Lena would have asked who Mythris was and why that temple was so elusive, but as she looked back toward the palace, she noticed a fleck of black rising from the roof. As it grew closer, the fleck transformed into a rider on a dark horse, a long silvery cloak billowing. Emris had noticed him too. The rider was galloping straight toward their carriage, and Emris’s mouth set itself in a firm, thin line. He pulled on the reins and the two horses drawing the carriage stopped, bizarrely, in the air. Floating. Somehow, it was weirder than flying. Now that they were still, Lena could hear the keening of the wind through the wheels.

“What’s going on?” she asked.

“Lord Chatham, come to ask me whether I found what he wanted me to find.” He shook his head at her questioning look. “This shouldn’t take long. Not to worry, Lena.” But the tightness in his face said otherwise.

The man drew up beside the carriage. “Good evening, huntsman,” he said, his voice friendly and businesslike on the surface, but somehow hard underneath. He had a pale, pointed, handsome face and oiled hair so ash-blond that it was nearly silver. He was oddly ageless, like a marble carving, but Lena guessed from the slight frown marks between his brows that he might be closer to forty than thirty. “Did you find Constance? Is she in the carriage?” Lena watched as his eyes lowered to her face, noticing how they flashed silver-blue in the light. “Who is this?” His gaze fixed on her mark. “Is she diseased?”

She quickly averted her eyes, wishing her cowl were raised, feeling a flash of hot anger deep inside her belly.

Emris’s voice was cold and impatient. “I did not find Constance. She rode to Duke’s Forest and disappeared into the storm cloud. I was unable to follow.”

Constance was the masked mage, then, Lena realized. The name was distantly familiar, but she couldn’t place it.

Lord Chatham’s lip curled.

Emris turned to Lena. “And this … this is a Rogue. I found her on the way back. I’m sure you understand that it’s imperative to take her to the temple as soon as possible.”

“Imperative, eh?” The man snorted, but his tone was curious. He looked at Lena so directly, she was shocked into meeting his eyes. Now that he knew she was a Rogue, his attitude had changed abruptly from disgust to interest. “Maybe for the likes of you, Emris. But there are those of us who don’t need your ridiculous superstitions in order to control ourselves.” Lena looked at Emris questioningly, but he shook his head slightly, as if to say, “Not now.”

Lena turned back to Lord Chatham. There was something about the way his horse stood there in space, something different from their horses, whose hot breath plumed into the air, hooves pawing the sky impatiently. Something … oddly still.