He’s … bizarrely beautiful, with high cheekbones and a regal nose. Long black hair twines around his neck and shoulders. His equally dark lashes cast shadows against his cheeks. His ears taper into a sharp point, like all highborn shamans.

There’s a greenish tint to his skin, but not the foul green of decay. The body is perfectly preserved. The green adds an almost vibrant sheen to his pale skin, as if he has become a part of the moss that’s overtaken his tomb. A small puncture wound darkens the skin at the base of his neck, like from a spider’s bite. A clear liquid seeps from the wound.

This shaman has been here a very long time.

Swallowing uneasily, I lean in so that his mouth almost touches my cheek and then hold utterly still. Not a hint of breath. He’s dead.

And yet, his power continues to press around me, a distorted oiliness that wants to catch in the flame of my magic. What kind of shaman could possess a power so immense that even death can’t silence it?

One who has been blackened by unnatural magic, whose soul was so shattered that he defied death by living off the souls of others. I shake my head, reeling.

The Soulless.

TWENTY-FOUR

Impossible. How can I be staring into the face of the most powerful and terrible soulrender Thiy has ever known? He lived six hundred years ago, as old as Ronin.

I’ve had it all so unbelievably wrong. Ronin’s familiar isn’t anchoring the spirits to the Dead Wood. The Soulless is, along with the same dark magic that created this place—a magic that has continued to distort and corrode until it’s become a poison, a rot seeping into the trees and the spirits. And infecting other spirits as well, including familiars.

I release a slow, tremulous breath. How could Ronin have done this?

Then again, Ronin desecrated an entire troll graveyard to build his manor house. I suppose it’s not so unlikely that he would have preserved the Soulless’s corpse in order to possess the magic that remained in his bones. I don’t know how he’s doing it, but he’s using the Soulless like a human talisman, amplifying his power.

But also corrupting it. Could this be why Ronin is losing control of the Dead Wood?

“Someone has wandered into my web,” says a soft voice.

I stiffen and look over my shoulder. Ronin stands at the other end of the greenhouse. Every muscle in my body tenses as I scan the room for his familiar. But still, there is nothing. Quickly, I climb back down.

Ronin, his gaze steady, lets me. When I’m on the ground, I turn to face him. His shadow stretches slowly around his feet, inky arms extending across the floor until the shape of an enormous spider rests at his back.