Shifting my gaze in the direction of Trollus, I leaned my elbows against the stone parapet, only vaguely aware of those who’d followed. My father had told Cécile of his intention to take the Isle peaceably, and to a certain extent I believed him. To that end, I knew his target would be Trianon, because whoever held the capital and its leaders controlled the Isle. Right now, I held the city, and it had to stay that way.

A vision of what I needed formed in my mind, and I let magic drift out and away, shaping it with willpower and practice. The walls surrounding Trianon began to glow with silver light until they appeared more magic than stone. And then I made them higher. Up and up the wall of light climbed, curving inward until the city was encased in a massive dome of magic.

“Is that to keep your kind out or us in?”

I turned. Fred, the Regent, and one other man, whom I presumed was his advisor, stood with their faces turned to the sky. Lady Marie shivered beside them, lips drawn into a thin line as she waited for an answer to her question.

“Both,” I said, neglecting to add that my father and a handful of others had enough power to break through, should they feel inclined. The purpose was not to stop a frontal attack, but to keep anyone from sneaking up on me unawares. My father didn’t want a war – he wanted to pull strings until everything fell into place. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t resort to force if necessary. “It will buy us time to plan.”

“Us?” she snarled. “If your interests were so aligned with ours, why didn’t you let Anushka be? If she was still alive, none of this would be happening.”

And Cécile would be dead, with me along with her. And my people would remain at the mercy of my enemies. “The costs were too high.” I hesitated. “I’ve come to believe there’s a better way.”

“Is that what you told Cécile to convince her to help you kill her mother?”

It had been very much the other way around, but I was content to let her believe I was the instigator. The Regent was staring at his wife as though she were a stranger, confirming he’d had no idea that Marie was harboring the witch he’d been hunting on our behalf.

“Genevieve de Troyes was one of the many aliases Anushka used over the years,” I said.

“And you knew?” the Regent demanded of his wife. “You harbored her? Do you have any idea what they would have done to us if they’d discovered your betrayal?” It dawned on him then that one of them stood less than two paces away. “I didn’t know.”

“Clearly,” I said, wondering how well he was going to take the revelation of his son’s betrayal. “But no longer relevant. What matters now is the defense of Trianon.”

They stepped aside for me as I made my way back to the heavy door. Cécile was moving through the castle, her distress biting at my concentration. I wanted to talk to her, to find out what was going on in her head, but what I needed was to focus on discovering the plans of both my father and Angoulême. And Winter.