Shearen halted outside a padlocked iron door, withdrawing a key. I dared a look around the corner. He unlocked the door and pulled it open, and as the door slowly closed behind him, a humming blasted me with an echo so strong, it shuddered through my chest.

Magic.

Twenty-Eight

Kiva! Kiva!” I shook her vigorously with one hand, though her eyes flashed open at my touch. Moonlight illuminated her disgruntled face, and she swatted at me lazily.

“I’m awake!” she grumbled, sitting forward in her chair. “Why are you?” She blinked, then coming fully awake, sprang to her feet. “Are you okay?”

“Yes. Fine. Shearen was in the halls, and I followed him. The door he went through, it’s locked, but when he opened it, I felt magic!”

She stared at me like I’d lost my mind. I replayed my rambling in my head. Taking a deep breath, I relayed it all again, taking pains to explain carefully what I’d seen.

“Humming?” she asked. “Like you felt with the egg?”

I nodded, and she folded her arms.

“You think Razel has some type of magic stored in there?”

“I don’t know, but we need to find out. It doesn’t seem likely, but strange things have been happening.” She listened as I explained about Res using shadow crow magic to conceal himself and the possibility that he’d used earth crow powers too.

Kiva rubbed her face. “That’s not possible.”

“Neither is this.” I held up my injured hand, which wasn’t quite so injured as it should have been. “We have to see what’s inside that room. If Razel has magic, we may not be prepared to fight Illucia after all, alliance or not.”

Kiva sighed. “You want to break in, don’t you?”

I grinned, and she rolled her eyes.

“How do you plan on getting past the padlock? Did you become a picklock when I wasn’t looking?”

“No, but I do know a few common infirmary ingredients that make for a nice acidic solution.”

“Saints. You’ve spent too much time with Caylus.”

I smirked. “Lord Rynthene’s ship will be in Port Maranock in two days. That means we need to figure out a way to escape by then.”

“It won’t be easy.” Kiva rocked onto the back legs of her chair. “We’ll have to leave at night, and we’ll need horses. If we’re lucky, we won’t be discovered until morning. But if Razel learns we’ve left before we reach the port…”

I nodded, not wanting to imagine what would happen. We didn’t have a choice.

We searched the quarters for the ingredients we would need to mix the acid. The healer might miss them, but she wouldn’t come accusing the Rhodairen princess. Kiva tucked them away in her pockets, and I climbed back into bed.

* * *