“We don’t like you very much,” said Lila, letting the chains pour from one hand to the other. “And we trust you even less.”
She held out the gold chains, but as Nadiya reached to take them, Lila’s hand closed over the top, and they glowed, and then melted, dripping between her fingers.
“No,” yelped the queen, lunging forward, too late, but instead of stepping out of her path, Lila stepped in to meet her, free hand vising around Nadiya’s throat.
The queen tensed beneath the grip, tried to pull back, pull free, but Lila took hold of Nadiya’s bones and forced them still.
“How does it feel?” she growled. “To be helpless? To be bound? At the mercy of someone else’s will?”
“I’m sorry,” gasped Nadiya.
“You’re sorry?”
“Alucard told me,” rasped the queen, struggling for breath. “About Berras. What he did.”
“Someone gave those chains to Berras Emery.” Lila’s grip tightened on the queen’s throat. “Was it you?”
Something flashed in Nadiya’s eyes, then. Not guilt, but righteous anger. “I would never.” Lila scowled, but didn’t let go. Nadiya’s face colored. Her pulse raged beneath Lila’s hand. A heart, like a candle, so easy to snuff out.
And then the queen met her gaze. “So keen to do—” she gasped, “—the Hand’s work—for them?”
Lila sighed and flung the queen away. She crashed back into the table, caught herself there. She lifted a hand to her throat. Her fingertips were shaking.
“You and I may not see eye to eye,” said Nadiya, “but I am not your enemy. The chains were stolen.”
“By who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Bullshit,” hissed Lila. “Nothing happens in this place without your knowing.”
Nadiya scowled. “Someone betrayed my trust. Believe me,” she said. “I want to find out who.”
“That’s the problem, Your Majesty,” said Lila, the wind picking up around her as she spoke, sweeping clear the tables and emptying the shelves. “I don’t believe you. I don’t trust you. And the next time you even think of creating something like those chains, I will turn you to stone and use your lifeless statue as a coatrack.”
With that, Lila turned and left the workshop, the wind dying in her wake as the remnants of paper and spell fluttered down like ash around the queen.
* * *
Alucard forced himself down the prison steps, one by one by one, steeling himself for what he’d face when he reached the bottom.
Of the four cells that composed the royal jail, three again were empty. There, in the last, where Tes had briefly been, was Berras. He sat on the stone floor, his back against the wall, his face in shadow. A heavy bandage was wound tight around one hand, where the fingers were missing. The cloth was red where the blood had wept, a patch of wall stained too, as if he had been hitting the same place, over and over, wondering which of them would crack first.
There were no soldiers standing guard. Alucard had sent them all away. His brother had already poisoned enough minds against the palace. He would not get the chance to ruin more.
The first thing Alucard had done last night, upon leaving the Emery estate, was order it torn down. He’d gone that very morning, to make sure it was done. And as he stood on the bare spot where the house had once been, he’d felt an overwhelming peace. A burden finally set down. A weight released.
Staring at his brother now, he felt no such relief, but the same grim resolve. Alucard straightened his coat as he crossed to the cell. He had chosen to dress in red and gold that day. Not a hint of Emery blue. His hair was pinned back with a chalice and sun, and at the sight of it, Berras sneered.
“I thought it would please you,” said Alucard, “that I wear these colors instead of yours.”
“No matter what you wear,” said Berras, rising to his feet, “it won’t change what you are, little brother.”
“And what is that?” asked Alucard blandly.
His brother approached the bars. “A disgrace.”
Alucard smiled. “Once upon a time, those words would have cut, as surely as a blade. Now I see them for what they are. The last punches of a man who’s lost his fight. What would Father say, if he could see you now? His oldest son, arrested for treason. Would he be proud, that you tried to overthrow the empire? Or simply disappointed that you failed?”
Berras’s good hand gripped the bars, squeezing until his scarred knuckles went pink, then white.