The Golden Yarn (Mirrorworld 3)

“Yes. She wants you to know that you’re a monster.”

Coming from Therese, that sounded almost like a compliment. It takes one to know one. Inside him, his rage was whispering: Have them both shot. Have their corpses mounted and put on display, like they used to do with your ancestors. But Kami’en knew his greatest successes had been fueled not by his rage but by his ability to control it.

“Spread the word we’re closing in on the Dwarf. And make sure Amalie knows what game her mother is playing.”

Hentzau thumped his fist to his chest. He’d rather have received the order to execute both women, but he was smart enough to know that would’ve meant the death of the prince. And, of course, Therese of Austry knew that as well.

“You should return to Vena, Your Majesty. Albion may soon have a new king. Two more Man-Goyl commanders are offering to return to your banner, and the anarchists in Lotharaine want to cooperate with us. The wind is turning in our favor.” Despite what your Fairy lover is up to. Kami’en knew Hentzau was adding that in his thoughts.

Kami’en looked over the roofs of Moskva.

Why hadn’t she come? Because she knew he was here?

He felt a brief sharp pain—as though he’d lost something he desired more than the soldiers in the courtyard or the son who was alive because of her. But he was afraid to name that something.

Ridiculous

Ever onward, following a trail only the Pup could read. Nerron had followed many trails, but this was the first time he’d had to rely on the eyes of another. Eyes, Nerron? No. Will Reckless was tracking the Dark Fairy without ever looking at the ground. Maybe she was washing away her tracks with the rain that had been falling for days from the endless gray skies. However she was doing it, she wasn’t leaving a single sign, neither on the ground nor in the grass that grew like shaggy hair all over this infernal country. But she couldn’t hide from the boy in whose body her magic had lived.

If it hadn’t been for the occasional lone spire or the outline of a village on the horizon, Nerron would’ve thought she was luring them into a land that belonged only to animals. They were everywhere—deer, boars, beavers, martens, hares, snakes, and toads, as though it were they who were covering the Dark One’s tracks. Nerron and Will’s own trail, in contrast, was very visible and obviously also quite enticing. A pack of wolves, a black bear, and finally a rather oversize Ogre—all had made the mistake of taking Will to be easy prey. But the glassy guardians took care of them so silently that the Pup didn’t even look around. Nerron’s treasure-hunting heart ached from having to leave all that precious metal in the Varangian taiga, but Seventeen had taken his advice to hide at least his larger victims. Nerron marked the places on a map. His personal stash of silver... Not bad. The bear and the Ogre were worth a fortune, for they were still alive. Nerron had reached into one of the wolves’ frozen jaws and had felt warm breath. For how long, who could say?

Will once nearly saw his guardians. Sixteen was getting sloppy. The bark was now all over her body, and at one point she forgot her camouflage when she scraped the wood off her arms. Nerron only just managed to distract the Pup by throwing a stone at his horse. Will’s ignorance gave Nerron confidence that things were still moving according to his plan, but he did feel a little uneasy about how much he was beginning to enjoy the Pup’s company.

The Bastard was a maverick. The last companion he’d grudgingly accepted had been a Waterman, and Nerron had been only too happy to be rid of him again. He definitely hadn’t missed having someone by his side who stopped his horse for every nightingale and who thought it wrong to shoot a deer when it looked at you. Yet he felt he was getting used to Milk-face. Maybe it was the way the Pup asked him about Goyl history. Nerron was the first to admit he loved holding forth about the lost cities and the forgotten wars, about the settling of the Deadly Caves or the expeditions to the Shoreless Lake. He’d never found anyone who would actually listen to his long lectures. He’d even caught himself thinking that he’d like to show it all to Milk-face one day. What was the matter with him? Was he not eating enough? Was it the cold? The rain? Some human virus eating away at his stone heart?

Will turned to him as though he’d heard Nerron’s internal curses.

Yes, the Bastard curses you, Milk-face. And he will sell you. Steal from you. Betray you. It is his nature. You can’t expect the wolf to turn vegetarian because of one Pup.

He gave Will his most devious smile.

And the Pup smiled back with his princeling face. No, his was the face of the poor, noble shepherd boy who, despite being slightly dim, always got the princess in the end. Oh, that sweet icing of innocence—it still made Nerron nauseous. But something in his heart, a tiny, barely nut-sized spot, turned as soft as snail skin when Will asked him when he’d met his first human, or at what age Goyl usually came to the surface. Milk-face seemed to remember more every day—the King’s palace, the Boulevard of the Dead, the Bridge of the Guardians. And he took Nerron with him into his memories, back under the earth, home. In return, Nerron told Milk-face about the things that he hadn’t seen: the living stalactites, the Mirror Caves, the Blue Meadows...and the Pup listened like a child.

Ridiculous.

Dangerous.

“You talk too much. Do I have to remind you we’re in a rush?” Seventeen, wearing his angriest face, had hissed to him last night.

No. Nerron had not forgotten. And yes, this excursion couldn’t be over soon enough. Not just because of the bark that was eating their shimmering companions.

The Bastard liked his stone heart. He had used every blow, every pain and injury, to harden it. Every humiliation, every defeat, and every betrayal life had dealt him—and there had been many. Even a nut-sized soft-spot was more than he could afford.

A Part of Her

The moth fluttered into the carriage like a shred of night. Absurd, how her sister dressed them in red. Black was so much more appropriate for the souls of men who’d chosen this shadow of an existence in the name of love. The Dark One wondered who this one had once been. There were so many who’d drowned themselves for her and her sisters in village ponds or castle fountains. It seemed only just that she was now feeling the same pain she’d inflicted so often. Just...The Dark One wasn’t sure she’d ever used that word before.

Pain bore interesting fruit.

Just like love.

Why did she still need to know what had become of the infant? She wanted to swat the moth away, since it might be bringing her images of the boy. She’d visited the baby a few times in secret, at night, when only the wet nurse was sleeping next to the crib. She’d gently pushed her finger into the tiny fists, and she’d touched his brow to give him the protection of her magic. And she’d been scared of what moved inside her. It would stop as soon as she severed the bond connecting her to the father. Wouldn’t it?

The Dark One caught the moth, and the images came.

A river surrounded by steep and densely wooded slopes. A building, big, old, with whitewashed walls. The Fairy heard the chime of a bell. And the cry of a child. She heard it so clearly, as if it were calling her. A woman stepped out of the gate in front of the building. She was wearing the black habit of a nun. A convent? In contrast to he

r mother, Amalie despised churches. Therese of Austry still prostrated herself every morning in the underground cell where the Goyl were keeping her prisoner. She worshipped her god like she treated her servants: “Look, I am lighting candles for you. Protect me. Grant all my wishes. Destroy my enemies.” Why a convent? Maybe because of the superstition that Fairies dissolved into water if they ever crossed the threshold of a church. Had Amalie forgotten that a Fairy had attended her wedding in the cathedral?