I twitched, feeling something slam against the magic of the dome with enough force that I knew it had been no human. But before I could raise the alarm, I felt another series of thuds. A pattern. One I hadn’t heard since the days when I held secret meetings in the Dregs.

“Do you know where she is?” Fred’s voice pulled me back to the council chambers, and I focused on Cécile.

“Far end of the castle,” I said, then hesitated. She seemed further than that, if not by much. Which if she was sleeping, made no sense at all. “Something’s not right.” I said, then a wave of dizziness sent me staggering. A sudden wakefulness accompanied by pain and panic.

“Stones and sky, Cécile,” I swore, righting myself. “What have you done?”

Chapter 7

Cécile

Roland sat straight-backed in a chair before an easel in Angoulême’s parlor. His brow was softer than usual, cheeks rounded with a smile as he dipped a brush in a dollop of crimson paint and began adding deft little touches to the piece. He was strikingly talented, his subject represented in exquisite detail. Unfortunately.

“Macabre,” the Queen murmured over my shoulder. “But the boy is naught but a tool in your enemy’s arsenal.” The view shifted, Roland relegated to the periphery in favor of Angoulême and Lessa, who stood bent over a map covered in what appeared to be golden Guerre pieces. He was dressed as was his custom, but she wore what I could only describe as armor: dull black leather reinforced with crimson scales. A sword hung at her side and she awkwardly touched the pommel from time to time in a way Anaïs never would’ve. How Angoulême had not recognized she was an impostor was beyond me.

“You’ll take him and the rest of your party down the Ocean Road while my mother sets our plans into action in Courville,” he said, tracing a finger along the map. “Don’t waste your time on the smaller hamlets – we have others who will manage those.”

“Not even to make a point?” she asked. “His Highness might enjoy that.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Roland smile.

Angoulême shook his head. “Make a point of those who refuse to swear allegiance to him. To him,” he repeated, turning to Lessa. “Tristan has shown an unwillingness to harm his brother in the past, and we can use that to our advantage. The sooner we swell our ranks, the sooner we can set humans to fighting humans. Tristan will be distracted with the task of keeping them from slaughtering each other, and then we’ll make our first move.”

Lessa scowled. “I want him–”

“In time,” Angoulême said, cutting her off and casting a meaningful glance in Roland’s direction. “Not even he can take them both on at the same time, and the boy has shown some reticence. We must be strategic.”

Several other trolls I recognized as aristocrats loyal to Angoulême came into the room, all dressed similarly to Lessa, the Dowager Duchesse Damia among them.