Page 57 of The Prince's Fealty

There was something about her tone of voice that set Ada on edge. She met Fernila’s gaze squarely.

“Why can’t it be Tor’s magic?” she asked flatly.

Fernila’s lips quivered. “I think you should talk to Var.”

Ada would like very much to talk to her brother right now, but he’d just manifested shields around them from somewhere else in the castle, and no one did that lightly. (Most people wouldn’t even know where to start. Ada had tried it a handful of times when she was younger and given up when it had proved more difficult than she imagined.)

“Fernila.” Ada spoke very calmly, but her tone left no room for argument. “What’s going on?”

Sucking in a noisy breath, Fernila finally blurted out, “Torex came back the day before the attack on the castle. And everything—everything!—went wrong.”

Ada had always thought that Tor and Fernila could get along fine if they’d just make the effort, but they never seemed willing to try.

She assumed at first that this would be the usual insults—but she listened in growing amazement and horror as Fernila explained about everything that had gone wrong in Tond, the borrowed magic, the letter from King Forex, and the accusation oftreason. What had Var been thinking?

Only then that thought was knocked right out of her brain as Fernila went on to explain through her tears about the attack.

“Mercenaries broke into the castle. They set a huge fire, so Var went to control it. We didn’t know that there were other mercenaries going after the baby.”

She clutched Cala to her instinctively, as though there were people here right now who were going to try to wrestle the baby away from her, and Cala let out a squawk of protest.

Fernila gulped and then visibly loosened her hold and managed to continue. “They attacked the nursery, and it was just Pama inside with the baby while the guards tried to fight them off. Only then Prince Torex came in through the window.”

Ada couldn’t help but laugh, because of course he had.

Fernila sniffed again. “He sent Pama and the baby back out the window after he shielded the baby so that she would be safe.”

Ada frowned. “But I thought he only had his base magic?”

The other woman nodded, an unsteady wobble of motion.

“And it was already going dark pink before he lowered them out of the room. He insisted on staying behind and guarding the cradle so that the mercenaries wouldn’t realize that they were in the wrong place.”

A shiver ran through Ada.

“What happened?” she whispered.

“The ceiling collapsed,” Fernila admitted bleakly. “Pama said the shield went blood red and then it disappeared.”

Ada sucked in a gasping breath, reeling. She’d known whatever had happened wouldn’t be good, but she hadn’t expected, couldn’t imagine—

How could Tor bedead?

Fernila licked her lips. Ada couldn’t seem to find any words at all.

“Before Pama arrived, Yomil was telling us how he’d seen the Prince in the hallway with the mercenaries, going after the baby.”

Ada blinked, needing a minute to process this, and then outrage scorched through her veins. “Yomil was setting Tor up?”

Fernila nodded. “Var didn’t know what to do. So we came here, just the three of us, where we knew we’d be safe, and where we didn’t have to question if we could trust anyone.”

Only someone had tried to kill Ada, and Var was shielding them from afar. Someone had killed Tor… and tried to kill Cala… and tried to kill Ada… and Var had put a shield up around the remaining members of his family.

“Goddess have mercy,” Ada breathed.

She stared in horror at the other woman, not sure how to voice the conclusion that she’d just drawn.

“What is it?” Fernila demanded. “Why are you looking at me like that?”