Total pages in book: 134
Estimated words: 127026 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 635(@200wpm)___ 508(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127026 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 635(@200wpm)___ 508(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
“But what if all the books weren’t burned?” Kerrigan said.
“It is possible,” Movanna said pensively. “I feel it’s more likely that they retained old artifacts when they were initially rounded up.”
Audria and Roake asked a string of additional questions, but Kerrigan was off in her head. She could now see the path for how the Red Masks had gotten that many artifacts into the hands of the House of Shadows. They had found a way to create new magical artifacts. The Collector might be ancient, but the ones they had fought during the battle were likely new models.
She didn’t feel any closer to finding the Collector, but while she waited for a dispensation from the council, she at least had more knowledge. And knowledge was power.
After class, she headed back up to her rooms to work on the paper that Movanna had assigned about the artifacts. Benton and Bayton had lunch spread out in the dining area when she arrived.
“Thank you so much,” she said with a sigh. “How has your day been?”
“We spoke to Mistress Helly, as directed, and she is in the process of certifying our place in your household. She said paperwork would be sent to you, and then we would get a stipend from your salary,” Benton said.
“Which is unnecessary,” Bayton said. “We love our new life, miss—Kerrigan. We don’t need our own money.”
She waved this same old argument off. Soon, she’d have the entire House of Cruse behind her. She could afford to pay them, and she had every intention of doing so. “You’re getting paid regardless.”
Benton shot Bayton a look that said, Drop it, and came forward. “We also received this letter.”
Kerrigan winced, anticipating the same letter Audria had been waving around with excitement. She didn’t need an invitation to her own party, but she didn’t put it past March to do it. As if she needed the reminder.
But when Kerrigan looked at it, she didn’t recognize the carefully scrawled handwriting, and there was no return address.
“Thank you.”
She ripped it open and read through it once, her eyes going wide.
The letter was no more than a handful of lines in an unfamiliar scrawl.
It should have meant so little.
Yet it meant so much.
Arbor and Prescott had made it out of Lethbridge.
15
THE LETTER
Kerrigan grabbed her cloak without another word and raced out of the mountain.
Arbor and Prescott weren’t in the House of Shadows. Somehow, the two of them had made it into Kinkadia.
As they were Fordham’s closest family, she had gotten to know them well in the weeks that she was at court in Ravinia Mountain. They were an odd pair, but their affection for Fordham was unmatched. If they were reaching out to her, then she felt obligated to respond.
She came upon the apartment just large enough for two above a chocolatier shop in Central. It wasn’t much, but it was better than most refugees could manage. From what she had heard, the majority of half-Fae and humans were crowding the already-crowded Dregs. But Arbor and Prescott were neither half-Fae nor human. They were full-blooded Fae nobles.
It had taken her a half hour of moving through the streets and backtracking to make sure that she wasn’t being followed before she located the apartment. March was clearly watching her, and the last thing she wanted was for him to discover this particular secret.
Kerrigan trekked up the stairs and then knocked twice on the faded blue door. A pair of bright blue eyes, set in dark features, appeared on the other side of the door. For a moment, Kerrigan couldn’t stop staring. The face was so similar to Fordham’s in so many ways. The chiseled jawline, the black hair, the hardened expression. Only those blue eyes were wrong. He should have had thunderclouds in his irises, not the ocean.
“Kerrigan,” Prescott said with a sharp smile.
He drew the door wider, and she got a full look at him in a fine black shirt and fitted pants. The bounce to his step had never left despite whatever they had gone through to get here.
“I came at once,” she said with a smile. She held the letter up as proof.
“Come in,” he said, opening the door wider.
She stepped inside the sparse apartment. It was hardly large enough for the grandeur of the pair. With a few small chairs, rough around the edges, and an open door revealed one bedroom beyond with a bed low to the floor. Arbor was seated on a chair when she entered. Her face brightened as she caught sight of Kerrigan. She rose to her full height. Her raven hair was loose to her curvy waist. She wore a House of Shadows black-and-silver dress and bright red lips.
“Kerrigan,” Arbor said, rushing forward and wrapping her arms around her.
Kerrigan hugged Fordham’s cousin in shock. “I can’t believe you’re here.”