“I told him what he expected. That you were a worthless half-Fae, bound to my brother.”

“Why?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. She couldn’t imagine that it was out of the goodness of her black heart.

“I see magic in color. Elementals are the easiest. Their affinity is shown in the color—blue for water, red for fire, yellow for air, and green for earth. The colors blend for multiple infinities. For instance, a fire and air user usually show up orange. For users with all four, they blend together. Arbor, for instance, looks pink at the edges. Fordham, with his inherited black smoke, has black and gray edges. But you …” She tilted her head at her. “You’re altogether different. You’re golden and as blinding as the sunlight. I’ve never seen this sort of magic anywhere else. Except here.”

She put her hand back out and touched the wall.

Kerrigan gulped. “The wall is golden?”

“Yes. Whatever sort of magic was used to put this barrier up, it was done by someone like you.”

Spirit magic. That was the only answer Kerrigan had and one she could never give Wynter. Her spirit magic gave her visions. It’d helped her win the tournament. It let her access the spirit plane as a dragon did—perhaps better than a dragon did. And if she didn’t learn to control it, she would go mad.

But that meant that all the lore about thirteen magical users coming together to put the wall up was a lie. No amount of magical users could do this. Which meant that a thousand years ago, another spiritcaster had existed, and they had bound all the House of Shadows within.

“Why are you telling me this?” Kerrigan asked.

“Like calls to like,” Wynter said.

She took Kerrigan’s hand and pushed it against the wall. A charge snapped against her hand. It made her jump in surprise, as if the magic really were speaking to her. And as she had the first time she’d touched the barrier, something was wrong. Something was intrinsically broken in the spellwork. She could almost see the edges of it, and then she was through to her elbow. The magic couldn’t keep her in, as it did to Wynter. Anger appeared on the princess’s face and then disappeared as quickly.

Kerrigan jerked her hand back out of the barrier. “What was that?”

“The walls are weakening. The thousand-year spell is fracturing at the edges.” Wynter stared, mesmerized by her jailor, before looking at Kerrigan. “And I want you to bring it down.”

10

The Court

Kerrigan’s mind was still reeling when she returned to the rooms. When she found Arbor and Prescott relaxing on the couch, eating out of a bag of chocolate treats, she jumped.

“Gods, don’t scare me like that,” Kerrigan said.

“Out riding?” Arbor asked.

Prescott grinned. “Wynter?”

“Yes.”

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Arbor said.