“And why does that matter to them?” What do they get out of it?
Her perfectly symmetrical eyebrows arch. “Because you are powerful, and you are now bound to them as they are to you.”
“Because of Ulysede.”
She smiles.
“If I’m their queen, can I order them to not open the Nulling?” That would end the blood curse and yet stop Malachi and untold monsters from flooding this world.
“That is impossible.”
“Why?”
“Because it is all connected. The Nulling shall open, my masters will return, and their power will heal the lands.”
“Are you saying the nymphs are in the Nulling?”
“It is all connected.”
I still don’t understand. “But Farren was a key caster too. How did she open the Nulling and not the nymphaeum door?”
“She did not open the Nulling, she tore into it. She did not hold the right key. My masters did not return.” Lucretia drags a nail along my forearm, tracing one of the blue lines.
“You mean, my blood.”
“The blood of the Daughter of Many and Queen for All.” She pauses to study me before moving off again. “Caster Farren tore a hole into the Nulling by channeling her affinity through one of the stones, yes. But without my masters here, the fates cannot pass through.”
Lucretia’s words strike a chord. “One of the stones. How many are there?”
She waves a hand around the room toward the nymph scripture on the wall.
It dawns on me. “These are all nymphaeum stones? Like the one in Cirilea?”
“They are all connected.” She strolls over to a rectangular engraving across from me. “Go ahead.”
I follow her and run my finger across the script. Childish laughter rings in my ears. “That didn’t work before.”
“Others no longer work. This one does. Channel your affinity into it and see for yourself,” she coaxes.
“Which affinity?”
Lucretia’s laughter is taunting, as if I should be ashamed that I don’t know the answer. “The Daughter of Many does not choose one over the other. Let them merge until they are as one, and you will know power like none other.”
“That’s not what Gesine taught me.”
“Your wielder servant?” More laughter. “What little she knows of the Queen for All’s abilities.”
Gesine did insist I learn what I can from Lucretia.
With a deep but wary breath, I follow her instructions, tugging on the threads that rise from my core, coaxing them to wind together. The power thrums inside me, growing in intensity by the second, until it vibrates with a level that feels almost overwhelming, like it might tear me apart.
It reminds me of that moment before I killed the grif.
“Good.” She applauds, as if she can see what I’m doing.
“What can I do with this?”
“What can’t you do with it?” She nods toward the stone. “Send it there. Gently. Not too much. Just a little tap.”
I release the bound thread, and it reaches toward the scripture on the wall like a long, tentative finger. The second it touches, the stone changes shape. It’s no longer just an engraving in a wall. Now it’s a tall rectangular stone.
My breath catches.
I’ve seen this one before … in Cirilea’s nymphaeum.
My mouth gapes as I take in the soaring trees and feel the cool air. I’m literally standing in Cirilea again.
This is what Lucretia meant when she said they’re all connected. They’re doors.
A smile stretches across my face as I turn, seeing the familiar pillars again, the stone altar …
The two forms mere feet away from me.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
GRACEN
Fikar strolls into the kitchens, his arms loaded with silver wine jugs. “Did ya hear? The king executed a lord in the middle of the assembly! Just cut off his head with a swing of his sword!”
The bowl in my hands slips with his outburst, clattering against the stone floor, shattering.
Atticus executed a lord? Himself?
I settle on my knees to collect the shattered clay and bits of pastry dough. He did allude to doing something drastic at that assembly. Something that his father and brother were not willing to do.
“And he threw all the eastern lords into the dungeons, accusing them of a plot to overthrow him. They say he has gone mad.”
He has not gone mad! They have been plotting. Lady Saoirse herself is a part of it! But I bite my tongue against the urge to defend him. Everything Atticus told me, he told me in confidence.