When he’s done, Cancarnette arches one eyebrow. “Isn’t that a little premature?” His eyes skate around the room. “How are we to execute a treaty between four parties, when only three are present?”
I resist the urge to remind him that we talked about this in the meetings, if he had bothered to attend. Instead, I point to the line on the page where it says Solaria will become part of the Adjacent Realms if its people should wish it. “Marcus accounted for that.”
“Well, if the Innkeeper says so.” He takes my pen and smiles indulgently as he signs. As he passes the treaty back to me—his signature bold and looping at the bottom—I’m bothered by the sense he isn’t taking this, taking me, seriously.
At least he didn’t refuse outright. I feared that might be the case, seeing as lots of the Fiorden and Byrnisian delegates probably still hate Solarians. They’re governed—as I was until recently—by stories of soul-devouring, shapeshifter monsters, fiery-eyed and sharp-clawed creatures who would tear you limb from limb just for the joy of it. Two weeks ago, we were hunting my friend Taya in the woods with knives and guns. But she saved me … us … Havenfall from the Silver Prince. I admit I was hoping for a little more enthusiasm from Cancarnette.
Still, Cancarnette isn’t wrong. This is a hollow treaty, tonight a hollow celebration, seeing as we don’t have any actual Solarians here. Not since Taya disappeared into the golden light of the Solarian doorway and the door sealed closed behind her, leaving only a blank wall of stone.
I have no way to reach her, no way to know if she’s even alive. There’s nothing I can do to help her—nothing at all, except to do my best to make this world safe for when she comes back.
She has to come back, right?
I can’t think about that now, or I’ll lose heart. I blink and focus on my surroundings, trying to get the image of her face in my mind—her radiant, powerful expression in the moment before she slipped through the door to Solaria—to recede.
But it doesn’t, and I feel suddenly claustrophobic, suffocated. Everything is color and music and light and laughter now, but suddenly I feel the aches and pains left over in my muscles from the fight with the Silver Prince. The Prince himself might be gone, but he’s taken with him the unconditional trust and happiness I once felt within these walls. Now I know it’s possible for enemies to enter here, and everything feels a little warped, a little off, tainted.
It’s impossible to know for sure that everyone in this room means us well. I learned my lesson about blind trust, and it came at a cost.
2
The night has only just started, but I need a breather. Before I can think too much about it, I hurry from the ballroom, walking fast but aimlessly down the hall until the noise from the dancing recedes. A moment ago I was nervous but confident; now I feel raw, panicked, like the task facing me is impossible. And the last thing I need is for the delegates to see me freak out. I don’t want to go all the way back up to my room, but I think I need to be alone. Fortunately, Marcus gave me a copy of all the inn’s keys.
In the small, secure room that Marcus calls the armory, silver glitters all around me, and I feel the weight of souls in the air. A tiny window set close to the ceiling lets in orange sunset light, but only a little. The air is chilly and smells like pine, and it’s blissfully silent.
But as soon as the door closes behind me, I realize I chose the wrong place to calm my nerves. It’s usually empty in here, but now silver objects stacked on shelves all around me catch and refract the sunlight, turning it strange and cold.
Jewelry—rings and necklaces and bracelets, earrings dripping with jewels, goblets and coins, vases and candlesticks and any other small precious thing you could think of—all of it is here. Once, I would have thought the pearlescent silver beautiful. It still is, but I can never look at the pieces the same way again, now that I know what they’re used for. Now that I know the truth beneath the surface … that they’re black market soul-silver. I can’t look at any of it without feeling an overwhelming knot of guilt and dread in my stomach.
I only learned about the silver trade—the soul trade—a few weeks ago. I’d always been taught the same thing about the Adjacent Realms that Cancarnette said a few minutes ago—that only people can possess magic, not objects. But it turns out that isn’t entirely true. Someone has been capturing Solarians and binding slivers of their souls, like pieces of string, to silver. The metal can then become enchanted with bits of magic—like Fiorden healing magic, or Byrnisian fire-wielding powers.
It seems silly now that I thought I could find anything out about the soul trade with a few indirect questions tossed casually to the delegates. While we know of some of the human buyers—the Heiress got their names when she was working with them and pretending to be one of them—there are no records of who brought the objects in or out of the other Realms.
Turning around in this small room, I meet the worried gaze of a hundred warped reflections. I want to believe that my beloved Havenfall wasn’t the focal point, that the stolen souls didn’t pass through here. But if the traders come from Fiordenkill or Byrn, the inn is the only place they can exist outside of their own respective worlds. Byrnisians and Fiordens have been known to leave the safety of the inn’s walls and walk into the town of Haven for short periods of time, but they can’t go farther than that without getting sick. If the soul traders aren’t smuggling silver through the inn or town, they must have access to the Realms somewhere else in order to smuggle the magic between worlds.
Could it really be possible? That there are other ways to enter other Realms? Marcus thinks that the world used to have more doorways, that Havenfall wasn’t always the only one. When I was a kid, that possibility seemed wondrous, and I often wished that I would stumble upon a doorway in a janitor’s closet at school or in the fallow fields behind my mom’s house. But now the idea makes me sick with worry. There’s just so much, and we don’t know about all of it.
Music drifts in through the closed door. The Elemental Orchestra has started playing a merry jaunt. I should be headed back already. I have a job to do tonight. I can’t let myself get derailed so easily going forward.
I take a deep breath and remind myself that this, what I’m doing, is in service to the captive souls. We need to know how the objects are being made, how they are getting into Havenfall, and who’s doing it. Maybe it’s someone in the ballroom right now.
I reach up to touch a silver vase, not really for courage, more as a reminder of what I have to do. Why tonight is important. Why I have to succeed.
Then I arrange my face into a smile and slip from the armory, pulling my shoulders back as I stride down the hall and back toward the ballroom.
The first thing I notice upon reentering is that Brekken is here. He stands by the entrance just inside the ballroom, as if he is waiting for me. I witness the moment he notices me, watch the sweet, startled smile unfurl across his face.
Seeing him is strange—it quiets and amplifies my nerves at the same time. Makes my heart feel light, but also makes it beat faster and unevenly. He looks amazing in a short velvet cape hanging smartly off his sharply angled shoulders—finery he hasn’t worn since that first night he arrived at Havenfall. His copper hair is combed back to accentuate his handsome face and brilliant blue eyes.