandered through his memories in his dreams. In the first, he was seven years old, and his ankle was tied to his bedpost.
“They’re called nightcreepers,” his mother said. She had a low, melodic sort of voice, perfect for narrating stories. And the Lowes loved to tell stories, especially after dark. “They only emerge when it’s pitch-black, so you can never see them.” She switched off the lights in his bedroom and began to close the door with a creak.
Alistair cried and furiously tugged at the cord, which was secured with a magickal knot. “No! Don’t—”